This was a super fun event! I believe this is the first year for the event (2022) and it was so…read moregreat to see the small community of Buellton offer more activities. Attending this right at the beginning of December really helped get me into the holiday spirit! Lots of people were there. The park had activities, including pictures with Santa, roasting marshmallows, hot chocolate for purchase, a beer garden, and food trucks! Lots of kids running around and families creating memories. It seemed a bit pricey for $25/ticket for 13y/o and up, but they did a great job with the lights and it made for several photo opportunities!

It was a cozy event, wasn't too bad to walk in heels! Great for a date night or a fun little trip…read morewith the family. There were opportunities for photo ops throughout, a couple food trucks, cotton candy booth, hot chocolate station and fires to sit down/warm up near. The field of lit up flowers and the lights that made it look like a river flowing was my favorite part of the walk!

I may have romanticized this festival in my head. I imagined buying a strawberry balloon from a…read morestrawberry mascot... grabbing a strawberry infused lunch from a trendy and innovative food truck... eating a homemade (organic and fresh) strawberry shortcake dessert... Ok, I definitely romanticized it. We walked down a street with standard fair-food options (corn dogs, funnel cake, towering fried foods) before deciding to skip out on lunch. I caved and got the kids a snow cone. I didn't want to pump them full of Red 40, but I was committed to the theme and ordered strawberry syrup. They loved it. I passed several shortcake options but the cake portion was the yellow store-bought circle kind and the strawberries were more of a goop. I found a homemade strawberry shortcake from an adorable little downtown store and it was okay. Not bad, not impressive. It was $7 and I ate about $4.25 of it. The area set aside for families and younger kids was a hit with my 2 and 4 year olds. The green tractor racers was a huge hit and the turns were impressively long. It's a busy festival with lots of people but they have set up many side areas/venues so the crowds are dispersed (to take full advantage of his festival download a map and plan out the music or acts you want to see) Beside my disappointment in the level of strawberriness, it was a solid family outing and the weather was perfect. If you don't have other epic plans, I can't think of a good reason NOT to go.

Signed up for the Strawberry Stampede 10k to kick off our first time visiting the Annual Strawberry…read morefestival. Other than the race, I can't believe how big of a dissapointment it was. The festival was more of a small-scale alternative to the mid-state fair including the same fair vendors, fair food, cheap craft booths with clothing and jewelry from national brands and a few from Fresno. The festival closed down about 4 blocks of streets for vendors, entertainment, and a couple for rides and bounce houses/games. There were a few booths from the same company that offered strawberry lemonade, strawberries with whip cream, and strawberries with angelfood cake. There was another booth that had cheesecake on a stick with strawberries. It seriously the strawberries to non-local gimmicky booths was about 25:1. At least there were a few local vendors offering BBQ sandwiches, but event burrito and Greek vendors were from out of town. Here's how you can make it better: get local restaurants to commit to participating and making an amazing strawberry dish! Ex: strawberry glazed meats, strawberry vinegarette, strawberry pie, strawberry sangria, sooo many options! If you could have closer to a 5:1 ratio of random vendors tobstrawberry vendors and get more local input this event could be amazing. Alternative option: don't call it the strawberry festival.. call it the AG Annual Fair Looked like a lot of the kids had a decent time, but talking with other adults in the area who voiced a similar dissapoitment from years past with no plan to return.

For what little there is to see and do, I'd really give this a 3, but the event could do with a bit…read moremore love. Also, it's arguably more for kids what with the bounce house and face-painting, but that didn't stop the fact that most of the costumed patrons were adults having a grand ol' time in sparkly wings and Renaissance faire garb. Why I feel it deserves a higher rating, though, is for their resident storyteller, True Thomas. I got to hear a good yarn about a drunk merman who kept the souls of dead sailors in his cabinet, while snacking on treats from Olsen's Bakery down the street. I was quite content. There were a few people who added a bit more to the experience. A man with a large, plush mallet ran about the festival chasing pixies to bonk them on the head, for instance. Truly, the fact that they held this event in Solvang was still a valid excuse for us to have made the drive. We had other places to run off to for Danish food since we weren't quite feeling up for tamales and pizza (the only food options at the faerie festival). It was also quite hot out (102 degrees when we checked), so heading further into town for butter cookies and aebleskivers was a good excuse to get into some A/C for a bit. The pictures on our camera are interspersed with fantasy costumes, windmills, jugglers, plates of meatballs and sausage with red cabbage, Brandon D. getting a dragon painted on his arm, and display cases of pastries. It was a typical visit to Solvang for us, with a bit more whimsy thrown in.

