The Venice Sharks Tooth Festival

April 13 - 15, 2012

Get your hands on some sharks teeth without getting into the water!

The Venice Sharks Tooth Festival brings out fossil collectors from all over.

Venice, Florida has long been known as the Sharks tooth capitol of the world because of the millions of white and black sharks teeth fossils that wash up on Venice Beach in Florida as well as other near by area beaches.

The Venice Sharks Tooth Festival is one of the most looked forward to events and one of the most well attended events of the year on my Escape to Sarasota Calendar of events.

Traditionally held in April, the dates and times for this year's Venice Sharks Tooth Festival are: April 13 - 15, 2012; Friday, 4 pm - 9 pm, Saturday, 10 am - 9 pm and Sunday, 10 am - 5 pm (dates and location subject to change).

The Annual Festival is held on the Venice Municipal Airport Festival Grounds on Airport Avenue.

The weather along the Sun Coast is usually perfect for outdoor festivals, such as this one, at this time of year. Skies are usually sunny with temperatures in the 70's to low 80's.

There’s food, fossils, arts and crafts, entertainment and children’s activities. It’s a fun and inexpensive event to attend at $3.00 admission and kids under 12 are free along with free parking.

I had no idea that Sharks tooth collecting was such a serious hobby.

While the shark’s teeth are the big draw to this event, there are other exhibitors of arts and crafts, some of which you might also want to purchase and take home. There are over 100 artist’s displays around the festival grounds.

There are some very talented artisans and craftsmen and women displaying their wares at this festival.

By walking and browsing through the special displays of arts and crafts, aisle by aisle, you can easily fill up an afternoon or early evening and see some very creative home made goods.

The Festival is much like a Carnival atmosphere and there are plenty of food vendors up and down the festival’s main path (an old runway, now turned into the Food Court!), so if you get hungry all you have to do is step into line.

The food court features everything from burgers and Italian sausage sandwiches to a variety of sea food, ribs and other food that smells so good in the open air, it will defy you to try to get through the afternoon or evening without stopping to eat.

The Venice Sharks Tooth Festival features a children’s playground area and fun and games for the kids as well as hands on exhibits from Sarasota’s famed Mote Aquarium.

There’s also an entertainment and musical lineup of live bands on Friday night from 6 p.m. - 9 p.m., all day Saturday, starting around 11 a.m. and running until 9 p.m. and on Sunday there’s live entertainment scheduled from 11:15 a.m. until 5 p.m.

From Venice Sharks Tooth Festival to Sarasota Events Calendar.

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