Tons of food trucks. Unfortunately, of the three we tried, all supplied us with mediocre food. Bend…read moreis food truck crazy but I'm forming the opinion that very few trucks actually deliver good product. I was pleased to see Island Noodles, however. I'm a fan from my Atlanta days. Not many non-food vendors on Friday. It seemed a few more opened their tents on Saturday. Music stage at the end of Minnesota but with very few places to sit and enjoy the tunes. I was a bit disappointed there. In general, the festival has too few seats and definitely too few high-top tables (people gotta eat their food truck food somewhere). Serious lack of garbage bins on Friday. For starters, every food truck should have one in front and the festival should provide bins at each corner. By that, I mean the intersection of Minnesota and Bond should have four bins. On Saturday, I saw quite a few more bins. Dogs everywhere, despite being against city ordinance. We wanted to bring our dog but were deterred by the law. So which is it? Dogs allowed or not? Only one beer vendor (Deschutes), which just doesn't seem right for Bend. Fortunately, Deschutes Brewing makes killer beer. All in all, an OK food festival. We didn't partake in the various competition events so maybe it wasn't aimed at us. The festival shared Saturday with the Bend Beers Bands & Public Lands event in Drake park. I thought that festival, though smaller with only two food trucks, was a better experience.

Such a fun way to experience Bend and its local restaurants…read more This week was Bend's 11th Annual Food Festival and it was a nice mix of local food, drink and entertainment. Food booths stretched for several blocks down Bond Street with Minnesota Avenue housing Locavore Alley and the Top Chef Stage on one side of Bond and the NW Spirits and Mixology Show on the other side. Oregon Street housed the Main Stage with various local music acts and Food Cart Row. We caught the semi-finals of the Top Chef competition with the chefs at Black Butte Ranch triumphing over Broken Top Bottle Shop & Ale Cafe. Many food booths offered small bites for around $2 and full plates for more. A couple of Bend's nicer restaurants were represented (Zydeco), but there was plenty of street fare (foot long corn dogs and chocolate dipped bananas). I've been less than impressed by the Bite of Portland. This was just a well organized event with a week's worth of special events around town leading up to the main weekend event. A beer run was also held, so a great blend of health and abundance in Central Oregon.

Everything!! The music and variety of musical groups is impressive! The event is organized so…read morewell!! The staff and volunteers are amazing!

So many great acts. So many venues ranging from two large venues, several small venues, and a dance…read morefloor. So little time. The festival seems to be over right after you arrive.

Very large Ranch, room for many to run play and get family fall photos. Also great place to pick…read moreup a pumpkin of any size and color....and look at the amazing views of Smith rock. Family and dog friendly.

Came down the mountain excited for a Blue Eyes burger and fries. Drove up to a dark alley and a…read moresign saying "sold out"! How does a burger joint run out of burgers and close before 7pm?!?!

Once a year juried art show held in Bend in the grassy park adjacent to the Deschutes River at the…read moreOld Mill District. If you're in Bend with time on your hands this weekend, even if it Is a grayish cool weekend, walking through the art show to see all of the artists' work and be able to "judge for yourself" is great fun. In particular since you will have a chance to talk with the artists to learn how they create their beautiful work...from woven art, to etchings, to jewelry to ceramic art, to glass art to watercolor's, to oils, to metal work to the most amazing display of glass and metal "whirlygigs". See photos added for context. Our fav this year was a Eugene based ceramic artist's work...but we neglected to take a photo of her booth to display it here. (You can likely find more at her website: Betsy Wolfston - Woof Works Studio - www.betsywolfston.com.) Art is for sale too. We didn't make any purchases this year though...but last year we ended up with a couple of treasures to add to our home collection. Runs through 4pm Sunday (Sunday hours 10 - 4) and is open until 6p Saturday. When you're done enjoying the art wonders, walk across the footbridge to the plaza at the shops at the Old Mill where there is music from local high school bands, among others, food vendor stands and merriment. Not to mention the spectacular setting on the Deschutes River. If you missed it this year, check our the non profit's web site (at the top of the Yelp page) for next year's dates. NOTES: The event parking at the lot adjacent to the site fails both state codes and ADA minimums for accessible parking. Several folks we met at the event yesterday, using canes and on crutches, weren't feeling good about that...so if you need accessible parking, you'll want to know in advance that this site does not meet the minimum requirements of twenty year old access standards. .

I don't have much to add beyond what Michele R wrote nine years ago. Her review of Art in the High…read moreDesert is comprehensive and informative (as are pretty much all her reviews). So I'm just adding a star rating. I'll give it a 4 due to the greater array of art and craft vendors beyond what you might see at one of the many local street festivals.

