Last year, the relaunch of Pebble Beach Food & Wine went big.
Big as in six football fields worth of Tasting Pavilions, complete with all the top-shelf chefs and boutique wineries of years past, but also new over-the-top experiential installations by upscale tequila, Portugal wine group, whisky and glacial water purveyors, among others. Big like waves of name-check mixologists, scores of events and dozens of world-class coastal venues. Big like a massive James Beard presence, big like 90 nonprofits benefiting by the fact it’s now overseen by Pebble Beach Foundation, and big like 6.3 tons of food donated.
The crazy things about that: 1) Year 2.0 of PBFW 2.0 aims to expand, with a bumper crop of fine-tuned and/or fresh programming; and 2) The April redux might not be the biggest event on the local calendar this month, or even that weekend.
That’s how XXXL the Sea Otter Classic gets at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca, with nearly 10,000 athletes and 74,000 fans every year — racing, stunting and slaloming, but also camping, shopping, eating, drinking and listening to live music.
Those two major draws lead the upcoming docket, serving as an unofficial launch to event season around the Monterey Peninsula.
Here appear more on those and Local Getaways’ other favorites, including a whale of a festival at historic Fisherman’s Wharf.
Featured photo from Pebble Beach Food & Wine Facebook.
April 4
The mural-slathered Art Park in Sand City serves as home base — with blocks of muraled buildings surrounding it, begging for a nocturnal walking tour — for a treasure trove of eat, drink, interactive art and live music. Participating presenters run 20+ deep, and range from ice cream pioneers Moonscoops to farmers market pioneers Everyone’s Harvest to craft brew house pioneers Post No Bills to pinball pioneers Lynn’s Arcade. Given all the groundbreakers, it’s safe to anticipate something fresh — and, more likely, several somethings. Songs Hot Box Harry Taught Us leads the performance docket.
April 6
Call this the anti-Pebble Beach Food & Wine, in a good way. While PBFW knocks down ticket rates for locals priced out last year, this very local-centric event has long been the best value for a region loaded with strolling eat-and-drink diversions. The depth and range of quality, family-run, international restaurants and caterers — paired with craft beer, local wine, live music and a legit silent auction — make $50 a dynamic deal.
April 7
Three jazz luminaries unite in a supremely rare and noteworthy collaboration, performing two shows in Santa Cruz in response to demand. (Please check ahead before committing, as they may both sell out.) Mehldau coaxes sublime contemporary jazz from the piano, mixing exploration, classical romanticism and pop. McBride navigates from jazz to R&B to pop to rock to hip-hop along hisnine-time GRAMMY-winning journey. Gilmore thumps away in his unique drummer/composer style, making the finest musicians in the world that much more compelling.
April 10-13
The Woodstock of Bicycles plays the hits (and then some): road races, enduro races, gravel races, “gravity” races, grand prix races, dual slalom races, single speed races and Fuego XL races, plus special bike trick spotlights and the must-see-and-shop expo infield, which stacks demos, gear, tools, tech and merch. Camping, live music and curated food and drink all help contribute to the singular scene around the historic Laguna Seca Race Track area.
April 10-13
The chef talent would be enough — think industry-shaking souls like Alice Waters, Jonathan Waxman, Maneet Chauhan, Vijay Kumar and Kiran Verma and, oh, 125 more where they came from. New inclusive, and immersive, “walk-around” tastings have widened, fitting with an ambitious plan to make sumptuousness even richer. Having last year’s experience, event organizer a21’a first partnering with Pebble Beach, is crucial, according to a21 founder and CEO Brett Friedman. “We’re here to create lasting moments for our audience, to make sure we’re doing something uniquely different, and to have fun,” he says. “It’s a word I harp on. I like the simplicity of it. We’re selling experiences so people have fun, and leave saying, ‘Man, that was awesome.’”
April 12 & 13
This is no fluke. It’s the 15th annual — with dozens of marine-related interactive exhibits, research and rescue boats available for public tours, and the loaded lineup of live entertainment and epicurean options to prove it. A dozen musical acts include Wave Tones, I Cantori di Carmel and Kuumbwa Jazz Honor Band. An annual symposium taps knowledge from world-renowned marine experts. The Monterey Bay Plein Air Painters Association paint marine landscapes and talk process throughout the sprawling layout. Life-size whales appear in inflatable and skeleton form. And dozens of participating science- and advocacy-centric orgs — Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, Moss Landing Marine Lab and O’Neill Sea Odyssey among them — share knowledge.
April 13
Six and a half decades of songs, sketches and characters — from alumni including Catherine O’Hara, Tina Fey, Keegan-Michael Key, Amber Ruffin, Stephen Colbert, Tim Meadows, Bill Murray, Tim Robinson, Joan Rivers, Eugene Levy, Adam McKay and more — leap to life by way of an all-star ensemble at The Sunset Cultural Center in Carmel-by-the-Sea.
April 26 & 27
Who can teach Mozart anything? Well, Haydn did! Franz Joseph Haydn, Mozart’s instructor, nudged the technical limits of in his time with a relatively new solo instrument in his Cello Concerto in D Major. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s memorable Eine Kleine Nachtmusik (“a little nocturne”), meanwhile, presents a piece of light entertainment by a staggering musical genius. And German composer Franz Schreker’s Chamber Symphony is an emotional kaleidoscope of hyper-Romanticism and Modernist harmonie. That insight comes from Sunset Center’s preview, which adds that the sequence of music “challenges us to hear familiar classical delights with new ears.”
April 27
This marathon is a world-class race set in a world-class place, but there’s really no contest here, at least when it comes to similar 26.2-ers. Sorry, Boston Marathon, Paris Marathon, Honolulu Marathon or even Amsterdam Marathon. The OMG around the nation’s first nationally-designated Scenic Highway (Highway 1, along which the entire epic unfolds), makes this #1 according to runner voting, and that is all buoyed by enthusiastic dancers, musicians and rooting parties along the way, including the pianist at the top of Hurricane Hill.