This was a cool little surprise festival that my boy friend and I came across rolling into Solvang…read more There was live shows and entertainment, people were dressed up fairy style, there was food, unique gift booths, and music. I thought it was great for us as a couple to see and i know I saw a lot of families enjoying its as well. Great make believe idea love it.

This year is the seventh annual Scarecrow Fest in Santa Ynez Valley. How did I just hear about this…read moreevent?? This was so much fun!! I had a few hours to kill so I wandered into Solvang to window shop. Quickly I noticed the adorable decorations and window displays. What could this be about? At one of the displays I found the information on the ballot sheet. There are over 100 businesses participating in Solvang and surrounding areas in the Santa Ynez Valley. On the ballot sheet is a map to all the participating businesses and organizations so you can be sure to not miss any. Voters can walk around (or drive for further out scarecrow locations) and enjoy all the different scarecrow and holiday displays. Voting categories include Most Danish (cuz it's Solvang after all), Best Photo Opportunity (you are encouraged to take pics with displays when possible and upload to FB or tweet them), Best Use of Business Theme, Most Humorous, Spookiest and Best Use of Recycled Materials. There was an incredible variety of displays showing different strengths, themes and artistic interpretations of Scarecrows. I felt like this was kind of a scavenger hunt as I ran through the streets trying to find all the different scarecrows. Unfortunately I didn't see too many others walking around participating, but I did notice that almost all the tourists (and some locals) were really enjoying the displays. Some of the window displays were difficult to take pictures of because of glare issues. I was in the city early in the day and not all businesses had their scarecrows out at that time, so I noticed a few extra as I was on my way out of the city. Scarecrow Fest this year goes from October 7 - November 7. Ballots need to include a name, email address and zip code for the votes to count. There are ballot boxes throughout the city to drop your completed ballots before the last day. The grand winner will be announced at the Haunted House and Street Fest on October 29th. Category winners will be announced on their website www.syvscarecrows.com at the end of the voting period. This was a ton of fun and a creative way to get visitors to explore the culture and climate of Santa Ynez Valley. I would definitely recommend checking it out, especially if you are an autumn junkie like me. This is something I will look forward to for many years to come.

Spectacular! Small enough to be WELL WORTH IT, and large enough to make it worthwhile. I never…read morewould have known about it, had it not been for Living Social. I had a free weekend, I drove up, stayed near Camarillo Outlets, then drove into Ventura for the balloon festival. There's only need to attend ONE day of the three. It's a GREAT hometown festival, whose main attraction are the balloons. Parking is good, wish I had time for the town tour, arrived early to take in the fest, and stayed late to experience all the balloons. I had the opportunity to watch them roll out the balloon, line up the strings, participate in the group effort to stand 'er up while the balloonist blew hot air within. The lighting of the balloons at night is spectacular, but probably would have been even more so if every balloon was alit during the fest. See pics.

Buying tickets online was easier this year because you could print out your entrance ticket…read moreimmediately. They also had streamlined the entrance process at the gate. Only bummer - they had the same bad t-shirt art again this year. How about taking a lesson from the Avocado Festival and having local artists compete for the t-shirt art and then maybe people would buy them? We started at the Wine Tasting Pavilion. 5 wineries this year. $2 per taste. I liked 75% of the wines this year. And towards the end of tasting time, the pours definitely were more generous. Although I did think it strange that a summer event would have all red wines, except for one white - a Chenin Blanc that was delicious. The boys headed for the beer tasting pavilion but ended up just buying full glasses of beer. I did try a Summer Shandy beer that was excellent. Dinner was from the Spencer MacKenzie fish truck again this year. I tried a less flammable sauce this year and enjoyed my fish taco more. I also enjoyed an order of their seasoned fries - thin, not overly greasy and lightly sprinkled with seasoning. The vendors were varied for craft items. I didn't purchase any impulse items, but the girl with us did purchase a few candles. The band for Friday evening played mellow County music and it fit with the casual evening. (I heard there was an unbefitting Rock band on Saturday.) The balloons are always center stage here and we weren't disappointed this year. They started inflating them just before sunset. They had more present than the previous year we had attended. We loved the alien-looking balloon called Outlander. And the Humpty Dumpty balloon was a hit. The Limoneira lemon-shaped balloon was fantastic. There were many with colorful patterns. Another evening of awe, wine, good food and friendship! I hope we can attend again next year

