The Lake Worth Street Painting Festival

I'm headed up to the 22nd annual Lake Worth Street Painting Festival today. I'll share photos tomorrow. Lake Worth is a town that is very similar to Coconut Grove, only they do it right. Even the festival, my friend jokes, is done right: there are no gates keeping people out, no fees to get in, parking is free all over town, wherever you can find it, even in closed bank lots, city hall, wherever.

The streets are closed in the main shopping district and there are hundreds of artists painting masterpieces on every part of the streets. Tomorrow cars and rain and people will be all over the images as they fade away, but for this weekend once a year, it's an amazing thing. You actually watch the artists work, they start on Saturday and finish up on Sunday. This is the largest event of its kind.

There are food and drink vendors and continuous live music on the main stage at Cultural Plaza, and it all surrounds the streets of this small village, which has lots of everything - restaurants, newsstands, shoe repair shops, bars, a playhouse in the center of town and the beach with a great pier, right over the bridge.

It's something that would work in Coconut Grove if someone could figure out the logistics, I think our main problem in the past is that whenever it's been tried like during the Mad Hatter Festival - it's been rained out!