Now you can take a virtual walk with me through a few of my favorite festival crafts…

It never ceases to amaze my inner child when I see someone has taken funked out metal parts and welds them together to make whimsical creatures. This flying bird monster & friends looks like it all began with a tiny BBQ propane tank.

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Promoters say that ROTHBURY is committed to producing a near zero-waste concert. The first to tackle a green program of this magnitude at an around-the-clock (camping) concert in the USA.

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Editor's note: Since we missed the weekend review last week, we thought we'd give you a double shot this week.

On Memorial Day Weekend, Americans gear up for summer with BBQs, road trips, and camping. This year, for a twist on the Memorial Day camping trip, I attended the Sasquatch Music Festival at the Gorge Ampitheater in the middle of Washington. The twist was that the festival was carbon neutral, and so was our transportation.

The Gorge Ampitheater is an impressive venue. On the edge of the Columbia River Gorge, the sun sets just behind the stage and the seating is on grass-covered hillside. The view is spectacular, and since Michael Franti and Spearhead were playing, I had to go.

I was thrilled to find out that the concert was carbon-neutral, through a partnership with Sustainable Energy Partner's Carbon Harmony program (which we covered here). And since my boyfriend and I just got our "volksvegan" waste vegetable oil powered VW van up and running, we made most of the trip carbon-neutral as well!

Carbon Harmony projects are not just carbon-neutral, they go a step above by being over 100% offset:

Carbon Harmony is taking the fight against global warming up to 11! Going a step beyond carbon neutral, Carbon Harmony projects result in a net reduction in the amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere.

Carbon Harmony is taking action against climate change so that an event, vehicle, business or project actually has a reducing effect on the amount of carbon dioxide in the environment. We know that there is already too much CO2 in the atmosphere. It isn't enough to just put out less. We need to REDUCE the amount of CO2. That's what Carbon Harmony is about.

For every carbon harmony project, calculations are done to understand what the CO2 emmisions impact would be. Then, a larger amount of carbon reductions credits are purchased to offset the impact of that project and to actually reduce the overall level of CO2 in the air. Harmony amounts start at 10% more than neutral and can go as high as you want.

The more people that get involved, the less CO2 there will be, and the closer we will be to solving the climate change problem.

Going above and beyond carbon-neutral is definitely a good thing! Unfortunately, the way the event was run would never have led me to believe that sustainability was a major focus of the event. The Gorge may be a beautiful location, but the venue's operations certainly don't promote green living. The overpriced campground was full of mowed grass instead of local plants or even trees, there was garbage everwhere, and aside from one recycling tent, I didn't see a single recycling collection container in the campground or the concert venue. I saw toilet paper being thrown into the wind over the concert just for fun. I waited in line for half an hour only to find out that there were no more veggie burgers, and the only other thing that was vegan on the menu was a $5 cup of fries. So, Sasquatch may have been talking the talk, but the venue certainly wasn't walking the walk.

The low level of eco-consciousness at the venue and in the campground, coupled with the steep ticket, food, and camping prices, was almost enough to make me wish we'd stayed home. Then, they shut down the main stage because of high winds. The Gorge is always windy (and just across the river was a beautiful ridge full of windmills to prove it), but apparently it was too windy for the stage to be safe. They rearranged the schedule a bit and thankfully the wind died down in the evening. But, since the schedule was rearranged, I had to choose between Micheal Franti and the Beastie Boys, and would have really liked to see both.

Despite my disappointments of how the concert was managed, Michael Franti and Spearhead put on a great show of postive, passionate, protest music and made the whole thing worthwhile. I gladly support musicians like Michael Franti and Spearhead that walk the walk (Franti plays for prisoners and soldiers in Iraq, raises awareness of important issues, traveled to the Middle East, and is vegan). Of course, the fact that our test run with the grease system on the "volksvegan" went off without a hitch was a huge bonus to my weekend as well!

I appreciate that popular concerts and events are doing their part to help combat global warming - that's certainly a trend I'd like to see continue. But when the concert experience seems antithetical to the carbon neutrality and eco-consciousness of the event, the green message is only hindered and it makes it all seem like a greenwashing marketing ploy.

Nice try, Sasquatch. It was fun and all, but you can't just slap a carbon-neutral sticker on an event and call it sustainable. Apparently the Sasquatch needs to evolve…