My husband and I love Septemberfest! It's one of the most well-run festivals in the area. The best…read morepart is that parking is free and super simple. You park at one of the high schools, and the shuttle will transport you to the festival. Shuttles run so frequently that every time I've gone I've never had to wait for one. The festival also has free admission! The only thing you have to pay for is food, drinks, and games. The concerts are also free to listen to. We come here every year and it's definitely worth the trip. The food options change every year, and we haven't been disappointed yet. Everything is delicious and we get try different cuisines without committing to going to the restaurant.

Returned to Septemberfest 2025. Added more photos. Food tent had more vendors selling food. All the…read morefood was delicious. Ride area was expanded with more rides.

Another typical suburban festival -- carnival rides, mixed with music stages, and food tents, and…read moresometimes, business vendors. To be honest, I enjoy em, and this one, called Buffalo Grove Days, or what the cool kids call it -- "BG Days" is A-OK with me. I do like how this is well laid-out. There are shuttle buses to take/drop you to where you need to be. I didn't bother looking for parking and ended up parking at wherever the Buffalo Grove Days parking signs pointed to, which ended up being at the Buffalo Grove Metra station, which was free. I do have to say that the offering of carnival rides BG Days have, compared to the other copious amounts of suburban festivals, was less. It was actually hard to use up our 22-tickets (this year it was 22-tickets for $25) and I'm glad I didn't go with the unlimited rides for $25 each. The carnival games included pop-a-shot, lucky ducks, and other typical games. Food-wise, the food tent was actually pretty big. Lots to choose from, from pizza, to Mexican, to Dairy Queen. Food prices were A-OK and definitely not like the $40 for a piece of lettuce prices you'd find at the Taste of Chicago. BATHROOM REVIEW: The couple of port-a-potties we visited were actually pretty clean! Many to choose from and there was no line on the evening we went. Sit or squat? It's still a port-a-potty after all. Squat.

Free to enter. There are various shuttles (bona-fide school busses!) to bus you from parking lots…read moreto the fairgrounds and back. Tip: Make sure to note whether your bus says COOK CO or LAKE CO on the side window so you can get back on the right bus route. Bring chairs or blankets for the parade (starts at 1). The north side of Lake Cook has craft fairs and food, while the south has rides and games (and a few food options - mostly cotton candy, elephant ears, corndogs). Ride tickets amount to about $1.25, and kiddie rides are typically 2-3 tickets. There are two sections of rides: the kiddie ones and adult. Food vendors included a lot of pizza (Nancy's, Wapaghettis...), Jersey Mike's, JD's BBQ, Culvers..also mac and cheese, chicken tenders, burritos, pretzels, etc from various other vendors. There's a covered picnic area to chill and take a break from the sun and heat, as well as a misting tent. Prices weren't TERRIBLE. My steak burrito was $7 and my custard sundae was $3. Pop cans are $1.50 and water is about $2.50. You can bring your own beverages, water, coolers, whatever (non-alc), too. There's an abundance of portra johns, and we even saw some being cleaned! Clean sh!tters?! Score!

This was great and it was bad at the same time. I don't go to too many festivals so when saw this…read morewas going to be in downtown Palatine, just a few miles from our home, we opted to go. The disappointment was the number of trucks. There were about seven or eight. Four or five of them had food, one had drinks, two had desserts. I had food from two of them - I had a pulled pork sandwich at the Best Truckin' BBQ and the three tacos combo at Mario's Cart. The food was good, but the waits were very long. I went to the BBQ cart early and didn't get my sandwich for 40 minutes. And, when I went to Mario's Cart a couple of hours later, even though I walked right up to the window, there were about 30 people waiting for theirs to be served. There were too few trucks for the number of people who showed. I later learned there was another Food Truck Festival in Elgin at the same time. I suppose that is where the rest of the trucks were. The great part of the fest was the band. Really, it was a separate event at the Palatine Bandshell, but it took place as soon as they closed the trucks. The band was called "Morry Sochat & The Special 20's" - they played a mixture of Blues Rock and Blues. I have to say they were really great. The musical talent on the stage was really wonderful. We went with a large group of friends and even ran into some people we knew while we were there. The music was great fun. The festival should/could have been better.