Having gone to a fair number of beer festivals I like to think I have a pretty good reference for…read morehow they 'can' be. That being said, this was my first time at the CFoB. I decided to buy both the Friday Connoisseur Tasting and Saturday Grand Tasting. I'll break this down by each day... Friday Connoisseur Tasting: Here is how it is billed on the website.. The "Arts and Drafts" Connoisseur Tasting will feature specially selected Craft beer and local food offerings for guests enjoyment. The intimate tasting format allows the beer "connoisseur" an unique opportunity to converse one-on-one with the brewery reps on hand. This evening will also feature the work of visual artists and musicians local to the California Central Coast. The idea was for this to be a more intimate exclusive event with local artists present, meet and chat with the brewery reps, and taste some special selections. Art... Okay, first off, I am not an art guy so that didn't do anything for me. Art and beer...can they go together? Sure, do they normally? No. But whatever, they were not in the way and some people seemed to like them and bought some stuff. Food... There was Buffalo Wild Wings, Kind bars, a bbq catering company, some meatballs, and some more meatballs. It was all okay, but seemed a bit sad and underwhelming. Everyone was really nice, but really...I came for good food and beer. I didn't get that. The breweries... I visited each, maybe eight, and no more than 10 breweries were there. I me maybe two brewers who knew a lot about the beer, most were just people who poured beer and didn't know anything about it. There were no special beers to taste, each beer served was wholly available in the store, either in a can or bottle. No one offs, no special blends, nothing unique at all. A total sham in my opinion. If someone was there for me to complain to, I would have. A waste of $50. Saturday Grand Tasting: Great location and the setup was spacious enough to allow for plenty of walking without long lines and huge immovable crowds. Almost 50 breweries (counting cideries)! Wow cool! That's what I thought when I showed up. But then I approached the Firestone tent...they were pouring Easy Jack and DBA. Wait..what? I went to Central Coast Brewing and they poured, Montery St., Catch 23, Chai Ale... I went to Barrelhouse, they poured Sunny Daze, IPA, etc. I went to Oscar Blues they were pouring IPA and Mexican Lager... What the heck? Is this just a bunch of breweries serving their normal everyday beers? Not only did each brewery serve their normal everyday bottled beer, but less than 10 had anything special (that 20% new beer). Very very disappointing. No free food, but plenty of food trucks/vendors. The Pairing Knife, What the Truck, and a few others. Good prices, and they all took credit cards which is great. Plenty of shaded seating, as it was hot and sunny all day. Perfect weather, but I can't say the same of the event. The staff were all friendly and the organization was nice. It's just too bad about all of the normal beer. I suppose this is what you get when the event serves to benefit Hospice of SLO and breweries are only donating beer. So...my fault for not picking up on that. Stick with for profit beer festivals for the good stuff. Againg, for $75 I would say I got my money's worth in terms of quantity, but I care more for quality. And no Spike's?! How do you know invite the guys who started the entire festival??? For shame.

Two day drinking festival going towards a good cause -- perfect event for a small college town!…read moreBeer Fest took place at the Madonna Inn with 50+ breweries. First Day -- Connoisseur Pairing is the smaller night event held indoors at the Madonna Expo that features music and art. It's mainly an event catered to people who want to pair different brews with food and cigars. Second Day -- Grand Tasting is the HUGE event that takes place outdoors in the Meadows from 11am - 4pm. There are about 3,000+ people, most of which are local college students. All the breweries come out and the guests can sample alllll the beer they want!! There are usually a few food vendors as well (Spikes, Marston's, Pacifica Catering, Popolo..) They also had a couple of random activities like life size beer pong with big trash bins and a soccer ball. Beer Fest tickets are pretty pricey and run up to around $80 for GA but all the proceeds go to the SLO Hospice Center, an organization that provides support for anyone experiencing life threatening illnesses or grief of a lost one. Definitely one of the biggest events of the year in SLO and always a great time!

Concerts in the Park happens every July and is sponsored by Santa Barbara Parks and Recreation…read more Hundreds of people bring their blankets and a picnic to enjoy this free music concert series. The setting couldn't be more perfect, as it's located right on Cabrillo Boulevard along the beautiful Santa Barbara waterfront. The concerts go from 6:00-7:30 p.m. on Thursday nights in Chase Palm Park. Dogs are welcome on leash. Alcoholic beverages are not permitted in the park, but you will see many people drinking wine. There is a policeman walking around, but he turns a blind eye as long as no one is causing trouble. It's a relaxing way to enjoy our beautiful city, chill with friends, and listen to good live music.

Every summer I venture out to something we locals dub "concerts in the park"…read more aKa free fun with lots of people you love and hate to see in one place with great music and odd picnic etiquette Each week is a different band, all of which kick butt! Ranging from Stevie Nicks cover bands, to funk, to Cuban soul, you just never know what the week will bring. Besides the people you are with the two beat parts are the people watching (you will know what I mean when you go) AND the evening sunsets with the beach breeze. Can't get better than a free concert on a summer night in the American Riviera.