Car show on Friday - total fun! Parade Saturday morning -…read moregood time for all! Two stages with local bands - listen and dance in public woot woot!! Food, crafts, and pony rides - what more could you want? Parking is tough so prepare to walk

I came here on Sunday. This was my first time in eagle river and at Bear Paw Festival. I thought…read morethis was an awesome event! The parking was free, but it took a while to find parking since there was so many people there. Admission was free as well! There were loads of food booths and there were all amazing. I was able to try the waffle, sweet fried pies, taste of Germany, and mac and cheese. + Waffles and Whatnot - Fruity Delight - Lightly sweetened crispy waffle and fruit toppings. Absolutely delicious! + Taste of Germany - Pork Schnitzel - Amazingly delicious! Fried, but not too oily. Breaded to perfection. Yum! + Mac and Cheese - Gourmet Mac - Phenomenal dish! Topped with reindeer sausage and Lay's original chips. + Sweet Fried Pies - Strawberry Pie - The crust was flakey and just the was i liked it. The strawberry filling was a little tart, but still delicious. Overall: I thought this was an amazing fair and would definitely come back next year!

Wife says " let's go to a Greek festival"? Shoot me…read morenow...stab me.. aaanything... is that like the renaissance fair ? The fur rendezvous ? The medieval festival..kids dressed up like Frodo Baggins? I'm thinking ...shit shit shit. , why doesn't a car break when I want it to , so I can stay home And work on a crisis instead Me, " I'd love to go" ( liar) Beer, got me started A good Greek gyro , got me walking Some baklava , and the second beer, got me into s fuzzy sugar high fuzzy zone. It was only 1.5 hr tour of the food, jewelry, books, raffles, and silent auction. All day( not worth it)( but 1.5 hrs....yrs sir!) But it was an easy 1.5 hr beer induced tipsy stroll past some good lunch and people watching..... and good live tunes. Show early.... parkings packed.

I'll admit that I have a bias in favor of church and charity fundraisers... I totally want to give…read morethem 5 stars. So it pains me to be so negative. I honestly feel bad; but man, it is what it is. Not great. There was a big buildup and a lot of anticipation for me since I've been wanting to go to this festival for years because it falls on a busy weekend. We finally made it and... well... MEH. To call it a festival is a huge overstatement. There's no activities (religious, cultural, carnival or otherwise) other than one tiny TINY bouncy house and sporadic live Greek music and dancing. This event really is all about food. Which ok, I'm down with food. I love me some fucking Greek food. But the food was, in a word, MEH. I mean if you plan an event based around food, you'd expect it would kill. But nope. Dry lamb, dry pastisio, dry moussaka, dry pita. Tzaziki that had so much garlic even I, lover of garlic, was reeling. The dolmathes were 3 for a dollar and tasted like they were the kind out of a can. Good, but damn, I coulda bought the can at Sam's myself for a much better value. The souvlaki and gyro portions were really small and the line was a half hour long- totally not worth it. The desserts were just ok. And the prices on ALL the food, except the spanakopita, were way out of line. Again, since it's a fundraiser, I was expecting that, but I was also expecting the food to be memorable. But 60 bucks for a mediocre meal just pisses me off. Parking and traffic was a huge hassle, waiting in seperate lines for each food item was a hassle. I'd like two hours of my life back, please. Defintely won't go back. I'm super bummed.

This market has thinned out a lot since my visit 13 years ago. Today when we went (a Sunday in…read moreJune), there was one total strip of retail and food vendors combined. The rest of the lot was amusement park rides. There was a booth to dress up and take photos with Alaskan huskies, ulu knives, handmade candles, fur, photography, jewelry, and my favorite: Christmas ornaments made of Alaskan clay. I had to get one and start my travel Christmas tree ornament collection. Paid parking across the street and they were actively ticketing!

Decent little market, but there really were not that many vendors as I was expecting. Only one row,…read morewith a majority of them having food. The carnival rides took up a majority of the parking lot, which limited how many vendors could possibly be there. With it only open a few months, I would expect more vendors to be out when the weather is nice. I honestly was pretty disappointed in how little they offered. There were a few decent stands, but the prices seemed to be pretty high compared to what was being offered and seemed to be more geared towards tourists rather than folks living in the area.

I'm only at 4 stars given the lack of food options. They weren't great and the limited vendors…read moreclosed down or ran out of food way too early. The $115/person for the VIP General Session was well worth it, despite not being able to use my food ticket in time. The VIP pass also comes with a t-shirt, pint glass, a growler, and 20 5 oz pours. That's 100 ounces, so you should leave feeling pretty good. The live music wasn't too bad and I'm guessing there were 40 or so beer vendors, so there was something here for everyone.

