Carrizozo Community Festival

On Saturday, September 5, 2026, the second annual Carrizozo Community Festival filled 12th Street in Carrizozo, the county seat of Lincoln County, about 60 miles north of Alamogordo on U.S. 54. Arts and crafts vendors set up along 12th: Acoma Pottery Creations (Karen Aragon), Elvin’s Wooden Bowls and Such, Mark’s Woodwork by Mark Ray, Sierra Blanca Studio (Lisa Amos), Western Flair (Carol Wells), Loud & Knotty (Harold and Quinn Jacobs), Art by Jess (Jessica Peralta), and Callie’s Cottage Crafts. Classic and vintage cars parked among them for a car show the organizers described plainly as “not sanctioned.” The galleries along the street kept their doors open. The organizers’ website gave the hours as 10 a.m. to 8 p.m., “depending on weather.” The festival’s Facebook event listing and a KTSM El Paso report put the start at 11.

Smokey Bear on 12th Street

The parade formed at 9:00 in a lot with recycling bins, north of the Carrizozo Heritage Museum, at the first curve on 12th as the road leaves U.S. 54 just south of its junction with U.S. 380. At 11 the floats turned onto 12th beside the museum. The grand marshals were Smokey Bear and Miss Teen New Mexico, Maliyah Mejia, and the vintage cars followed behind the floats. The route ran to the end of the street by the Post Office, turned south of it, and came back along 13th Street. Nobody on the floats threw candy. The organizers’ notice gave the reason: “Due to our insurance, no throwing candy during parade (or anything else, for that matter).”

Afterward the alliance posted a reel of floats, classic cars, local organizations, businesses, and families under the line “THIS is how Carrizozo does a parade!” It asked viewers to tag whoever should ride the route next time.

Two stages in McDonald Park

Once the parade ended, the day moved to McDonald Park, right off U.S. 54. From noon until about 8, local bands played the main stage in this order: Back Porch (William Keith and Mike Goza); Piper Adamian; Jim Mack; Somos de Carrizozo; Obscure; Ryder Lemons with Jimmy Linton; and George’s Bindle Bag, who closed from 6 to 8. Other performers filled the gaps on a smaller stage while the bigger bands set up. Between the first and second sets, beginning at 1:15, the parade and car show awards were read from the music stage. Catfish Fry lent the sound equipment. Every act played for free, and the organizers asked listeners to “please tip generously. We want them to come back!”

Next to the musicians stood a fenced beer garden run by Bonito Valley Brewing Company of Lincoln, which brought Noisy Water wines as well. The entrance was by the porta-potties, under the info-booth banner. Security checked IDs, no one under 21 could enter without a parent or guardian, and no outside alcohol was allowed in the park. Buying a drink was optional. In the organizers’ words, “the wonderful sounds of music will fill the park and beyond,” and they told people to bring a lawn chair or a blanket. Children’s activities ran on the north side of the park, near the swing sets.

Food trucks on Dulce, galleries on 12th

The food trucks parked on Dulce Street, which runs perpendicular to 12th and U.S. 54 and is wide enough to give them room. Among them were Munchies y Mas, The Dizzy Lemon, Crazy Town Cooking, and a stand for Sweet Daisy Lemonade and Kettlecorn. Zia Bites was there too, the lime-green truck that stands on other days at the corner of 54 and 3rd, across from the courthouse. A pre-festival post praised its owner: “Robert is one of the hardest workers on the planet,” it said, adding that “there is talk in at least one jury deliberation room (yes, I was there).” Down at Court and 13th, a vendor called Hands of Mobile Expert washed cars beside Photozozo.

Photozozo, in the Lutz Building, shows the work of New Mexico photographers, and it took 10 percent off everything for that one day. Gallery 408 on 12th did the same. It has painted burros in its garden outside, and inside, in a historic building, it hangs local and international artists. The alliance thanked the gallery’s Joanie for “bringing art to Carrizozo.”

The organizers also suggested visitors bring pickleball paddles, disc golf discs, and fishing rods, “and license.” The town has two pickleball courts off Highway 380 west of the Spencer Park pool, and Disc-O-Zozo, its public disc golf course, is in the Community Park, where people also fish.

Bringing back the Street Fair

The festival grew out of a recruiting problem. According to the organizers, Carrizozo’s not-for-profits were “individually struggling to recruit new members amid increasingly difficult times.” They describe the town as “rural, it is isolated, it is a minority-majority town set in an incredibly beautiful part of the state.” The groups banded together as the Carrizozo Not-for-Profit Alliance. Its first joint project was to bring back the old Street Fair once held on Labor Day Weekend. “This festival may not compete with the reality or memories of those days,” the alliance wrote, “but it is a beginning.” When the alliance opened its Facebook page ahead of the 2026 festival, it wrote: “No matter where we come from, we’re all Carrizozo now.”

Carrizozo Works, Inc., a member of the alliance and one of its sponsors, has done a good share of the work. It was incorporated in 2008 as an economic development group and moved into community projects in 2021. In that time it has built the disc golf course, put up benches and interpretive signs, set out luminarias, and arranged a Brownfields designation to clear asbestos and lead paint from the Rec Center. On the eve of the 2026 festival, its director, Lisa Maue, posted that “in a town that is susceptible to negativity and undue criticism, it is important to remember we are all here doing our best in a place where it is difficult to thrive.”

About 300 people from around the state came to the first festival, according to the organizers. After the second, the alliance reported that visitors “stayed, they shopped, they ate, they laughed,” and that “our vendors and food trucks MADE MONEY!” It singled out Lisa, Susan, Sandy, and Keith for carrying much of the work behind the scenes. The post ended: “Carrizozo is small. But yesterday, we were mighty.”