Tag: festivals

Summer Is Here (Pretty Much)!

Most local schools let out this Friday for summer, meaning the best part of the year is almost here! Below, I’ve shared some quirky summer events, plus some more summer-related ideas.

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Most local schools let out this Friday for summer, meaning the best part of the year is almost here! Below, I’ve shared some quirky summer events, plus some more summer-related ideas. I don’t know about you, but I welcome the consistent sunshine-y days we’ll be getting here in the East Bay!

Quirky Summer Events

One of the best local outlets, 7×7, shared this guide to quirky summer festivals in Northern California and it is just so Bay Area I had to share it. From jumping frogs to artichokes, to crawdads, to accordions, you can’t go wrong with looking into some of these hilarious and quirky summer events.

Handel’s Ice Cream

Handel’s Ice Cream – first created in the summer heat of 1945 Youngstown, Ohio – is now in Walnut Creek! Alice Handel, who used fresh fruit from her own garden and personal recipes to start her business nearly 80 years ago, started an ice cream legacy. They still make each batch fresh daily using Alice’s original methods and you can try some right next to the movie theater downtown.

Despite a lot of competition in Walnut Creek (Lottie’s, San Francisco Creamery, and even Shake Shack – not to mention all the yogurt!), Handel’s has a very eclectic flavor list. I ordered Spouse Like a House on a cone and enjoyed it a lot! I would change their rule about the two smaller scoops that come in a size small only being allowed to be one flavor – I wanted to try another!

Other Summer Fun

As I mentioned above, Walnut Creek definitely doesn’t lack in frozen dessert options – perfect as we roll into summer. One of my favorite places is The Yogurt Spot, which I have written about previously. There’s also the Creamery and so many other delightful choices. What is your favorite?

Finally, make sure to check out the Art & Wine Festival at Heather Farms this weekend! This Walnut Creek staple has been going for 41 years and is always a treat. Best of all, it’s FREE! More info here.

Road Trips: BottleRock

We touched on this event in my recent music festivals blog, but I had to expand it into its own feature. Because BottleRock is constantly the best day of the festival season each Spring! This was my third year going and what I like about it the best is that for the most part, it is a laid back concert scene. People either hang out on their blankets in the back, sit it the wine lounges or jostle to get up front. Even if you are up front it is still fairly chill

This year’s lineup included Bruno Mars, The Killers, Muse, Incubus, Snoop Dogg, Halsey, Earth, Wind & Fire, Billy Idol, and dozens more. I did one day at BottleRock (Friday) and took in Incubus (the lead singer Brandon Boyd has charm and sex appeal; I couldn’t stop looking at him! Did you know Incubus means “a male demon believed to have sexual intercourse with sleeping women?” I also saw The Struts (a band I hadn’t heard of, but the singer reminded me of Freddy Mercury), FLOR (the long-haired redhead pictured below was a great new band), and The Chainsmokers. In hindsight, we maybe should not have gone with The Chainsmokers instead of headliner Muse – I didn’t realize The Chainsmokers were a DJ duo, but they rocked it and that was the one place where the people were very pushy. It was a younger crowd and lots of lights and smoke as shown above. We got a little bored with Earth Wind & Fire, but really liked the jam of Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue.

One of the best things about BottleRock is that it’s a combination of music and culinary excellence for an entire weekend. Being in Napa makes it a requirement to have awesome food and wine to go with the music (but they really do come up with an awesome music lineup every year). So in addition to seeing some great shows, we saw Shaun White, a 3-time gold medalist in snowboarding on the Culinary Stage. It was awesome – they had a winter-themed cooking show that included cotton candy made into huge snowballs and they were tossed into the audience where the promptly broke apart spreading blue cotton candy around. At the end, they were tossing Hostess snowball packages out to the audience.

Words can barely do this experience justice. Check out the art and experiences created by various vendors in the following photos. You can’t beat sitting in the grass under the sun with a glass of red, watching a famous band play live music to thousands of people. If you haven’t been yet, plan ahead for next Memorial Day weekend  – it is always Friday/Saturday/Sunday and tickets sell out quickly. So, prepare to make that short drive up to Napa to experience BottleRock!