After five years, the 51st annual Santa Barbara Greek Festival has returned with enough gyros and baklava for everyone.
The Santa Barbara Greek Festival is being held at Chase Palm Park Field on Friday, June 28 through Saturday, June 29.
Hosted by the Santa Barbara Greek Orthodox Church, the event features food, drinks, live music, and more.
According to Marina Vogel the co-chair of the festival and the church’s treasurer, this is the first year that the Church has been able to host the event since the pandemic.
“We managed to pull everything together, so we’re super excited. It’s really a pleasure […] because we want to share all this with everybody,” Vogel said.
While one of the points of the festival is to help share Greek culture, the other goal is to help raise funds for the church – which Vogel says has made things difficult for the church over the last few years.
According to Vogel, not only attracts members of the Santa Barbara church and residents but also people from Greek churches all the way from Los Angeles.
One of the major changes to this year’s event is the relocation to Chase Palm Park. In the past, the event was hosted at Oak Park.
The event will feature examples of Greek food, drinks, and pastries. Including gyros, loukoumades, hummus and pita bread, and spanakopita.
According to Vogel, most of the food at the event is made by volunteers and church members.
“One thing that’s amazing about our church is we have many many Greek ‘yayas,’ the grandmothers, who came from Greece and brought their recipes over,” she said.
The church tries different recipes and chooses the ones they like the most for the event.
Guests can also try different drinks including Greek coffee, imported beer, and soda. There is also a bar featuring Greek wine.
Other vendors include artists, clothes, jewelry, and more.
Guests can also visit the kid’s corner, which includes games, an inflatable bounce house, and face painting.
One of the guests included Allison Hovey, who attended the event with her husband and their two kids, who were getting their faces painted.
Hovey came to the event as a way to share her culture with her kids.
“I’m Greek. When I was a little kid growing up in New Jersey, we went to the Greek Festival every single year. So, it was a very important part of my family tradition. I want my kids to have the same thing,” Hovey said.
Cameron McNulty was playing rugby near the park when the festival was being set up and was curious about all the tents.
“I enjoy Greek food and the culture, so I tried to check it out and I did. It’s awesome,” McNulty said.
The festival will begin Friday from 2 pm to 9 pm and continue on Saturday from 11 am to 9 pm.
The festival will also feature professional Greek dancers and a segment where guests can learn Greek dancing. The class will be at 7 pm on Friday and 8 pm on Saturday.
Entry for the event is $5 per person but comes with a raffle ticket for each purchase. The raffle will include multiple prizes, including two-round trip tickets to Greece.
To learn more about the event, visit sbgreekfest.org.
