For every warm weather holiday, quite a few people in my city (San Antonio) camp out in the public parks in order to “save a grill.” People show up a day or two early in order to get the prime picnic table or spot for their family picnic. Then they sit there to guard it. These guys always get interviewed by local TV, sometimes they are seriously competitive, sometimes they are comical.
I thought it was just a somewhat bizarre local tradition, until I heard George Lopez the comedian joke about being woken up at 4:00am in order to go “get a grill” at the local park in California.
So, is this a Hispanic thing? Or do people in other parts of the country/world do this?
Why can’t you just bring your own grill? I’ll assume it’s against some regulation or another. Even so, it’s unlikely you’d get caught, and even then you could probably get off with a warning. Seems easier than camping out.
In most parks/picnic areas I have seen, overnight camping is illegal. The popular ones that have group pavillions, etc. will take reservations. Why Texas is different I have no idea.
I don’t know if people do this here or at home, really. We don’t have our family summer holiday stuff at parks because most of the relatives have yards and grills and in many cases patios or picnic tables. It seems like if anybody in the family has a yard, it would be far simpler to just have the gathering at their house.
We can reserve picnic spots up to a year in advance. Though, lately we’ve been doing the parties at someone’s house so we can continue partying after the sun goes down.
It’s pretty traditional around here (San Diego), at least for the most desirable spots and weekends. It does seem to be popular with Hispanic families (also Filipino) but that may be due to the greater tradition to have huge family get-togethers for birthdays with huge trays of homemade fried chicken and tamales and lumpia and right where I have to walk by it when I’m trying to do my healthful exercise. But I digress. It’s much nicer to just have everyone show up at the park, rather than try to fit them all in your house and yard, I imagine. It’s also common for other events, though, like office parties. I think you can reserve certain areas, but many times someone will just show up early in the morning and “camp out” at the spot for the day until party time. I once took my daughter to a classmate’s birthday at a beach-front park in La Jolla that started around lunch time and the Mom commented that they had been there since about 5 or 6 that morning. I don’t think I’ve personally heard of anyone camping out over night, but I wouldn’t be surprised if people do it at strategic spots for special events, like 4th of July displays and so forth.
Can someone please tell me wtf this thread is about. Do people really stay overnight in a park to save a picnic spot or have I misunderstood something?
Yes, you read it right. Even around here, people will get up early to get to the park and grab a grill and some picnic tables. No one does the overnight thing, but if you haven’t grabbed a table and grill by dawn on busy weekends and holidays, you’re just out of luck. Having a picnic is not an impromptu event. And while you can reserve a pavillion, the other tables are first come, first served.
Even if you have a yard and a grill at home, people like to go to the park because of the parking, the space to let the kids run wild, the lack of neighbors compalining, the easy clean-up (stuff it in the trash barrel and walk away), the playground, the pool, the duck pond, the baseball fields, the tennis courts…the only drawback is the hike to the bathrooms. And having to send someone there before dawn.
During the cherry blossom season in Japan lots of companies and clubs will have parties out in the parks (basically an excuse for everyone to go outside during work hours and get completely wasted). In areas where the park:person ratio is low, it’s fairly common for a low-ranking member to get assigned with the task of staking out a spot and sitting there until the rest of the company shows up later. It’s not unheard of for people to camp overnight to save a good spot, but it probably happens more for sport groups and clubs than for companies.
Yes, it would make sense just to have your holiday festivities at someone’s home, but people do it anyway. It becomes a group phenomenon, a “happening.”
The only park I have been to in the USA was Central Park in Manhattan. There was heaps of room there to have a picnic and that is in a very densly populated area, so it seems weird to read the accounts in this thread.