North Beach Festival

To sum it up shortly:
Weekend-​long daytime frat party!
(Part II of Union Street Festival, haha)

CRAB GARLIC FRIES WITH CRAB AIOLI. $ 8 and sooooo worth it.
4 out of 5 because my sister and I couldn’t find the damn turkey legs! Where were they selling those bad boys???
Way more crowded than last year.

I enjoy the weather here. They had the stage in Washington Square where they played live music. Bring at least 10 bucks to buy cooked food from vendors. Alot of hot girls, alot of dogs and senior Chinese picking up cans to recycle. I wish I can stay longer but had to go to work. No fun for me.

As i try to make my way trough a mix of cramped promotion-​selling cheesy kiosks, slow strolling confused tourists, drunk-​ass jocks on a mission to attend to most beer gardens the city will provide tru the summer, a couple youth being handcuffed and other party goers trying to throw their friend in a massive dumpster, i started to wonder, is this festival really supposed to be a celebration of what we called Little Italy and the Home of the beat generation?

O Dio Mio!
The Haight Street Fair, oh, I mean the Union Street Fair, hum, wait, I mean the North Beach fair has become, well, a complete replica of what else fair is there in the city. And I might have liked it when i had first moved here, but now, meh, i’ve experience better!

If you like crowds of drunk obnoxious people, come to the North Beach festival. If you want to wait 15 minutes or more for a beer, this is the spot. Maybe this was too close (for me) to Bay to Breakers, but I am just irritated by drunk ass people. I know, I know, shut up, I asked for it by going there. Well, I walked my sorry ass home after about 15 minutes. Yes, I am old. Or maybe I was just too sober.
I actually do like North Beach– I used to live there, even. But the clientelle at this festival was just too much for me. On the plus side, I did get a free kabob, which was pretty good.

It was not your imagination; the festival was lacking this year. Perhaps it was the absence of the Unauthorized Rolling Stones. Or the 30 minute line for beer garden bracelets. Or the 20 minute line for beer. Or the drunk people that kept cutting me in line for beer.
I was looking forward to my first festival season as a North Beach resident, but the season itself is becoming a commodity. The same food stands were present at Carnivale, Union St. North Beach, etc. I feel like the neighborhood festivals that beat the June gloom are losing the local flavors that make our neighborhoods unique. I didn’t walk down from my apartment to eat kabobs and get trampled by frat guys.
On the upside, the businesses are always good sports and the smaller stage acts never fail to impress.

Well like I said last year, if you don’t like, don’t go, but don’t come here to bitch and moan.
I was born & raised here, as everyone knows, so I have seen LOTS of changes. For your info, the Animal Blessing was at
St. Francis if Assisi Church on Vallejo, and so was the Chalk Art, as it was last year.
The Animal Blessing was BOTH days this year, as it has grown tremendously.
There a 3 banks on the corner of Green & Columbus, with ATM’s, there were a dozen public restrooms, one really needs to open ones eyes. So do not complain, everything was availiable for the masses. If you can organize a party for 150,000 people better than the Chamber, then by all means go ahead. There was free dog & cat food being handed out everywhere, free prizes if you spun a wheel for charity !
I bought a beautiful Murano Glass Ring hand made by a great Italian Artist. I enjoyed my 4 Don Julios at Joey & Eddies because it felt good, but the price I paid for those miniscule shots was an insult.
A true Sicilian. Yep well its true and I still had a great time.
Every bar had room in it for a quick drink, the only thing I agree with is the music choices, but there was live music in everyother bar that day.
I have some great pictures to post of the Chalk Art.

