Adios, Amigos! Waco's Margarita & Salsa Fest Will End Its Run

All good things must come to an end, and such is the case for the annual Margarita & Salsa Festival in Waco, Texas.

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Sadly, the 24 year tradition has ended.

Margarita & Salsa Festival

Shortly before moving to Central Texas in the summer of 2017, I took to Google to see what kinds of events were happening in and around Waco. I saw the Margarita & Salsa Festival was an annual event, and I knew my wife would be excited because margaritas and salsa are two of her favorite things.

The fact that they had margaritas and salsa was great, but add some live music from top name artists and I knew we'd be back year after year.

Pandemic

The end of the festival happened all too suddenly and almost without notice. The COVID-19 pandemic hit and forced its cancelation in both 2020 and 2021. We always thought that it'd be back after the pandemic but unfortunately it's not.

The Waco Tribune-Herald reports that the Margarita & Salsa Festival that had taken place every year since 1996 has ended after 24 years. Wes Allison, CEO and President of the Extraco Events Center, confirms the festival won't be back, saying:

It is over. The last one was in 2019 and it hadn’t made money for some time. There was too much risk and not enough reward. It had a nice run

It was fun while it lasted.

Margarita & Salsa

Here's a fun fact you may not be aware of: a Texas Country favorite helped get the Margarita & Salsa Festival started in 1996. In fact, the festival started as a fundraiser for the Arthritis Foundation. Pat Green's mother, Patsy Burgess, suffered from arthritis and the festival was a way to raise some money to help support the foundation.

Live music with a margarita and salsa competition got the local restaurants involved and it all just grew from there. The festival would transition to a scholarship fundraiser following the departure of both Green and the Arthritis Foundation in 2012.

As I stated at the top, all good things must come to an end. It is with a heavy heart that I say adios to the Margarita & Salsa Festival. I'm just glad I was able to make it out there a couple of times.

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Top 20 Restaurants Central Texans Wish Would Come to Temple

A while back, I asked the good people of Temple if they could picture a good restaurant to fill the lot on North General Bruce Drive where the soon to be torn down Long John Silver's stood.

This was before it was announced that a Dutch Bros. Coffee location would open there (which was one of the places I predicted as a contender in our article).

So now Dutch Bros. is open in that spot, but the responses to my survey were interesting because they paint a picture of just how diverse Temple's population is. People recommended some familiar restaurants with locations in the surrounding area, but also a few I'd never even heard of.

Here are the top 20 results of the survey. Let's see what the good people of Temple are craving!