Another year, another Itasca Fest…read more We live minutes from the Itasca border, so getting here is a breeze. And so is parking -- though you do have to be willing to walk a block or two. But downtown Itasca is lovely. I think most people, if they drove through this little village of 8,300 people, would not expect very big happenings. But Itasca Fest is pretty impressive for the size of the town. Free admission, and there's a huge carnival, a big tent set up with plenty of tables for noshing at and a stage with live entertainment, bingo, a rummage sale, educational events for the kids (including interacting with wild animals) and of course plenty of greasy food to go around. Last year, there was a super-cool NASA trailer set up where you could play with various gadgets and learn about life in a spaceship. Honestly, I enjoyed it as much as the kid with us did. Unfortunately, no NASA trailer this year. Still, four stars for a solidly good time nearby and on the cheap.

Considering the majority of my big fat Italian family lives in Itasca, it's shocking that this was…read moremy first time here. And let's be honest, I came for the Bingo. We started here on Sunday night, the last night of the fest. Bingo is run by the Lyons Club and they do a great job of keeping the natives restless while having some personality. The guy working our row was awesome, was so friendly. Cards are 3 for a dollar and my dreams were crushed when I saw they were the sliders and not the stamp kind of cards. I was really looking forward to having a big purple stamper to dot up my cards. Each round of Bingo could win somewhere between $50-$70 but alas, I didn't have any luck. The final round was a cover-all game and cards were $1 each. The jackpot for that final round was above the $200 mark. In order to entertain us before the final round (and possibly because it was the last night of the fest, we were able to get as many free drinks as we wanted before the last game). I spent about $13 total on an hour of Bingo, which I don't consider to be too much of a loss. Did I really just write about Bingo for a full paragraph? Back to the fest. They have about 8-10 vendors for food including local restaurants. Rides are plentiful here, I couldn't even guess how many. Upwards of a dozen? Games were also not scarce, and they had all the classic games. I ended up winning myself a stuffed monkey. It's what every 29 year old adult female needs. I can only compare Itasca fest to Bartlett fest or Naperville's Rib Fest. I would probably prefer Itasca fest over both because it has WAY more games and rides than Bartlett, and isn't as crowded as Rib Fest. It's a new summer tradition.

Waited in line for food for 30 minutes only to be told, they only except cash or Venmo what are we…read moredrug dealers? Left it don't need it not coming back again

This was really a lot of fun. We got to hear two bands - the first "Wedding Band", was a pretty…read moregood cover band. They all wore t-shirt tuxedos (a little tacky), but their music was good. At 10 pm the headliner came out - they were called the "Cherry Poppin' Daddies" out of Oregon somewhere. The name put us off a little (no- a lot). Their music was what I would call "suggestive" but their style could be classified as swing. This was not what a Saturday night crowd of several thousands wanted to hear. Not sure why Palatine chose them and not a rock band. Needless to say, a lot of people left during their performance. Now, the festival itself was great - Palatine festivals always get a great turn out. There were the regular information booths from insurers, politicians and window replacement companies. The food tents represented the best of Palatine - I had Pad Thai from Siri Thai and a hamburger from Heybeck's. Both were outstanding. Finally, the beer garden was packed. We set up chairs by the stage, but trans-versed the crowds to get beer several times. All I can say is there was no way to get to the beer tent easily. Oh, it was a straight shot. But there were so many people and the music was so loud, in many cases you had to push your way through. The craziest thing was the way they cordoned off the beer garden. The main entry was about a 30 foot long metal plank on the south of the area. There was one other entry point to the east. The porta- potties were set up to the northwest of the beer garden which I think makes sense. But, there was no entry between the two. In order to go from one section to the other, you had to leave the beer garden from either the south or the east, then walk all of the way around until you got there. It was not convenient. But, overall, it was a really good street fest which I will definitely go to again next years. My hope is that the people who put it together take these two points into consideration. If they corrected these, it would be a 5 star experience.

