Stories from Seattle Hempfest 2013

I could smell the weed even a mile and a half away from the epicenter of Seattle Hempfest 2013. It was just a short drive from my place to Hempfest and I had to laugh out loud about the fact that I could smell it from that far away.

A few of us on the editorial and managerial staff met up for a sesh and a run on the festivities. We were hosted by Diablo Dabs Seattle, who introduced us to the power of the dank dabber in his dab-atorium. The evening was a galactic mix of big dabs, chill talk, rolled joints, and choice eats.

The dabber hits fierce, but it’s a clean smoke. I was good to go just after one toke, but in my defense I hadn’t smoked in like three weeks.

It was my first time to Hempfest, and the first thing I came to appreciate was how chill it was. The festival is spread over three parks near downtown Seattle: Centennial Park, Myrtle Edwards Park, and the Olympic Sculpture Park. For those not familiar with Seattle, these three parks are stretched across about a mile of coast, providing a nice view of Elliot Bay as well as the Space Needle.

It was awesome to just chill by the water and smoke. Normally, you probably wouldn’t be able to do that, so I took advantage of this new liberty. Of course, almost everyone around me was smoking and high as well, which added to the vibe, and was something I’d never seen before.

Over by the dubstep stage, there was this funky, tall and skinny guy who had the most legit afro I have ever seen. He was busting moves that looked like what Bruce Lee would do on the dance floor. While I was watching with a grin, some other guy with a shaved head except for dreads on the top came up and started dancing on the afro dancer, crowding his flow. Afro-man didn’t give a damn though, he just kept on dancing and jumping around like the guy wasn’t even there. Later, the guy with dreads came up to us and said something intelligible and then continued on.

While me and Diablo Dabs were walking past a stage on the northern side of the festival, we passed by what appeared to be a guy who had just proposed to his girlfriend, who apparently said yes. She was jumping and hugging her man and a bunch of people were cheering. The singer on the stage laughed and said, “Go get ’em, tiger.”

Standing by the edge of the water I saw some dude start freaking out. I was looking out when suddenly he started screaming incoherently, then he eventually said something like, “Cameron! If you don’t answer your fucking phone!!!” I couldn’t help but laugh, and I can’t remember if he ever got hold of Cameron.

I also liked being able to smoke right in front of police. While Washington state has legalized marijuana, it isn’t technically legal yet because they haven’t established all the rules and regulations for the new industry. All the cops there seemed pretty cool and they were even handing out bags of chips on Friday.

On our way out, Diablo Dabs and I hung out on the top of the main bridge entrance and scoped out the crowd below. Each person down there had their own story of how they came to Hempfest and what they did there. My experience was just one among many, and now that I’ve been there once I will be better prepared for next year!