Hm apparently I missed all the free stuff they were handing out according to previous reviews. Maybe then I would have added another star. I showed up here around 3pm when the beer garden was packed to the gills and the streets were chaos only to find out that there were NO ATMs anywhere near the beer garden and NO public restrooms. Seriously? You can’t expect to feed people massive amounts of beer and then have their bladders magically hold it for a few hours. I managed to sneak into not one, not two, but THREE different restaurants to pee in their «Customer Only» restrooms after elbowing my way through the drunken crowds to get out of the maze that was the beer garden.
I liked the general vibe of the whole thing — the music wasn’t great but people were happy and dancing and it was definitely a diverse San Francisco crowd. I love any excuse for day drinking so I can’t complain too much but the organization of this could have been a ton better.
The lady with the free face paint was definitely a hit. Waking up with face paint smeared on my pillow? Not so much.

To me most street fairs are the same. The only thing that differentiates them is the neighborhood feel. And sadly I didn’t get much of a feel from this one.
For a festival that has been in existence for 54 years, you would think they would have distinguished themselves as «The Italian Street Fair» or something of a similar vein. While going to Washington Square park to listen to Lavay Smith play was nice, I was kind of over it after two songs, mostly because I have heard her before and I was anxious to see the rest of the fair.
But I guess my anxiousness was unfounded because the only really cool thing I found was handmade masks and I love me some MASKS!
So I advise that unless there is a specific band you want to go see, don’t even bother with this. It’s just an opportunity for street vendors to sell their shit with no cohesive feel to the fair itself.

As I sat on a patch of grass in Washington Square park drinking beer from a can and listening to, what sounded like a horrible version of a ZZ Top cover band, I could not stop staring at this crackhead in front of me sitting in a lawn chair. Her shirt was hiked up revealing a milky white muffin top glaring in the sun. The strands of her mullet were flapping in the warm breeze and the gaps in her teeth allowed for sudden mists of beer soaked spittle to escape with every burst of psychotic laughter. I thought about the possibility of a few drops landing in my Heineken and lost my desire to drink.
I. Lost. My. Desire. To. Drink.
If that isn’t cause for one star I don’t know what else is.
Oh, I guess the massive amount of assholes and the nauseating smell of overcooked meat could also be factored in.

I wasn’t so much a fan. Sure, I had a couple different friend groups to meet up with, I bumped into my old pal from growing-​up in Colorado, saw a guy from a ridiculous night out, and met some crazy new kids, but that’s only b/​c EVERYONE went to this festival. Aside from bringing everyone together, I thought this festival kinda sucked. The only thing I got out of it was another awesome spin at the Zip Car booth (a $ 50 driving credit — woo hoo!) and an invite to a super-​fun game of flip cup later Saturday eve…
The actual festival, though, it was like all of the annoyingness of North Beach x10 — mega tourists, cramped venues, crowded streets, and kinda a cheese-​ball vibe…
Frankly, the Haight Street festival still totally takes the cake for me. Literally. And um, anyhow, if I had to vote a second, I’d give it to Union Street over North Beach…

I mean, drunken bodies everywhere. thats the fun of a festival, well maybe only if you are one of those bodies. But I always have a blast… plus I love the man in a cheese stick costume handing out pepper jack! UMMM how I love cheese!!!
Music was OK, but hey I was with my girls and plenty of beer (that was not $ 8 or how ever much they were).
Was invited to many parties, kinda wish I would have gone since the streets were so packed.
I had an even better time just chillin out in a art gallery. look for review next.
Like others have said… most street fairs are pretty similar and I did not feel much Italian love this year, people concentrate too much on selling stuff instead of the culture of the neighborhood.

CRAB GARLIC FRIES!!!
That’s all that was worth remembering from this year’s North Beach Festival. They were so good that I could not socialize with anyone during the 7 minutes it took me to eat them (and proceed to lick the aioli off of my fingers… classy).Then I could not socialize with anyone afterward because I reeked of garlic. Needless to say, I did not care. YUM. HEAVEN.

