In the shadow of Mount Monadnock, where Emerson and Thoreau each found deeper meaning in a walk in the woods, crowds assemble every August to find transcendence in a more spectacular manner: pyrotechnics. The half-hour extravaganza by the Jaffrey Festival of Fireworks draws as many as 30,000 viewers. In addition to an aerial display that can make the Fourth of July on the Esplanade look like bottle rockets, there are “ground effect” fireworks – detonated on the ground, not in the air – that will leave many awestruck. Aug. 16 at 9 p.m. (best to arrive by 8:30) at Jaffrey airpark, Jaffrey, N.H.; $8 per walk-in; $40 per carload. 603-532-4549

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