Hahira Honeybee Festival 2026: Dates, Parade Route, Parking and What to Expect

By Ricky Browning — September 2026 · Updated Sept. 18, 2026

If you live in Hahira, you do not need me to tell you the Honeybee is coming. You can feel it: the booth lines get chalked on the sidewalks, the “Busy Bees” are in the last weeks of a planning cycle that started back in March, and every family within a half-hour’s drive starts negotiating who is bringing the wagon.

What is genuinely hard to find, every single year, is the practical stuff in one place — what time the parade actually starts, which roads close, where to leave the truck, and what is happening on the weekdays before the big Saturday. So this is that. Everything below comes from the Hahira Honeybee Festival Committee’s own site and the race registration page, checked the week of Sept. 14. If something changes, the committee’s site and Facebook page are the final word.

When is the 2026 Hahira Honeybee Festival?

The 2026 Hahira Honeybee Festival runs Monday, Sept. 28 through Saturday, Oct. 3. Weekday events are small and community-minded — a breakfast, a walk, a lunch concert. The festival proper, with the vendors and the crowds, is Friday and Saturday, and Saturday is the day almost everyone means when they say “the Honeybee.”

Here is the whole week, straight from the committee’s event pages:

One scheduling note for football families: per the schedules in our Valdosta & Lowndes 2026 preview, both the Wildcats and the Vikings have home games on Friday, Oct. 2. The fish fry serves 4:30 to 8, so it is doable to eat in Hahira and still make kickoff — just do not expect Main Street to be quick to get out of.

What time is the parade, and what is the route?

The Honeybee Festival Parade steps off at noon on Saturday, Oct. 3, with a posted window of 12 to 2 p.m., and runs about a mile east down Main Street (GA 122) from behind Food Lion at West Park Street and Union Road to Hahira Middle School at Nelson Street. Main Street and Stanfill are closed 12 to 2 p.m., side streets off Main are closed, and US 41 is detoured while it runs. The committee bills it as the largest non-holiday parade in the South, and the Shriners have been in it since the first one.

Everything else about the parade is in our parade route guide: an interactive map, when the front reaches each corner, the best spots and the shady side, why US 41 gets detoured, how to get out afterward, and the rules and entry form if you want to be in it.

Where do you park for the Honeybee Festival?

On Saturday, the easy answer is Hahira Elementary School. The committee runs free parking in the HES lot off Hagan Bridge Road and Claudia Drive, with a free shuttle bus from the school to the Dollar General downtown. The shuttle runs until just after the parade, so if you plan to stay for the 4 p.m. quilt drawing, you will be walking back or timing it earlier. Extra handicap parking, with a decal, is along the railroad tracks on Railroad Street between West Park Street and Main Street. The parking details are on the committee’s directions and parking page.

The reason to take the shuttle seriously is scale. Hahira had 3,384 people in the 2020 census. The committee’s own history page estimates 30,000 to 50,000 visitors come to town for the parade and the vendors. Even if the real number lands at the low end, that is roughly nine times the population of the city arriving on one Saturday, on a downtown that is a few blocks long. Street parking near Main fills early, and once the noon closures go in, moving a vehicle anywhere near the route is a problem until after 2.

If you are coming from Valdosta, leave earlier than feels necessary — and gas up first. Our neighbor-reported Gas Finder is the quickest way to see who has the cheapest price on the way up US 41 or I-75.

What is there to do besides the parade?

Two full days of vendors, a Kid Zone, a fish fry, a 5K and a quilt raffle. The arts and crafts are the backbone of the festival — the committee is advertising more than 250 vendors this year, and all booth slots and all food vendor spots are already full. If you are a crafter who missed the window, there is a wait list at hhbartsandcrafts@hotmail.com; Kid Zone applications were still posted as of mid-September.

A few of the smaller events are worth knowing about, because they are the ones people miss:

• The Kick-Off Breakfast (Monday, 7–9 a.m., the Depot) is free and open to everybody, no tickets. The committee sends special invitations to the Teachers of the Year, the HES poster contest winners, community leaders and local farmers. The menu changes, but it is hot and local; the grits are cooked in-house, and the honey on the table is from local hives. No to-go plates.
• The Senior Walk (Tuesday, 7–8 a.m.) is hosted by the Hahira Lions Club as a Strides for Diabetes walk. All ages are welcome, medical personnel will be on hand for blood pressure checks, and there is a small snack afterward. Questions go to Shannon Kingston at 229-834-2306.
• The Brown Bag Luncheon (Wednesday, 11–2, the Depot stage) is an open-air concert that honors the Teachers of the Year from the four feeder schools — HES, HMS, Pine Grove Elementary and Pine Grove Middle — along with local farmers and Hahira business leaders. Bring a chair and your own lunch.
• The Historical Society Fish Fry (Friday, 4:30–8 p.m., 116 E. Lawson St.) is $14 a plate, catered by Sam Gay, and it supports the Hahira Historical Society, which also offers tours and takes donations of local artifacts. Membership is $15 a family per year.
• The 5K (Saturday, 8 a.m.) starts at the Community Center, 215 Randall St., with the 1-mile fun run at 9. Online registration closes at 7:45 the morning of; race-day sign-up opens at 6:45. Packet pickup is Friday 4:30–6 at the Community Center or race morning. Shirts were only guaranteed for 5K entries by Sept. 20, so sign up this week if you want one.
• The quilt drawing (Saturday, 4 p.m.) is for a quilt Nan Boyd hand-sews for the committee every year. All proceeds go to the community.

