Summer in the City Festival - Salem, Oregon

Something very good is happening in Salem. People are planning events and other people are coming out of the woodwork to check them out! It's exciting to see people in the streets of downtown Salem.

The festival goes all weekend and has a lot of great music and food to try out. There are three music stages, one whole block of wine tasting, a beer garden, and lots of great food from downtown restaurants. One of my favorite things about the layout of the event is that the beer and wine areas were set up near the stages so that you could enjoy music and drinks at the same time. The stages were not actually inside the drinking areas though, so anyone could get close to the music. Also, the children's area had its own street so the kids could go crazy and not disturb the music listeners.

There are also a lot of businesses taking advantage of the crowds downtown with sidewalk sales so there's lots to see, do, and buy down there this weekend. It takes me back to the days when the sidewalk sale downtown was a highlight of the summer.

Summer In The City was planned and organized by Go Downtown! headed up by Suzie Bicknell and I was very impressed with the organization and the layout of the event. One of the problems with events in the past is that no one would go out of the box and take on the likes of city council, OLCC and other entities to get things moving in a more modern direction. We were stuck in a small town mentality for too long. Thank heavens we are moving into big city mode. Or at least medium city mode. :) Thank you, Suzie and Salem.

I hope this event becomes synonomous with Salem in the summertime. We need fun events to bring people out to explore our own little city. This is a great start.