I only found out about this street fair because Waze sent me a traffic alert about Woodside Avenue…read morebeing closed. I found a few mentions of it online but no official website, it's apparently organized by the Queens Public Library and I did spot a table giving out free books. I uploaded some photos of online mentions of it to prove to Yelp it exists!
The street fair is small, maybe five blocks, and consists mostly of affordable jewelry, toys, clothing, shoes and bags. Some if was a dollar store nonsense, but other people were selling everything from rugs to pipes, incense to handmade magnets. The older woman buying a magnet made me smile, "I'm getting the STRAWBERRY, because they're in season". I mean, it's a magnet, but also, it's October.
I also saw a woman selling CBD products claiming to provide instant pain relief, another offering vegan soy based candles and soaps. I bought a cute over the shoulder travel bag for just $22.
There was the annoying T-Mobile truck, and an Escape to the Caribbean booth which seems a bit suspicious to me. USA Devanand Yoga Center was there. As well as Exit Realty....
But they also had bouncy castles for the kids on one of the side streets. It was cool seeing them underneath the elevated 7 line tracks.
Suddenly an older woman grabbed me and started rubbing my shoulders before directing me to a bunch of massage chairs (she was definitely someone's grandma, it was cool). I'm so primed to just so no but then I instantly thought, ya know what, I DO want a massage. $15 for 15 minutes, money well spent. They put a clean paper towel over the part of the chair my face rests on without me having to ask and were very friendly. It wasn't the best massage I've had, but it was great for the setting!
Food options were limited. Queen Big Candy Apples, Ecuadorian grilled corn, Cane Man (cane juice), Zeppole/funnel cake guy, Mozzarepas (mozzarella grilled in-between corn bread), cotton candy out of an adorable tiny pink truck, Panaderia Tlaxcalita - selling lemonade and fruit juices, the sausage and pepper guys, and Athens Delight doing lamb gyros, and beef and chicken kebabs. This was the place I ended up ordering a lamb gyro from, with lettuce, onions, tomato, and tzatziki sauce. For $10 this was super filling, I couldn't even finish it. It tasted a bit like sausage but sliced long and thin, really moist and flavorful.
The festival was a nice walk, a fun last minute thing to do, I definitely enjoyed myself. But right now it's small enough that I wouldn't tell people to make a pilgrimage for it. I'd like to see them bring more local restaurants from the area to sell their food, or even some of the regular street vendors who work in that area.
Two porta potties, pleasent surprise!
