Several of the events that had been halted due to the spread of COVID-19 and the resulting stay-at-home public health orders are repopulating the downtown Napa Fairgrounds. In the wake of large gatherings like the BottleRock Music Festival and the Junior Cattle Auction, dog shows, Christmas tree sales, and even a mixed martial arts competition are expected to take place in downtown Third Street over the next two months – reopening a tap of rental income that dried up when the pandemic halted nearly all mass gatherings from March 2020.

A list of approved rentals shared with the Expo board last week includes the Wine Country Dog Show November 12-14, followed by the Steve’s Trees Christmas Tree Seasonal Lot, which is expected to welcome its first customers. in late November and was one of the few Expo must-sees to open in 2020. Later, the Expo’s Chardonnay Hall will host an MMA match on December 4 hosted by SF Combat.

Some Expo events, however, remain on hiatus despite California lifting most of the crowd curbs in June. One of the exhibition center’s first highlights, the Gifts’ n Tyme Holiday Faire, will not take place in November, although organizer Kim Patillo has announced plans to relaunch the Christmas-themed craft fair in November. 2022.

Becoming the Expo’s new general manager in August after months of canceled events and lost revenue in Napa, Corey Oakley had few solid expectations about how quickly the facility would relaunch, he said. he said after Tuesday’s board meeting.

“It’s a good program for the end of the year, and I’m happy with it,” said Oakley, who was previously vice president of Helm and Sons, the town’s carnival and midway operator. & Country Fair. “But this is the Expo; activity is what sustains it. I can’t wait to be in 2022, especially the second half, when I hope and pray that we don’t have any restrictions. “

The Napa County Winter Homeless Shelter will continue to operate out of Riesling Hall, but revert to its normal seasonal nightly schedule only from November 15 to April 15. The shelter, operated by county homeless outreach contractor Abode Services, became a full-time 24-hour shelter from early 2020 until June, as county officials sought to create more shelter space to better protect homeless people from exposure to COVID-19.

Since California lifted most crowd size restrictions as part of a reopening of the state’s economy on June 15, in-person entertainment has gradually revived in Napa Valley, but not without some problems and with the obligation to provide proof of COVID-19 vaccination or a recent negative test for the virus.

BottleRock, the county’s largest annual event, returned to the Napa Valley Expo in early September to a sold-out audience of around 120,000 over three days. Most of the concerts went on as planned, but Stevie Nicks, the 73-year-old Fleetwood Mac singer and solo artist, pulled out of her day one performance and all of her concert dates in 2021, citing her age. and a summer increase in coronavirus cases.

The Expo also split this year’s Town & Country Fair into two separate events, hosting a reduced carnival in June and the junior cattle auction in July.

Elsewhere in Napa, the Oxbow RiverStage concert series resumed in August and continued into October, although a BottleRock-branded concert scheduled for RiverStage’s Oxbow Commons site was canceled just over a week before. its scheduled date of September 26.

Performances have resumed at the Uptown Theater on Third Street, and Blue Note Napa on Main Street is planning their first indoor concert since the pandemic hit when singer Kellie Fuller and the Mike Greensill Trio appear on November 11.