Buellton Fall Festival

For three days each November the Avenue of the Flags in downtown Buellton closes to cars between Central Avenue and 2nd Street and fills with a carnival. The Century Wheel turns near the main stage. Around it run the Zipper, the Kamikaze, the Tilt A Whirl, bumper cars, a glass house called Crystal Lil’s, a small children’s ride called Beary Go Round, and Pharaohs Fury, a swinging ship for riders 48 inches and taller. Single tickets and wristbands are sold at kiosks near the Ferris wheel. An unlimited-ride band bought at the event costs $43.

The 2026 festival runs November 6 through 8. It opens at 4 p.m. Friday and at noon Saturday and Sunday, and closes at 10 each night. Admission is free. Guests come and go as they like, and dogs are allowed on a leash. The grounds cover two blocks, with more than 60 food and merchant booths and more than 40 bands on two stages. In 2022 the two stages stood at either end of the grounds.

Three bars and an open street

Guests 21 and older buy beer, wine and cocktails at three bars and may carry them anywhere on the grounds, because the whole festival is a permitted open-container area. Andres Nuño, the organizer, explained the arrangement to Noozhawk in 2025: “We didn’t want to stick people in a beer garden away from everything. This way, parents can enjoy a drink while spending time with their kids — just like they would at a ball game or a restaurant.”

On Saturday, November 7, 2026, from noon to 3:30, a ticketed tasting called Ales on the Avenue pours from more than 12 craft breweries, ciders, seltzers and wineries. Tickets cost $35, and 300 are sold.

For the fifth annual festival in 2025, Nuño sorted the main stage by genre:

• Friday: a 1980s and ‘90s dance party, headlined by the Molly Ringwald Project.
• Saturday: funk and rock by day, then Reggae Night, with Pato Banton returning.
• Sunday: Fiesta Sunday, with regional Mexican music from Equipo Elite, then Country Night with the Jimi Nelson Band.

“The other stage kind of bounces around,” he said. “If you like music, any style of it, we will most likely have somebody who you will be playing that.”

Part of the proceeds goes to the Buellton Chamber of Commerce scholarship fund for local high school seniors. In 2023 the Chamber also ran a community bar where local breweries poured, and every tip that weekend went to the fund. Nonprofits take booths at no charge. “Any nonprofit can be at the Buellton Fall Fest for free,” Nuño said that year. “It gives nonprofits a platform to make money. We want them to feel like it’s their event.”

From a Solvang big top to Median 3

The festival began in the next town over. In 2019 Nuño, co-owner of En Fuego Events, produced an inaugural three-day music and big-top jubilee in downtown Solvang, where festivalgoers lined up for drink tickets from local brewers. In 2021 a follow-up came to Buellton, billed as a “bigger than ever” community event presented by Discover Buellton and set for November 12 through 14.

“We couldn’t be more excited to bring Fall Fest to Buellton,” Nuño said. “We have grown to fall in love with the city of Buellton.” Kathy Vreeland, executive director of the Buellton Chamber of Commerce, said a centrally located festival would let many residents walk or ride bicycles to it.

The city planning department recorded where the 2021 carnival stood: on Median 3 and the vacant lots beside it. Median 3 is the grassy strip down the middle of the Avenue that the city intends to make a downtown park. In spring 2020, thirty-five Cal Poly landscape architecture students drew concepts for it, with a town plaza, an amphitheater and a park.

The 2021 bill had three headliners:

• Friday: the Molly Ringwald Project.
• Saturday: Soltribe, a reggae and alternative band from San Antonio. Nuño said its leader, Anthony Berdecio, had been hand-selected by Bon Jovi for touring support.
• Sunday: Artikal Sound System, a touring reggae band from South Florida, which closed the festival.

Among the local performers was Will Breman, a semifinalist on NBC’s The Voice. Before the festival, the paper counted over 30 bands. Afterward, the Lompoc Record reported over 25.

That year also held the second Battle of the Teenage Bands. Radiation Invasion, a five-member rock band from Lompoc, took first place: drummer Steven Hubert, 15; rhythm guitarist Jair Balderas, 16; lead guitarist Mars Mohamed, 16; bassist Andy Ramirez, 17; and lead singer Liana Lindsey, 16. Jump Start took second, and the top two shared $700 toward their musical goals.

On Sunday afternoon a photographer caught a game-booth operator from Arizona calling to passersby, and Pharaoh’s Fury swinging its screaming riders. Marco Covarrubias, a Buellton Parks and Recreation maintenance worker, drove the grounds in his utility truck checking that people parked safely. “So far, so good,” he said.

The weekend was hot. The festival gave $2,500 to the Solvang Arts and Music Foundation for music and arts at Solvang School. The Lompoc Record and the city both put attendance at about 15,000. Nuño later said 15,000 to 20,000. When it was over he announced that the festival would not go back to Solvang: “The Fall Festival was excited to make Buellton its new home, and the Buellton Fall Festival is here to stay.”

Shade structures and a 2 a.m. teardown

The second festival, November 11 through 13, 2022, came in cold. “Last year was really hot,” Nuño said. “So this year we added more shade structures.” He also added several rides, brought vendors to 60 and bands to 34. The Molly Ringwald Project and Spence the Gardener headlined. Ales on the Avenue returned on Saturday with more than 15 breweries and seltzers.

Nuño’s crew of 18 began setting up 19 hours before the 4 p.m. Friday opening. They tore down until 2 a.m. Monday. “We had to clear the streets to open Monday at 6 a.m.,” he said.

The third festival, in 2023, had 41 bands and deejays, 40 merchant vendors and more than 20 food vendors. More than 15,000 people came over the three days. “It was really great — by far our best one,” Nuño said. He reported that every hotel in Buellton was booked that Saturday night, and that he met visitors from Las Vegas and Camarillo who had stayed over. In 2024, he said, the count again passed 15,000.

“This event was created for families to enjoy themselves — rides, shopping, food and drinks and to get the kids’ face painted,” Nuño said in 2023. “I think of my own [family] when I create these events.”