International Folk Art Market

I was fortunate enough to attend the International Folk Art Market which has been going on for 10 years.  It was well organized even though the mass of people attending was a bit overwhelming.

The event is held outside in the courtyard area of Museum Hill under huge tents.  There is no parking at the venue so we had to park in designated areas and board buses to the venue.

Here we are queue up on Friday evening awaiting our turn on the bus.

It took about 30 minutes from the parking lot to the venue and after arriving, we still had to queue up for the entrance.

There were people handing out pieces of watermelon as well as water while we waited in line.  From the house to the venue took about an hour.

The friday night event opened the market and there were drinks and some food but we were primarily interested in the shopping.  The event lasted a couple of hours and we did some damage and did not even cover half the market.

The next morning, we repeated the transportation and arrived at the start time at 9:00 to the market and shopped some more.

Here are my cohorts - Kim and Karen.  It was much warmer and I brought the spray can of sun screen with 100 SPF that we sprayed on each other periodically throughout the day.  A lady walking by just stuck out her arms for coverage while I was applying to Kim.  No sunburns even though the sun's rays were very strong.

The decorations were pretty and over the top.  Here is one of the trees in front of the stage where music was being performed.

This is one of the tent tops.  Every tent had some kind of decoration and there was even a booth to pick up some for home.

We lasted until mid afternoon with no food and overwhelmed by the crowds and the heat.  There were free cold water stations so if you brought your own water bottle, they refilled for you at no charge.

It was a great two days and I left with a much lighter pocket book.