What I’ve heard from others Saturday afternoon can be fun there, especially since they had a great Lindy Hop/​Swing Dance band in the park.
I had some friends in from out of town & thought we’d check out the Festival today since we were wine tasting yesterday.
I have to say it was a bit disappointing. Maybe we got there too early? It was close to noon. The vendors were alright but the only music was classical in Washington Square Park and a guy banging a drum warming up a few blocks away.
We got a free bag of raisins and some guy tried to recruit us for a corporate sponsored cheer for the US team at the Olympics because one friend mistakenly did a little cheer for us joking around.
Let me put it this way, there was a really long line with the most people we saw in one place… what was it for? Mostly more senior aged citizens waiting for their free Sensodyne toothpaste. My friend pointed out that stuff ain’t cheap, but yes two stars or «meh. I’ve experienced better» sums it up (early on a Sunday afternoon).

Great time to walk around and people watch with friends and family. There is always something interesting going on. If I get tired of the crowd, it is an easy walk over to Russian Hill for a quiet sunny afternoon lunch.

I’m going to be honest, this review is going to be bias. Hey, I can’t help it… I live in this neighborhood AND beer is my drink of choice, so I loved it!
Went on Sunday (6÷17÷2007), walked around and checked out most of the vendors. The «peace» chain vendor was the best. The guy made over 341,837pieces with «peace» written in a handful of different languages. Good stuff. Off course, I got one… he was only accepting donations so it was practically free. KAPAYAPAAN!
After walking around, my friends and I chilled at Columbus Café for a bit, drank a couple of beers and headed to Sotto Mare for some oysters!
I really liked the chalk art — it was nice seeing all the different themes and styles of the artists. I surely did have a great time and looking forward to next year’s festivities :-)!

Why can’t we get some more imaginative vendors at there festivals? it seems that year after year we get much of the same stuff being sold at all the festivals. Given that this is one of the greatest cities in the country, I would expect better food options as well.
The police were acting like idiots at the end of the festival actually making some people go into bars to get them off the street. You would think that you in Boston in 1939. It was quite the scene. In a word, embarassing.
On the bright side, it was a nice day and there were many beautiful and interesting people to see!

Not that fun.
1) The crowd management and planning that took place in and around the park was absolutely unacceptable. It was as if they hired a homeless person to design the traffic flow patterns in and out of the beer gardens. When he came back with a scrap of paper covered in scribbled crayon markings and urine, the planners decided to implement the plan with no revisions whatsoever.
2) It was like someone installed a gigantic douche bag magnet in North beach, and all of the generators in the area were powering it. It worked flawlessly.

Well, shit. I could have sworn this was fun last year. Did it have all the bizarre and arbitrary fencing? Was it so poorly planned?
I went on Saturday and, though I would say that I made a swift exit, I was so caught up in the circus of pedestrian traffic and battling metal fences, it wasn’t so swift after all.
Other than that, there’s some good beer and good grub.

I went to the 54^th Annual Precious Cheese North Beach Festival on Sat. 6÷14÷08. I got there around 1:30pm and everywhere there were people. It gets really crowded after noon. I usually like to go around 10am to beat the crowds.
It’s FREE so I’m more likely to go. FREE music, FREE samples, sidewalk art (didn’t see), pet blessing (didn’t see).
Since I was late there were lines for Everything.
I stood in line to spin a wheel sponsored by Precious Cheese — & got a small stick of jack cheese. I liked it fine.
Then stood in another line to get a FREE sample of Precious Cheese beef kebab w/​Precious Cheese on it too. It was fine.
Sampled some kind of beef from Safeway — it was ok.
Walked to Washington Square where tons more people were.
Got my tiny Sensodyne toothpaste — yes, it’s really Expensive in the stores, so happy to get a FREE small tube of it.
FREE sample of Naked Juice-​I got 2: mango & pomegrante. — Both ok.
Then about 4 different SF Style Magazine issues FREE-​those suckers are Heavy though.
Sample of Rainbow Ice-​only a spoonful, you had to buy a cup for $ 4. I just Thanked him & left.
Then I left. I ate in Chinatown, since most places were way too crowded & lines very long.
Still recommended at least once for Tourist & Locals.
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