Bele Chere Festival, Asheville
The biggest arts festival in the region of western North Carolina, USA takes place each summer in the historical downtown area of Asheville, the only substantial city in the entire Appalachian range of mountains. The festival occupies the downtown, which is restricted even to local residents from motor traffic, and lasts the entire weekend. Some 500 or more vendors selling everything from cotton candy to handmade furniture show up to sell their wares, and hundreds of musicians play for free on the many stages of the festival. Beginning in 2005, the festival also began to include special headliner performers, and there is a nominal fee of a few dollars to attend those shows.
Lodging in Asheville is generally packed-out for the festival, and locals even make extra money renting out their guestrooms to visitors. So if you have plans to attend the festival, it is a good idea to book your hotel or motel far in advance. Many people who go to Bele Chere will book rooms a year in advance, and you don’t want to arrive and find that there are not rooms available.
One of the best things about the festival is the food. Lots of restaurants and catering companies have booths and sell wonderful appetizers, dinner plates, and desserts at reasonable prices. Wear your best walking shoes, because the town is hilly and the festival covers about 20 square blocks of asphalt territory.