This year was the 20th annual event and featured products from more than 50 different Alaska…read morebreweries. Tickets went on sale a few months ago. A different ticket was needed for each of the different sessions on Friday and Saturday. A friend accidentally bought one for Saturday and was not able to use it when we tried to enter for the Friday evening session. Serious bummer. Doors opened promptly at 6:00 PM. Attendees were given a program listing some background on each of the breweries that were attending and the specifications of each of the beers and barleywines that they had on offer. A shotglass (pictured) with a three ounce line that was supposed to be the top for each sample and a booklet of thirty tickets. Most of the samples were one "ticket" but a few of them were two or even three. Inside, it got crowded pretty quickly. Within an hour, there was enough room to walk around through the crowds. But no one ran out of beer, which was great. I managed to drink 24 of my 30 tickets before I had to sit down and rest for a bit. In those 90 minutes, I had a few good ones and a few that I would never actually pay for. Including King Street Brewing Company (Pilsner), California Cider Company (Hard Apple Cider), Pyramid Breweries (Hefeweizen), Shocktop (Chocolate Wheat), Last Frontier Brewing Company (24 Karat Gold Lager), Silver Gulch Brewing Company (Coldfoot Pilsner), 21st Amendment Brewery (Hell of High Watermelon). My favorite overall was Alaskan Brewery's White Ale - I went back for seconds. This was also my choice later, when we were out and about drinking and eating in Alaska. There wasn't much for food, though a vendor downstairs was selling something. I'd recommend that you bring your own, such as a string of pretzels as a necklace. A live band was playing music, loudly. Maybe too loudly. We shouldn't have to shout to be heard by the guy/gal standing next to us, knowwhatImean? The venue was pretty good, but the bathrooms were downstairs. Beer festival, folks! Lots of people need to be making room for more beer and they probably shouldn't be negotiating stairs or an escalator. Know what I mean? There was also a coat check downstairs, so that you could be comfortable inside without having to drag around your winter gear. It is January, after all! All told, a super event and I had a grand time. Looking forward to doing it again!

Christmas is one of my favorite times of the year. Alaska is an awesome place to be this season…read more The Anchorage Christmas Events are definitely something you wouldn't want to miss. The celebration started of as early as November when the Christmas Arts & Crafts emporium was held. There were local bazaars featuring awesome goods from Alaskan artisit and crafters. There's also a festival Christmas train aboard the Alaska railroad. All sorts of Festivals like the North Pole Christmas in Ice, Candle Lighting Festival, Festival of Lights,Winter Arts Faire and many more are here for everyone to enjoy,whether it's the kids or the kids at heart.

We had fun, it took about 10 mins to walk through and see everything. There's lots of tables to…read moresit at when you get to the end. Lots of booths to do face painting and crazy hair, lots of food options too. Downside is it's all by tickets so you have to go see how many tickets you need for food first so you don't buy too many. There's tons of photo ops and they have characters walking around to take photos with. Everyone was super friendly and nice, made it even better. Usually I get photos done professionally by the people there but that is kinda spendy so I skipped it this year. I'd definitely go next year.

Great place for kids to trick or treat indoors specially if it's really cold outside. It was well…read moreorganized and had people doing parking/crossing street duties. My son had a lot of fun, so did my wife and I. Would definitely go again next Halloween!!!

I took an alcohol ink class here and really enjoyed myself. It is a small studio tucked away in…read moreSpenard. There was four of us so it was nice and intimate and a lot of interaction with our teacher unlike other painting companies in town. Alcohol ink was new to me, but I'm fairly pleased with my outcome! The host was vibrant, talkative and engaging. She let us play and test the waters with the inks before diving right in to create our masterpiece. She offers so many different classes; alcohol ink, wood burning, water color, acrylics, terrarium building, succulent classes. I really look forward to joining in on another class. The wood burning in particular sounds fun! Price range is $50-60 which is about average. It's totally worth it to me because of the smaller class size and intimate atmosphere about it. Did I mention it was a sip and paint?! Yep! She provides snacks and wine! I divulged in the Moscato :)

I am giving this company another review as the owner contacted me on Sept 4th and apologized…read moreprofusely about the Alaska State painting. She indicated that the instructor was new and she was hesitant to utilize her again after that event. She did give me a full reimbursement and extended the invitation to give the studio another try. I have not yet went back as I have recently returned from vacation, but I will. Honestly, just having the owner make contact and offer as well as comply with a full reimbursement speaks volumes. There could be a lot of other ways this was handled but I think the owner did it right.

This festival occurs once a year, usually at the end of July…read more The block near Snow City is shut down and everyone feasts and listens to live music. And...it's free! It's a great way to bump into everyone you know. Snow City is usually the main entity running the show, but other organizations often chip in. There are often lots of kid-friendly activities. Bummer for me: when I hear "BBQ" I think of smoked meats. The BBQ plates here are hamburgers. It's rough growing up in the south and then leaving.

Not a huge market this early in the growing season, but each stall was run by delightful people and…read morewe walked away with some of the best tasting tomatoes EVER. The music by the Traveling Fleas was also so much fun!

I'm enjoying adventurous Alaska & part of that is the essence of good eats especially with fruits &…read morevegetables. Although this is a small farmer's market, all you need are a few stalls with excellent stuff & you have a simple salad, a delightful dessert or a versatile vegetable fricassee. There's stalls with fine flowers, healthful honey, a parade of pickled items like garlic & other pickled delicacies, marvelous mushrooms, various vegetables & flavorful fruits. Most take credit card. I learned about pink as wells as lion's mane mushrooms. And I know that $2 for a bunch of orange beets with vitamin filled beet greens to boot is a showstopper. Don't even get me started on $3 giant leeks. I could eat just those with toast points. While it may not be for you, nobody gets more excited or fanatical about a festive farmer's market.