Our Monthly Picks | October 2023
Portland Greek Festival
October 6th-8th | Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Cathedral
The Portland Greek Festival is celebrated as the largest Greek Festival on the west coast with more than 15,000 people attending. This cultural experience features Greek food, music, dance, and shopping! The Agora – the Greek marketplace – features imported merchandise, clothing, jewelry, icons, flokati rugs, and cookbooks.
www.portlandgreekfestival.com
Portland Film Festival
October 12th-16th | Theaters Across Portland
Portland Film Festival is a non-profit organization dedicated to nurturing filmmakers and audiences and celebrating a good story’s power. The festival focuses on the people, ideas, technology, skills, and artistry behind filmmaking and provides both entertaining and educational opportunities to the public. The festival is anchored with outdoor screenings, offering its filmmakers one of the largest audiences on the West Coast. Portland Film Festival is Portland, Oregon’s largest film festival by filmmakers for filmmakers.
www.portlandfilm.org
Portland Fermentation Festival
October 19th | Ecotrust – Natural Capital Center
Celebrate pickling season and talk to fellow fermenters, exchange cultures and recipes, get advice from local food fermentation enthusiasts, attend fermentation demos, and sample everything from sour pickles, miso, and natto to cheeses, long-fermented bread, hard cider, and kombucha.
www.portlandfermentationfestival.com
The Spirit of Halloweentown
All Month Long! | Courthouse Plaza in St. Helens
It’s no “Legend of Sleepy Hollow” or “Night of the Living Dead,” but one time back in the 1990s, the lovely Oregon town of St. Helens was overrun by something worse than zombies or vampires — a Hollywood movie crew! The historic town of St. Helens, located 45 minutes from Portland, celebrates Halloween all month long with haunted tours, costume contests, and more.
www.spiritofhalloweentown.com
Giant Pumpkin Regatta
October 22nd | Lake of the Commons in Tualatin
Just when you think you’ve seen everything, you realize you’ve been missing the West Coast Giant Pumpkin Regatta since 2004. This cherished local event returns to the Tualatin Commons every October with a series of races. The series is exactly what it sounds like, consisting of costumed racers piloting a gaggle of gigantic gourds through a watercourse on Tualatin Commons Lake. The event kicks off with a giant pumpkin parade and weigh-off, followed by a full day of pumpkin paddlers plying the shallow lake in 1,000-pound pumpkin boats.
www.tualatinoregon.gov/pumpkinregatta