Tampa's Cigar Heritage Festival

Hot off the heels of the Big Smoke, one must travel east to partake in this year’s seventh annual Tampa Cigar Heritage Festival. The event will kick off at 10:00 a.m. and will smoke away until 6:00 p.m. at Centennial Park, the Ybor City Museum State Park and surrounding streets.

The festival features cigar vendors and cigar-related items, live entertainment, a sports pavilion and activities at Ybor City Museum State Park, including cigar rolling demonstrations, guided tours, family entertainment and food. Here’s a breakdown of the events of the day:

·Cigar vendors and cigar related items vendors
·VIP Experience: a limited number of tickets will be sold to an exclusive area where VIPs can meet true legends from the cigar world, sample fine food and spirits from some of Tampa's best restaurants and liquor companies, and receive a goodie bag of sample cigars and novelties from the Tampa Bay's best cigar manufacturers
·Live entertainment stage with a cultural dancers and bands
·Sports Pavilion with live broadcasts of some of NCAA football's biggest games plus favorite game room activities including foosball, darts and billiards
·Ybor City Museum activities throughout the day including:
o Museum tours recounting Ybor City's cigar manufacturing past and multicultural heritage
o Children's activities
o Fresh Cuban bread
o Cigar rolling demonstrations
·Charity Beer Garden with proceeds benefiting the Ybor City Museum Society
·Food vendors from some of Tampa's best restaurants
·Ybor City Fresh Market with arts, crafts, produce, plants, and novelty vendors
·19th Street tea room, shops and galleries featuring handmade clothing and accessories, jewelry, pottery, glass and paintings.

Admission to this event is free (unless you’re willing to purchase an airline ticket just to get there). Since I have no current plans to travel to Florida this weekend, I’ll just have to light up a smoke in honor of the festival.