Land Rush is what begins "Winfield"....

Walnut Valley Festival 2003 (ariel view from the South)

The Walnut Valley Festival in Winfield officially opens on the Wednesday of the 3rd full weekend in September with Pre-Festival Workshops.

The interior gates are staffed and volunteers are checking armbands beginning Thursday for entrance to the festival grounds.

But as long-time festival goers know, the REAL festival begins the week BEFORE the festival opens with the LAND RUSH.


   

These are the two years that I participated in the Land Rush with my pals Jim and Jeff (in 2009); Jim and Juel (in 2010).  In the 2010 video, the front of Jim's white pickup is visible on the left side of this view as the campers are heading (in assigned numerical order) into the Walnut Grove (or West Campground.)  My van was parked under the streetlight just to the right of this view during the massive thunderstorms the night before.

The hard-core participants have gotten in line for this Land-Rush more than a week before this, at the end of August.

Once in line, the greetings to neighbors, the seeking out of old friends, and the picking of new and old tunes and story swaps begin....and continue throughout the festival.

I was able to arrive this year on the afternoon of Land Rush after leaving my home in Fort Collins at 3:18 am.   (more to come....)