Little Woody is a different sort of beer festival, as compared to the much larger and popular Bend…read moreBrewfest, for instance. Featuring mostly local breweries, this festival is about beers you might not see in the brewpubs. As the name suggests, a lot of barrel-aged beers. Which means a lot of beers with high ABV (alcohol content). So, one has to be careful or one might find themselves falling down in the gutter before too long. Located on the grounds of the Deschutes Historical Museum, the festival is compact without being tight. Just about perfect in terms of size, I'd say. You can survey the options fairly quickly and then easily find a spot to enjoy your choice. Note that the vendors are almost exclusively beer & cider & whiskey - there's not a lot of 'other' booths selling various craft goods and whatnot. Also as the name implies, there's whiskey happening here, too. Those vendors - all local, I believe - were sequestered in their own larger tent. Several food trucks on site but, as I've mentioned elsewhere in my Bend festival and food truck lot reviews, I find them somewhat disappointing. Bend loves food trucks, so I would hope to see that improve in time. The good and the bad: - Easy access and check-in. Price for admission, which gains you an initial supply of beer/whiskey tokens, is quite reasonable and you can buy more tokens without hassle. - Virtually no waiting for beer. I attended Friday and Saturday and even though there were quite a few people in attendance, I don't think I waited more than once to have my glass filled. - Whiskey tent: pricey. I literally could not 'afford' a sample of many (most?) of the whiskies with the full number of tokens I received on admission. You can buy shots for less at any number of local bars. If participation in the event is meant to showcase their products, that's a big fail. - Lots of great local, unusual beers. Most were quite strong. Like the whiskey folks, some of the beer vendors were out of line with prices, though. I feel every beer/cider should have been priced at $2 (two tokens). You don't get but a taste, so the idea is for people to try stuff they might not otherwise drink. Even at $2, given the small glass, you're paying more than you would at the brewpubs themselves. - Worthy ran out of the apparently popular Betty White early on Saturday. Rather than take the sign down for that beer they chose to announce - rather brusquely - that they were out of it as you approached the booth. Other booths simply took the sign down if they ran out of a beer. - Schatz Pretzel: Love their tip jar, not so much the pretzel, which was very stale on Friday, almost inedible. At $8, that constitutes robbery. - I didn't patronize any other food trucks, although a couple were familiar. Tots, for example, is quite good. I'll be back next year.

Wow!!!!!!! Dark heavy barrel aged beers.... YUMMMMY!!!!!! There's also a tots truck and a pretzel…read moretruck with warm pretzels!!!!! With just a touch of cool fall air, the dark beers hit the spot!!!! Games.... growler fills..... specialty small batch beer. What more could you ask for????? This is the 10th anniversary of this festival. If your around Bend, come on down!

Great music, rad weekend! Nice variety of food trucks, beer taps and bands! Really loved the laid…read moreback atmosphere. Stoked to see what next year has in store.

I waited 1 hour past since when I was supposed to open. Terrible service. I waited 1 hour past…read moresince when I was supposed to open. Terrible service.

The Fermentation Celebration is always a fun event. Local breweries kicking off the summer with…read moregreat brews and a fun event!

Had a great time here! Stopped in Bend for a little as a break from the PCT and had such a…read morewonderful day tasting home brews and larger breweries.

Excellent job taking on this event and hosting the world at the total solar eclipse in Madras. All…read morestaff and volunteers as well as public safety members were awesome and great representatives of this town. Thanks for making our visit memorable.

Hard to give a single rating for this. Totality and the minutes leading up to it, extraordinary…read morelife experience. BUT, we were crammed into a 15x15 patch of grass for a campsite, which also included your vehicle. Flat rate of $150 for 5 nights. My Cherokee and tent almost filled the entire spot, only a few feet from neighbors. Everyone I saw and met were wonderful people, all here from long distances to have a life changing experience. But there were no markings on the "streets", hard to see at night which one is yours. Only 6 outhouses nearby, with long lines, scant toilet paper, and nearly filled on Monday. Heaps of garbage bags, essentially no garbage containers. Non-potable water was $1 PER GALLON, complete ripoff. No place to dump your grey water. No shade. Shower trailers such a long walk that I did not bathe for the 2 nights I stayed. Significantly, I never used my shuttle pass, both times on Sunday the buses either never appeared, or we were told "shuttles are cancelled, go back to camp." Could never use my Festival ticket. T shirt I ordered online weeks ago never arrived. Though they did charge my credit card. Food stands in the grass area were pretty good, hot air balloon rides (tethered) looked fun. Had heard the Festival itself was small and overrated. They charged $50 EACH for passes to the "kid's" area, which was also apparently not worth it. Madras ppl were very nice, but the venue was not well run. Well worth doing, but I felt taken advantage of, charged a lot for rather little. Some of the above are observations, not entirely complaints. Not sure how anyone could manage an event of such uncertain parameters.

This bluegrass festival occurs over a three-day weekend in mid-August - it's been going for four…read moreyears now . Admission to the festival is $10 (for the day or for the weekend) and camping is $10 total for Friday and Saturday nights. It's my favourite BG festival - good groups (Lee Highway has headlined there each time I've been there. This year (2010) they also featured Misty Mamas, Quincy Street, Bluestone County, LeRoy Newport, Bitterbrush, and a number of other groups. The event is well-run - they keep on schedule and when the bands on the main stage are setting up and breaking down, local groups play short sets on the side stage. Some of these localmusicians are very good too; overall there's very little music I wouldn't want to listen to - not true of many festivals... There's food vendors here - four or five of them, good food, but if one doesn't want to eat here, it's not far to drive into Bend which has a plethora of restaurants. Camping is in a field and there's plenty of room for RV's (no hookups); for tent campers there's an nice area among the junipers. Lots of jamming goes on after the last set is done on stage - it's nice to drift off to sleep with the sound of distant banjos and mandolins in one's ears.