Who runs the festival, and where does the money go?

An all-volunteer nonprofit, the Hahira Honeybee Festival Committee — the “Busy Bees” — which is not a City of Hahira entity, though the city supports it with services and employees. The committee meets the third Tuesday of every month from March through September at the Hahira Courthouse, 6 p.m., and it invites visitors and volunteers. Its stated mission is to benefit “the citizens and programs (young, elderly, infirmed, and needy) of the Hahira Community.”

The festival was started by two women, Mamie Sorrell and Adeline Landrum, who wanted “to liven up the city” with a weekend of arts, crafts, entertainment and a parade. The committee’s history page dates that to 1981 (Hall put it at 1982 in a 2021 interview); 2026 is billed as the 45th festival, a count that runs through two years with no festival at all, 2020 for COVID and 2024 after Hurricane Helene. The weekend has since grown into a full week. In that 2021 Daily Times interview, Hall listed the beneficiaries of the profits: bee-keeping education, the food pantry, the library, the schools, Jacobs’ Ladder Therapeutic Riding Center, Shriners burn centers, Lowndes High JROTC and veterans. The committee says it gives back “in the tens of thousands” annually. Hall’s summary of how the thing works: “It takes an entire community to make it happen.”

Two things make 2026 a little different. First, the festival honors the Salvation Army this year, under the theme “Bringing Hope to Georgia.” Each year the committee picks a group to recognize for what it adds to the community, and the Brown Bag luncheon carries the theme. Second, three of the committee’s longest-serving volunteers — Melba Locher, Helen Petitjean and Lana Hall — are retiring from the committee this year. By the committee’s count, those three women and their families have put in more than 100 combined years. Locher is the daughter of co-founder Mamie Sorrell and has worked the festival in some capacity since it began. If you see one of them on Main Street, it would not hurt to say thank you.

That volunteer, family-business backbone is most of what makes Hahira what it is. It is the same reason we wrote about the Brigman brothers — Brigman Cabinets is a family-owned custom cabinet shop right here in Hahira and one of the sponsors that keeps riktom.com free — and about the Hahira Police Department, whose chief sets the parade route every year. Small town, same names doing the work.

Tips for taking kids to the Honeybee Festival

Go early, bring a wagon, and plan around the heat and the parade closures. As a dad of four with two of them still small, that is the whole strategy; everything else is detail.

• It will probably still be warm. Valdosta’s October normal high is 80.5°F, and the first days of the month sit at the warm end of that average. Water, hats and sunscreen still apply. Our fall 2026 outlook covers when it actually cools off down here.
• Stake out the parade spot early. The route runs the length of Main, so there is plenty of curb, but the shade goes first; the parade guide has the shady side and an arrival time. Bring chairs; the wagon doubles as a seat and a hauler for whatever gets handed out; the city asks entries to walk candy to the curb rather than throw it, though some still toss.
• Shop the crafts Friday if you can. Friday hours are 9 to 6 with the same 250+ vendors and a fraction of Saturday’s crowd. Save Saturday for the parade and the food.
• Bring cash. Many vendors take cards now, but at a small-town festival, cash is still the thing that never fails.
• Watch the weather that week. Early October is still hurricane season. If the tropics are active, the committee’s Facebook page is where any change would be posted, and our free storm email alerts cover Lowndes County.
• Make it a whole day out. If the small ones are done by mid-afternoon, the Family Fun Finder has parks and playgrounds within a few minutes of downtown Hahira to burn off the funnel cake.

Common Questions

When is the Hahira Honeybee Festival in 2026?
Sept. 28 through Oct. 3. Weekday events Monday to Wednesday, vendors Friday and Saturday, the parade at noon Saturday, Oct. 3.

What time is the parade?
Noon Saturday, with a 12–2 p.m. window, east down Main Street from Food Lion to Hahira Middle School. Route, map and timing are in the parade guide.

Which roads close?
Main Street and Stanfill, 12 to 2 p.m. Saturday, plus side streets off Main. US 41 is detoured while the parade runs; the parade guide explains why and what to do about it.

Where do I park?
Saturday: free at Hahira Elementary off Hagan Bridge Road and Claudia Drive, with a free shuttle to Dollar General downtown that runs until just after the parade. Handicap parking with a decal is along Railroad Street between Park and Main.

Is it free?
The festival and parade are free, and so is Monday’s breakfast. The 5K is $25, the fun run $15, and the fish fry $14 a plate.

Can I still get a booth?
No — arts and crafts and food vendor spots are full for 2026. Email hhbartsandcrafts@hotmail.com for the crafts wait list.

Is there a rain plan?
The committee has not posted one. Check its Facebook page the week of the festival for any weather changes.

The Bottom Line

Sept. 28 to Oct. 3, parade at noon Saturday, park at the elementary school and ride the shuttle. Go Friday for the shopping and Saturday for the parade. Eat at the fish fry. Buy a quilt ticket.

And remember what the thing is for. A town of 3,400 people throws a party for ten times that many every fall, run entirely by volunteers, and hands the money back to the schools, the library, the food pantry and the kids. Forty-five years of that is worth a Saturday.