After experiencing the difficulty of getting near the launch site of the fireworks shows, this year…read moreI decided to watch Itasca's firework show from a distance in Elk Grove Village. Though there was still quite a line off 53 and onto Biesterfield and Arlington Heights Roads, this is still much better than what I've experienced closer where the fireworks are launched. It's a good idea to allow a minimum of 30 min before and 30 min after for heavy congestion though even an hour after the show, the traffic was still quite heavy on the main roads. The show itself really dazzled with both a higher frequency of fireworks than many nearby spots as was a larger size fireworks. This spanned a large array of different firework types though I wish there was a little more variety in the colors available. Regardless, even from over a mile away, the show was amazing and well worth the drive nearby. It's still crowded in the surrounding towns and there were a substantial number of lines at local businesses like McDonalds who were serving food. Overall, great fireworks show to watch -- even if you're not experiencing it directly at Hamilton Lakes.

Great shot with lots of beautiful and very patriotic colors and styles of designs above our heads…read moregoing off, but was a little too short.

Sadly, as others have shared, there weren't a lot of strawberry items here as there have been at…read morepast festivals. However, I can always count on Enzo & Lucia's for a cool, themed cocktail, like a frozen strawberry daiquiri, in this case. Other "on theme" items we saw were chocolate dipped strawberries (dark chocolate is my favorite), strawberry donuts, strawberry Nutrl, Smithwick's strawberry brew, and chocolate strawberry kabobs. One Greek food vendor had a strawberry frozen yogurt with baklava that was very refreshing in the heat. A beer mimosa at Buffalo Creek Brewing hit the spot too, and it's great to be able to cool off inside, even with our pup. We are always thankful for the parking at Long Grove Community Church for a $5 donation - totally worth it. And the people working the parking lot are so friendly. Thank you to the Village of Long Grove and an army of volunteers, first responders, and people it takes to make these festivals available.

$5 to park with The Lions, $7 to park in the lot by Buffalo Creek Brewing, used to be free (first…read morecome first serve). $7 to enter the festival, used to be a suggested donation, now it's required. So you are already out the 12 to 14 bucks plus gas and you have not even done anything yet. Interestingly enough, Buffalo Creek Brewing was pretty chill just outside the festival and did not have a booth at the festival either; but was a welcome respite from the crowds. FYI - Buffalo beers in plastic cups are allowed to take with you when a festival is going on. If you are coming for music, scope the schedule out ahead of time because they tend to do theme nights, this year Friday was modern, Saturday was classic rock, and Sunday was country. There were a few niche "strawberry" type featured items from some vendors, but for the most part, this was more of a straight up street fest. You are allowed to bring lawn chairs for the live music and many do. Several food types available, BBQ, Brats, Grilled Cheese, Quesadillas, Nachos, Chinese, burgers, hot dogs, etc. Vendor beverages featured beer, seltzers, NA, and sangria. Years past, I think you had to buy tickets to get food and drink and this year they seem to be shying away from that practice (thank gawd). We usually linger longer, but this year I think we left a little earlier than we expected.

2024 Review! This is…read morethe third year my partner and I have been to the Taste of Roselle! The festival is the first weekend in August every year on Friday evening and all day Saturday/Sunday. They have a mix of food vendors, artisan tents, and carnival rides. There is all live music each evening with 3-4 bands rotating timeslots. The entire event spans on Main Street from Park St to Roselle Rd. Each year we have gone, there have been some consistent food vendors but always some new! They always have Doctor Dogs, Italian Pizza Kitchen, and Pollyanna serving beers, seltzers, and some of Lynfred's wines. The first booth we stopped at was Chicago Culinary Kitchen out of Palatine. Their menu offered a variety of BBQ style sandwiches with unique flavors. My partner got the Pit Beef Sandwich ($17). Forewarning, the horseradish sauce did not disappoint on the spice level and meat was tasty! The second booth we stopped at was Aunt Tina's which offers souther style cuisine. They had a "tasting menu" where all items were $6; I got the mac and cheese as well as cornbread fritters. Mac and Cheese was creamy and hit the spot. The cornbread fritters I would pass in next time.

Lots of vendors and good entertainment. Went for the beer and music. The food is super expensive…read morefor what you get in my opinion. I did share a Mexican plate with my wife and it was very good.