Trade Secrets (and Tartans) This Year at Lime Rock Park

Although it has new owners now, the race track at Lime Rock Park in Salisbury, Conn., will continue and even expand its tradition of offering use of the track facilities for nonprofit fundraisers and other interesting activities.

Trade Secrets

This year for the first time, the Trade Secrets Rare Plant and Garden Antiques Sale will be held at the track, on Saturday, May 14.

Trade Secrets is the wildly popular annual fundraising event for Women’s Support Services. Based in Lakeville, Conn., the agency supports victims of domestic violence throughout the region.

Founded by famed interior designer Bunny Williams of New York City and Falls Village, Conn., Trade Secrets comprises the plant and design sale on Saturday and tours of six significant gardens on Sunday.

This year, for the first time, the Saturday sale (and book signing by local authors including another famed interior designer, Matthew Patrick Smyth, of New York and Salisbury, Conn.) will be held at the track.

Historically, it has always been a bit of a challenge to park and the vendors have always been a little bit squeezed together. In a COVID world, the track offers the event (which attracts patrons from literally all across America) a way to spread out a little.

For details and ticket information (and to volunteer to help out during the two-day event) go to  www.tradesecretsct.com or call 860-364-1080. Volunteers work for a scant few hours and get free admission to the sale and the garden tours.

The Great Country
Mutt Show

Trade Secrets is truly glamorous. The Great Country Mutt Show to benefit the Little Guild animal shelter in Cornwall, Conn., is the variation on glamour known as “camp.”

This year’s Big Day for Dogs will also be held at Lime Rock Park, on Sunday, June 5, from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.

Beloved pooches (and many of the contestants will be former residents of the Little Guild) compete in categories such as Cutest Carry-On, Sweetest Pair of Dogs, Best Ears, Waggiest Tail, Best Paw Shake, Best Trick, Most Unidentifiable Mix, Dog That Looks Most Like It’s Owner, Best Senior and Best Lap Dog Over 40 Pounds.

Adding to the kitschy fun this year will be a fashion show judged by Michael Musto, whose name will be familiar to anyone who lived and loved the nightlife in New York City in the 1980s. His co-judge will be Mickey Boardman, a writer and now fashion designer who is known by the sobriquet “Mr. Mickey.”

To register and for more information, go to www.littleguild.org.

The Highland Games

A third event, and my particular favorite, is an event that is less glamorous and more earnest — and a boatload of fun. The Scottish Round Hill Games will return to Lime Rock Park on Sunday, June 26.

Competitions start at 8:30 a.m. in categories that are best described as “throwing very large rocks,” “throwing heavy weights attached to heavy chains” and “throwing large pieces of wood that look like telephone poles.”

Not all the competitors are Scottish; these events are unexpectedly diverse. But everyone wears a kilt.

Silly events include a kilted run around the race track; the clog race; the Rolling Pin Toss for Ladies; and the Haggis Toss. If you don’t know what haggis is (yet), then you should definitely go to the games, which have been held for 99 years and have been at Lime Rock for about a decade. There are many vendor booths, including food trucks that sell haggis and other, edible food.

Musicians play throughout the day and there are demonstrations of Highland dancing.

Most moving are the eerie and beautiful pipe band competitions that are held throughout the day, with the final contest at 3:30 p.m.

Learn more at www.rhhg.org and on Facebook at Round Hill Highland Games.

And of course the auto race season officially begins at Lime Rock Park on Memorial Day weekend. Learn more at www.limerock.com.

This year, Lime Rock Park will host several signature nonprofit events of the Northwest Corner, including Trade Secrets and the Scottish Round Hill Games, photo, above, with caper tosses, haggis and more. Photo by Cynthia Hochswender