Annual Street Festival Features Fun, Music, Food and More Beer Gardens Than the Bar Blogger Can See in a Day
I need to go back to the Abbott Kinney Festival next year.
That’s because I only made it to two of the three beer gardens.
And so let me raise my plastic Bud Light cup to the organizers for having three beer gardens. And for not gouging us on the price – $6 for a variety of beers. I drifted off with Drifter Pale Ale in one beer garden for much of the Sunday afternoon and would have been content to spend the remaining time of the event there, but I was reporting on the event and needed to move on to other locations.
The event is usually the third Sunday in September but has been moved to Oct. 7, for 2012, and I’ll certainly be back in the future. It’s held along Abbot Kinney Blvd., in Venice, CA, which was once known as nice shortcut from Marina Del Rey to Santa Monica but is now filled with all sorts of shops, restaurants and a couple of hip bars.
To be sure, the beer gardens are not the only reason to go to the Abbott Kinney Festival. The event itself is cool, a line of tents for more than a mile along this eclectic part of Los Angeles in Venice selling arts and crafts – I bought a cutting board in the shape of a surfboard for the closing event price of $10 – with food and bands.
It’s like being on Venice Beach without the “3 t-shirts for $10.”
But, of course, the Bar Blogger was there for the beer! And when I discovered Drifter Pale Ale in the Widmer beer garden, strategically located next to a big stage, this seemed like an ideal spot to spend, oh, I don’t know, a couple of hours.
And so it was, but letting the afternoon pass without checking out the other beer gardens – the event ends at 6 p.m., and beer sales are cut off at 5:30 – seemed not to do justice to this article and its readers.
So I made my way to the Stella beer tent. And here’s an interesting thing about this festival: It’s $2 for a beer garden wristband but you can buy a “VIP” pass for $20. The latter includes a single beer but front-of-line entry.
At $6 a beer, it seemed to me a much more reasonable option was simply to go into the beer garden when there was no line and get two beers. I can see the advantage of it, tho, eliminating the hurry and worry for those who want to eat and shop. However, even with a slight line (a dozen people) the tent was far from crowded and two girls in front of me said they never did get into the third beer garden despite their friend inside telling them there was plenty of room.
The Stella area was more happening than the Widmer tent. It had a DJ in, off all things, a food truck, and people were dancing rather than sitting at tables. I ran out of time to get to that third beer garden, which apparently has booze as well as beer, plus a DJ on an elevated stage. It’s by the entrance closest to Washington Blvd.
The Stella tent may be the place to hang, tho. It’s located right next to The Other Room perhaps the coolest bar on Abbott Kinney Blvd. But you had better extract yourself from the beer garden by about 5:15, for by 5:30 there are 100 people wanting to go there, at least 50 of whom are waiting in not one, but two, lines outside. Like anyone is going to leave!
A little further down the street the scene is similar at the cool bar Hal’s, though the line is much more manageable, about a dozen people at about 5:30.
Faced with these post-beer garden options, the Bar Blogger went a mile down the street to Baja Cantina. This used to be one of LA’s best Sunday afternoon/evening bars, so much so it was where Ron Goldman was headed before he was OJ’d. But that was then and this is now; the once lively patio is now filled with diners rather than revelers. Though it must be reported that the place served ice cold – and I mean ice cold – Stella drafts for $5.
It was a pleasant way to end a fun, eventful day.
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