Summertime Festivals

The summer brings more daylight, heat, and best of all, festivals. Every city in a America hosts a festival during the summer months. Some are centered around types of music, others around types of food, and a few celebrate art and heritage. There is a festival to suit everyone in the family's interests. The types of festivals that have been mentioned are well known and can be found easily on the internet, but there are some festivals with wacky themes and traditions, making for a great stop during your RV vacation, all have RV parks at or near the festival.

July 23-25, Great Texas Mosquito Festival. Load up the RV, slather on the bug spray, and prepare for family fun, great eats and plenty of good music. Enter yourself  in the Mr. & Mrs. Mosquito Legs contest or join the dodge ball sting tournament. There are plenty of carnival rides for the kids, and the BBQ is amazing because, hey, it's Texas.

July 24-26, Gilroy Garlic Festival. It’s all about the food when the community of Gilroy, California hosts this annual celebration of  a vampire's worst nightmare. Celebrity chefs, cook-offs, cooking demonstrations and tons of pasta, calamari, scampi and other goodies fill the air with heavenly scents. Plus great musical entertainment.

July 29-Aug. 2, Appalachian String Band Music Festival. On a mountaintop in Clifftop, West Virginia, folks from around the world gather to pluck banjos, fiddles, dance and sing in a toe-tapping celebration of Appalachian music. Learn to square dance or flatfoot or try your hand at basket weaving. Enjoy family activities with this woodsy festival.

Aug. 28-29, Potato Days.  Rediscover your love for this multi-faceted food and enjoy the themed games when the town of Barnesville, Minnesota celebrates its spud-producing heritage. Mashed potato wrestling, mashed potato sculpting, potato car races, barrel rides, a potato picking contest and potato sack fashion show are just part of the old-fashioned fun. Make sure to sample the homemade potato soup, potato pancakes and potato sausage!