Something big, hairy, and a little bit scary is coming to Estes Park this weekend.
The Bigfoot Days Festival lumbers into town with a lineup that includes TV celebrities, Front Range musicians, and maybe even a few beastly sightings.
The festivities kick off Friday evening with the Bigfoot BBQ, a ticketed dinner at the Estes Park Events Complex beginning at 6 p.m. with a cash bar cocktail hour with appetizers, and dinner at 7 p.m. The dinner will give festivalgoers a chance to rub elbows and take pictures with celebrity explorers including Dr. Mireya Mayor, Bryce Johnson, and Biko Wright of Expedition Bigfoot. Tickets for the event are $100 for those 12 and older, and $50 for ages 6-11 and can be found here.
The main festival begins in downtown’s Bond Park at 10 a.m. Saturday on the Main Stage with Tumbledown Shack — a five-piece tribute band from Northern Colorado that specializes in recreating the music and spirit of the Grateful Dead.
American actor, producer, and paranormal researcher Bryce Johnson, who serves as the expedition operations manager on Expedition Bigfoot, will give a talk at Town Hall at 10:30 a.m.
The popular Bigfoot Calling Contest will take place on the Main Stage at 12:30 p.m. Participants will be split into two groups — 12 and younger, and 13 and older — and Bigfoot celebrities will choose the winners.
Dr. Mireya Mayor will give a talk at the Park Theatre at 1 p.m. Mayor is a primatologist, anthropologist and National Geographic explorer who serves as the primary scientist for the Expedition Bigfoot team.
The band Stepmother Nature — a popular Estes Park band known for their high-energy “mountain funk” and electric soul sound — takes the Main Stage at 1:30 p.m.
“Bigfoot & Jeff”, a comedic duo who portray the humorous relationship between a National Park Ranger (Jeff) and Bigfoot will appear at Town Hall at 1:45 p.m.
Biko Wright, a former participant on the History Channel series “Alone”, and the newest member of the Expedition Bigfoot team, will give a talk at the Park Theatre at 2:15 p.m.
At 3:30 p.m the Park Theatre will host the first of two film screenings with the premiere of “The High Strangeness of Colorado’s Bigfoot”, a documentary by Alan Megargle and Ronald Meyer that explores the remote Colorado town of Church Creek and departs from the traditional quest to prove Bigfoot’s existence and instead investigates what the phenomenon actually is, according to a news release from festival organizers.
At 7 p.m. the Park Theatre will host the premiere of the second film called “Squatch” — a horror-thriller directed by Tom Chaney about a specialized team of Bigfoot hunters who venture deep into the wilderness to track down the legendary creature.
Both premieres will feature a red carpet arrival, photo and autograph opportunities with the actors, a live comedian set, a Q&A discussion panel with the directors and cast, concessions and drinks, a poster giveaway, merchandise, and more, according to the release.
Rob Hinkle, the town of Estes Park’s director of events and visitor services brought the Bigfoot Days Festival to Estes Park over 10 years ago after returning to the West from the East Coast where he had attended another Bigfoot Gathering, said the town’s current special events coordinator Maddie Hodge.
Hodge said the festival has proven so popular in Estes Park that as many as 9,000 festivalgoers are expected to attend this weekend.
