These days, I usually spend most of my money at a faire on food. If I'm going to set my tent up at a faire, I usually make Chex Mix and eat it in place of one of my meals on site.
If I could just avoid eating one time a day at faire I might save around $15 (and 30 minutes in a line). What kinds of foods do others take in a pouch or eat in their car eat to offset their meal costs?
If we are daytripping, we grab breakfast on the road. We all have mugs so we get water from the water fountains at faire. That alone saves a bunch of money. We will snack and drink a few choice things at faire, then grab a meal on the way home. If we camp, we grab a few things on faire and head back to camp for lunch/dinner then back in to faire for the evening and fireworks. Then snacks back at camp. I rarely drink alcohol in faire, wait till I get back to camp.
Salty snacks and jerky are easy things to take into faire. You can also pack single serve powder drinks to add to water.
Ah, beef jerky. Why didn't I think of that? I love "messin' with Sasquatch" at work and home. I'll have to try that, a protein bar and maybe some dried mango. Grammercy!
Dehydrated or freeze dried snacks and protein bars are the easiest to travel with. We've become experts in faire on a budget! If you have a small child or very restrictive diet you can get away with bringing in a little more snacks. Having some sort of drinking vessel and sticking to the water fountain is a huge help. Unfortunately I know a lot of faires don't have the amenities that we are lucky to have at TRF. I envy those lucky folks that can go every weekend. I don't know how they afford it! Last year bottled drinks were $5.50 and turkey legs were $15! We were shocked!
Grammercy, Trillium. I'll have to look for those types of snacks as well. I see those drinking fountains at the Oklahoma Renaissance Festival but just don't know about using them. Especially since there was some freaky flooding on the festival site last week. That has never happened before but they got about 6 inches of rain in one night.
At least water bottles are still only $2 in Oklahoma this year. Although the turkey legs are $15 at every event. They were only $9 a few years ago.