Abbot Kinney Festival

Every year, Abbot Kinney, in Venice puts on a Festival with live music, great food and craft beers, with a commitment to the environment!  I met up with a couple of my friends on Sunday in Venice for a fun-filled day with good people.

I'm not a big crowd person, at least not anymore, so when I realized that this Festival was going to be crazy, I felt a twinge in my stomach, but I pushed it aside and I'm so glad that I did!  Even though I had to drive around for 20 minutes trying to find parking and was worried I wouldn't find anything or have to pay $20 just to park my car, I got lucky, and found a spot just over a half mile away.  I walked to The Brig which had a big Beer Garden where tons of people were hanging out behind a stage for Live Music.  You had to wait in line for a wrist band so that took another 20 minutes and after an hour of staving off excitement, that first beer tasted so good!

Bree and a couple of her friends had gotten there about an hour before me, and Brad and his friends had all biked from Playa to Venice for the Festival.  It probably would have been a lot of fun as a group to bike over there and avoid the traffic and parking situation but I haven't had a bike since I moved to LA and I hear horror stories all the time about people getting their bikes stolen, so my car was the best choice for me.  We had a nice big group of people and even Jamie joined us later on in the afternoon!  The Beer Garden had a few different kinds of beers including cocktails so that was pretty cool and the Bartenders were working their butts off and busy the whole afternoon with no rest!  We all just hung out, enjoyed the sun and music, waited in the long line for beers in groups, played bean bags, or as some would call it 'Cornhole,' and had a great time!  If I hadn't gotten there so late I would have walked around Abbot Kinney because they had another Beer Garden further down that was being sponsored by another Bar, and had all these food trucks and restaurants so you could try some fantastic food.  There were people of all ages roaming the streets, adults and teens, families with children, pets, and even stilt walkers.

Bree & I at the Venice Festival

The festival went until 6 pm and even though I thought I would only stay for a couple hours and hate missing Sunday Football I had a blast and got enjoy something new and different to do in LA :)