Ask a longtime Griffin resident when downtown stopped being a place you drove through to get somewhere else, and most will point to sometime in the past eighteen months. Not because of any single opening, but because the openings finally landed close enough together that you can walk between them.
That matters this particular September, because the 12th Annual Doc Holliday Festival returns to Griffin City Park on Saturday, September 12, and for the first time in the festival's run, the two or three blocks around it can carry an entire day and evening without anyone needing to drive out to the Expressway, let alone to Locust Grove or Peachtree City, for something worth stopping for.
What the Festival Itself Actually Involves
The Doc Holliday Festival and BBQ Championship runs the Saturday after Labor Day every year, and 2026 is no exception. Gates are free and open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. at Griffin City Park, with parking free throughout the park grounds. The event marks its 12th year honoring John Henry "Doc" Holliday, the gunslinger and gambler who spent the first thirteen years of his life in Griffin and later ran a dentistry practice on Solomon Street before heading west.
The barbecue side of the weekend is the part with real stakes attached. The competition is sanctioned by the Georgia Barbecue Association, doubles as the GA State Brisket Championship, and carries a total payout in excess of $13,000 across the pork loin, pulled pork, and rib categories, with more than 30 professional teams expected to compete. Ancillary contests for wings and dessert run the Friday night before. If you want to taste what the judges are tasting without becoming one, organizers have priced the People's Choice sampler, a dozen team tastes plus a drink and chips, at $10 in recent years, with voting open to anyone who buys in.
The historical side is a live reenactment of the 1881 shootout at the O.K. Corral, staged in three roughly 30-minute shows throughout the day. The 2026 event listing names the performing troupe as Spurred West, though past materials from the same festival have credited the group as Aces and Eights, so don't be surprised if the announcer uses either name from the stage.
Awards for the barbecue teams are handed out at 4 p.m. in the City Park gym, which gives you a natural stopping point if you're planning the rest of your day around the festival rather than the other way around.
What Changed in the Three Blocks Around It
Here's the part that didn't exist the last time this festival rolled around. Downtown Griffin's core, roughly the stretch bounded by Solomon Street, South Hill Street, South 6th Street, and West Bank Street, has picked up enough independently owned food and drink spots in the past year that a full evening downtown no longer means picking one restaurant and going home.
The additions, in roughly the order they opened:
- Kiosko Venezia Cafe, which took space in the Mill & Market building on Solomon Street.
- Pour Decisions Lounge, which held its ribbon cutting after taking over the former Smokin' Margaritas space on South Hill Street.
- A new Irish-style pub on the same block, which soft-opened the same afternoon as Pour Decisions, built around the idea that regulars and first-timers get treated the same way, with live sports, live music, and a full Guinness pour.
- El Catrin Mexican Restaurant, a newer location on West McIntosh Road, celebrated with a ribbon cutting by the Griffin/Spalding Chamber of Commerce. It sits outside the downtown walking radius, but it's worth knowing about if you're driving that side of town anyway.
None of this replaces what was already working. Piedmont Brewery & Kitchen on South 6th Street still runs Tuesday trivia and still carries the highest rating in town on Yelp. Southern Social by Firemaker Brewing on West Bank Street still has the golf simulators for a group that wants more than dinner. El Saborcito on East Solomon Street still runs street tacos as a Tuesday special, which is why it's become a standing pre-trivia stop for some regulars before they walk over to Piedmont. What changed is that those three spots are no longer the only reasons to park downtown and stay a while. They're now three stops on a loop instead of three separate destinations.
A Loop That Actually Works on Foot
If you're building a Saturday around the festival, here's a version that keeps you within a few blocks the entire time and doesn't require moving your car once you've parked near the park:
- Arrive at Griffin City Park before the 10 a.m. gates for the earliest reenactment show and to walk the barbecue teams' setup on the ball field while the smoke is still going.
- Head downtown by early afternoon, before the 4 p.m. awards, for lunch at one of the Solomon Street spots.
- Use the mid-afternoon lull to walk the Mill & Market building, where Kiosko Venezia Cafe anchors one end of the block.
- Circle back toward South Hill Street for a drink at Pour Decisions or the new pub before dinner.
- Close the night at Piedmont Brewery or Southern Social, both an easy walk from South Hill Street, depending on whether you want a kitchen menu or golf simulators.
None of that requires the Expressway. That's the actual change this year, not any single new opening but the fact that the loop closes.
The Rest of the Calendar Isn't Slowing Down Either
The festival isn't downtown Griffin's only date this fall. The 2026 Second Saturday Concert Series, presented by First National Bank, continues on Solomon Street through the season, with the Duncan Brothers Band booked for September and Are You Kind closing out the year's run in October as part of the Oktoberfest-themed installment of the same series. Both are free, family-friendly, and held in the same downtown footprint as everything above.
Feast on East, the Griffin Downtown Council's community meal on East Solomon Street, typically lands on a Sunday afternoon in late October. The past two years put it on October 20 and October 26, so expect something similar this fall, with the exact 2026 date to be confirmed on the city's own events calendar closer to the season.
What This Actually Means If You Live Here
The Doc Holliday Festival has been the same event for over a decade: free admission, a sanctioned barbecue championship, a shootout reenactment, a schedule that runs 10 to 5. None of that changed this year. What changed is everything around it. The festival used to be the one thing worth driving downtown for on a September Saturday. Now it's the excuse to be downtown for the whole day, because the blocks around the park finally have enough going on to hold you there past the 4 p.m. awards ceremony.
If you've been meaning to check out what's opened downtown but keep defaulting to the same three-restaurant rotation, this is the weekend that makes the detour easy. You're already going to be there for the barbecue.
For more on what's happening around Griffin throughout the year, Christie Howell Arnold keeps a running local guide at the Griffin neighborhood page. If you're weighing a move to this corner of Spalding County or just want an honest read on what's changing block by block, reach out anytime. Let's Connect.
