It’s the sticky-sweet weekend that Goleta families, businesses, artists and neighbors look forward to all year—the Lemon Festival at Girsh Park.
This year marked the 33rd Goleta Lemon Festival, hosted by the Santa Barbara South Coast Chamber of Commerce and presented by the Santa Barbara Airport. The two-day, family-friendly festival draws hundreds of thousands of attendees, including visitors, community leaders and elected officials.
Hundreds of booths dotted the fields of Girsh Park, from local banks to prominent non-profit organizations. Artists sold handmade jewelry and crafts, and food vendors attracted long lines of guests thirsty for lemonade and hungry for classic fair foods.
Goleta families who hold the Lemon Festival as local tradition make up the bulk of the crowd. Saturday marked Goleta Resident Wendy Ino’s 12th time at the Lemon Festival. She also volunteers, and said had been at Girsh Park since 6:30 a.m. that morning helping with setup.
“It’s my favorite Goleta tradition,” Ino said. “I think it’s something we all look forward to every year, we all get to see each other.”
A local lineup of bands occupy the main stage all day with live music, only interrupted by the iconic lemon meringue pie eating contest at noon. The pie eating contest is the main event, with prominent locals like Goleta city councilmembers James Kyriaco, Luz Reyes- Martin, District Attorney John Savrnoch and K-Lite 101.7 radio host Catherine Remak judging the contestants.
This year, it was a tie between sisters Amber and Jade Dean, who came all the way from Lompoc for the Lemon Festival.
“We came out of pie eating retirement for this one,” Dean said, her face smeared with meringue. “Victory feels… so sweet.”
Opposite the main stage was a lemony wonderland for Goleta kids, featuring bouncy houses, trampolines and lemon-themed mini golf.
The festival celebrates Goleta’s rich agricultural history with lemons. The town’s residential neighborhoods and shopping centers were once peaceful lemon groves that stretched on for miles on end. The festival began with a small street fair in 1949. It’s been operating on a large scale since 1991.
“This is such a great event for Goleta,” Ino said. “It’s about seeing the community come out and all our friends having a great time.”
