Santa Barbara: Summer Solstice parade and festival this weekend

Summer’s finally at our doorstep, and downtown Santa Barbara is about to usher in the season with handcrafted local flair.

Its annual hat-tip to the longest day of the year, the city’s Summer Solstice Celebration kicks off today at 4 p.m. in Alameda Park with the Solstice Festival. The event runs until 9 p.m., with musical and dance entertainment. But if that’s too short notice for you to make an exit from L.A., plan on joining the Saturday fun instead.

Beginning at noon Saturday, the Summer Solstice Parade will feature more than 1,000 parade participants, floats, costumes and dancing ensembles. For the parade — its theme is “Splash” — the number of spectators is expected to exceed 100,000.

The parade begins at noon at Cota Street, heading down State Street to Micheltorena. It should be a great showcase of the area’s creativity, as the elements of the parade (floats, costumes, etc.) are created by community members. No advertisements or motorized vehicles will be allowed in the parade. Nudity won’t be permitted either, by the way.

At Alameda Park, the end of the route, day two of the Solstice Festival commences with live music, food, crafts, a beer and wine garden, and a drum circle. (I guess you really can’t have a solstice celebration without a drum circle.) The parade floats will be displayed at the festival, and a children’s stage will host musicians, storytellers, mimes and other performers.

– Susan Derby, Special to the Los Angeles Times

Photos: Scenes from last year’s Summer Solstice Parade. Credit: Robert Bernstein

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This entry was posted on Friday, June 19, 2009 at 10:41 am by Susan Derby and is filed under California, Family & Kids, Last Minute, Santa Barbara, Summer. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site.