If you've spent the last few Octobers circling the first Sunday of the month for the Scrumpy Skedaddle, you're going to want to check your calendar again. Almar Orchards still describes the run on its own website as happening on the first Sunday of October, which is the pattern regulars have come to expect. This year it's landing on September 27, a full week earlier than that usual slot.
That single date shift changes the shape of the next two weekends in Flushing. Instead of the orchard crowd and the downtown Harvest Festival crowd competing for the same Saturday, as the calendar sometimes sets them up to do, this year they fall back to back. One weekend belongs to Duffield Road. The next belongs to Main Street. Here's how the pieces actually line up, and what each one asks of you if you want in.
The Race That Anchors the Orchard Weekend
The Scrumpy Skedaddle starts and finishes at Almar Orchards, 1431 Duffield Rd, with three ways to run it: a 10-mile course at 9:15 a.m., a Kids' 1K at 9:40, and the 5K/10K field starting together at 10:00. The course is a mix of orchard paths and dirt roads through a working farm, which means fallen apples and tractor ruts are part of the terrain, not a flaw in it.
Parking is in the fields near the orchard, and organizers are upfront that it's roughly a quarter-mile walk from your car to the start line, so budget extra time if you're running the early wave. Packet pickup happens two ways this year: Thursday, September 24, from 2 to 6 p.m. at Complete Runner Flint on S. Linden Road, or race morning starting at 8:30 a.m. and running until 15 minutes before your start.
The finish is where the event earns its name. Every distance ends with a pour of Almar's award-winning hard or soft cider, a finisher medal that doubles as a bottle opener, and an all-you-can-eat pancake breakfast with live music at the orchard. Extra pancake tickets are available for anyone who didn't register but wants in on breakfast.
The Same Saturday, Two Other Things Are Already Happening
The race is Sunday morning, but the day before it is already busy in its own right. The Flushing Farmers Market runs Saturdays from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Riverview Park on S. Cherry Street, with the season scheduled to run through October 31. The market itself is a comeback story worth knowing: Flushing Parks and Recreation revived it after a hiatus, bringing back a mix of local produce, baked goods, and handmade items on the same concrete pad next to the Riverview Park lot. If you're downtown early on the 26th, that's your window for produce and a walk through the stalls before the day gets warm.
That same Saturday evening, Flushing Valley Golf Club at 1124 E Main St has an event on its calendar starting at 6 p.m. Between the two, you've got a full Saturday in town before Sunday even starts.
Here's how the three pieces actually stack against each other:
| Day | Time | Event | Location |
|---|---|---|---|
| Thu, Sept 24 | 2:00-6:00 p.m. | Scrumpy Skedaddle packet pickup | Complete Runner Flint, 3170 S. Linden Rd |
| Thu, Sept 24 | 7:00 p.m. | Evening program | Flushing Area Historical Society & Museum |
| Sat, Sept 26 | 9:00 a.m.-2:00 p.m. | Flushing Farmers Market | Riverview Park, S. Cherry St |
| Sat, Sept 26 | 6:00 p.m. | Evening event | Flushing Valley Golf Club, 1124 E Main St |
| Sun, Sept 27 | 9:15-10:00 a.m. starts | Scrumpy Skedaddle | Almar Orchards, 1431 Duffield Rd |
If you want to string all of it together, the sequence that works is market Saturday morning downtown, golf club Saturday evening, orchard Sunday morning. The only real conflict would be trying to do the historical society program and packet pickup on the same Thursday afternoon and evening, and even that only overlaps if you're cutting it close on timing.
The Race Is the Loud Part, Not the Whole Point
It's easy to treat Scrumpy Skedaddle weekend as the only reason to drive out to Almar Orchards, but the orchard's own description of its calendar makes clear the race is one loud morning inside a much longer stretch. From late August into early November, Almar runs what they call "the Season": hayrides, fresh donuts, and daily free tastings across at least ten taps of cider, alongside the apples and honey the farm is known for.
That means the weeks before and after September 27 are just as open as race day itself, minus the crowd and the parking walk. If your only trip to Almar all year is the one tied to a bib number, you're seeing the orchard at its most crowded, not necessarily its best.
Main Street's Turn Comes a Week Later
Once the orchard weekend passes, the calendar's center of gravity shifts back downtown. Flushing's Harvest Festival is set for October 3, which puts it a clean week after the Skedaddle rather than stacked on top of it. That gap gives you two distinct weekends instead of one crowded one, each with its own character: rural and farm-based one Sunday, walkable and downtown the next Saturday.
Downtown Main Street is worth the trip on its own terms in that window. Madison's on Main, at 126 E Main St, is open Tuesday through Sunday from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. and has built a menu around scratch-made comfort food and a banquet space for anyone planning something bigger than a weeknight dinner. A few doors down the strip, Teta's Grill serves Lebanese dishes built to accommodate major food allergies, with a menu the restaurant describes as 99 percent soy-free and 98 percent gluten-free, which is a real draw if you've got a mixed group with different dietary needs. Johnny's Pour House and Trackside Cafe, the latter at 424 Emily St with early-morning hours that run into early afternoon, round out the corridor if you're stringing together a full day downtown rather than a single meal.
If you want a quieter start to the whole stretch, the Flushing Area Historical Society & Museum has an evening program on Thursday, September 24, the same day as packet pickup. It's a low-key way to open the six weeks before the bigger weekends take over.
Two Weekends, Not One Crowded Saturday
The short version: if you've always thought of Flushing's fall calendar as one big blur of apples and festival booths, this year it's cleanly split. September 26 and 27 belong to the orchard side of town, with the farmers market and a golf club evening filling out Saturday before Sunday's run at Almar. October 3 belongs to Main Street and the Harvest Festival. Because the race moved a week earlier than its usual first-Sunday-of-October slot, the two don't fight each other for the same weekend the way they might in a year when the dates land differently.
Whether you're circling one weekend or both, knowing the actual dates ahead of time means you're not the person showing up at Almar on October 4 wondering where everyone went.
Flushing's calendar this time of year says something about the town itself: a farming edge that still runs on its own rhythm, and a Main Street that fills in right behind it. If you're weighing what it would take to be a five-minute walk from that Main Street corridor instead of a drive from it, Mid MI HomeSellers can talk through what's currently available in and around downtown Flushing and how the two ends of town compare day to day.
