This Weekend In CT: Hot Cemeteries, Cool Chalk & More Fall Festivals

CONNECTICUT — If you're looking for an unusual activity to enjoy with your family this weekend, there may be a tombstone in your immediate future.

Cemeteries are hot, in Connecticut. In the run-up to Halloween, it seems that every third burg in the state is throwing open their Gothic gates for some kind of a graveyard social.

The Ancient Burial Ground in Hartford will be the site of two separately themed tours this weekend. On Saturday, at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m., "Witchcraft Panic in Colonial Connecticut" entertains with the stories, gossip, and intrigue of the people connected to the 17th century witchcraft brouhaha in Hartford. Come back on Sunday at 12:15 p.m. or 3:15 p.m. for a deeper dive into the demonic with "Justice Meets Myth & Magic" tour.

The Ancient Burial Ground is Hartford's oldest historic site, and is located downtown at the corner of Main Street and Gold Street behind the First Church of Christ.

Touted as "an up close and creepy examination of all things funereal," "The Witches & Tombstones Tour" returns to the Webb Deane Stevens Museum in Wethersfield on Saturday, and runs all week. Tours step off throughout the day (check times).

The Stanley-Whitman House in Farmington will be offering more graveside entertainment during "Ghost Walk Tours" in the local Memento Mori cemetery, at 3:00, 4:00 and 5:00 p.m. Saturday.

West Hartford is also going big and dead at its Old North Cemetery on Oct. 19, 20, 21, 26, 27 and 28. The Noah Webster House & West Hartford Historical Society’s annual spooky, theatrical cemetery tour serves up a ghostly guide telling "tales of death, disease, and real history" on a lantern-lit jaunt through the boneyard. Tours leave every 15 minutes starting at 6 p.m and run for 45 minutes.

But if you'd prefer your weekend frivolity to be less about the ghouls and more about the grub, the 2nd Annual Mystic Apple Festival will be celebrating "everything fall"on Saturday and Sunday from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. The fest will be sprawled throughout Olde Mistick Village, and feature vendors with arts and crafts, specialty hand-knit products, and seasonal flavors— think maple, pumpkin, apple and caramel.

The Great Pumpkin will be stopping by Putnam a few weeks early for the festival named in his honor on Saturday. Downtown Putnam will be painted orange from 10:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. on Saturday. Shops and restaurants will be serving up fall themes, and there will be a craft and artist vendor fair, live music, and activities for the children.

Castle Hill Farm in Newtown will be rolling out its annual Fall Festival the whole weekend long. A corn maze, hay rides, live music and food trucks will be among the highlights, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Saturday and Sunday.

Get out of the cornfield and back onto the streets at the New Haven Chalk Art Festival on Saturday. Underfoot will be elaborate chalk art designs by more than 75 talented artists at two locations outside The Shops at Yale. A "Family Fun Zone" will provide free chalk and drawing lessons, musicians will provide live entertainment, and a roaming magician provides the prestidigitation. It's all free and open to the public, from noon to 4 p.m.

This is also your last weekend to catch the unique and genuinely witty "Complete Works of Jane Austen (Abridged)" in West Hartford at the Playhouse on Park. Three performers, all of Austen, in 80 minutes. You don't have to be a Janeite to appreciate it, but, man, it helps…