People lounge and
smoke during the annual 4/20 celebration in Golden Gate Park's Sharon
Meadow April 20, 2016 in San Francisco, Calif.
Fabio, as the plant man preferred to be called, and his six strains of pot shrubs were among the scores of crowd-pleasing curiosities for the estimated 10,000-plus revelers celebrating at what has become the global epicenter of the 4/20 marijuana holiday.
But even with legalization, chances that Golden Gate Park could ever be a legitimate venue for the national holiday are slim. Smoking has been banned in all San Francisco parks for more than a decade.
As in previous years, the annual unsanctioned pot party attracted people from all over the Bay Area, California and the world. While authorities maintained a lax attitude toward many of the illegal activities during the free-for-all, city officials had put measures in place to mitigate troubling behavior seen at previous gatherings, including an assault on a park ranger last year.
The day was not without drama. At about 5:45 p.m. hundreds of people started to make a mad dash out of the Hippy Hill area as rumors spread that a man on the hill was waving a gun. The chaos lasted less than a minute — before whatever threat occurred seemed to dissipate. Police officers on the scene said the report of a firearm was unconfirmed and nobody had been arrested.
“Brother, I thought it was a tsunami,” said Leo Lopez of San Jose, who was in the area. “I just started running. Thank God it wasn’t anything serious.”
City residents and drivers, many of whom want nothing to do with the event, toughed out an afternoon of traffic headaches as cooler- and tent-toting throngs began clogging streets.
“I hate what’s happening to San Francisco,” a frustrated Samantha Grier said while stuck in traffic on Fell Street along the Panhandle. “It’s bumper-to-bumper.”
Inside the park, thousands set up on Hippie Hill while dozens of vendors — selling beer, Tequila, Jell-O shots and a host of infused edibles — lined the path that winds through Sharon Meadow.
“Edibles! Margaritas! Hot Dogs! Cold Beer!” one shirtless man shouted while standing on a cooler, surrounded by scores of other unlicensed vendors selling food, booze, glass pipes and T-shirts.
Diamond, a 24-year-old Stockton resident who didn’t use a last name, was selling treats made with Fruity Pebbles and Froot Loops, among other substances, though he said his wasn’t a money-making endeavor.
“I’m not here to make a profit, I’m here to feed the need,” he said, noting that his belief in karma prevented him from exploiting the hungry stoners around him. “What goes around comes around.”
The aptly named Joe Green, 24, of San Francisco rode a tall bike painted in green, red and yellow Rastafarian colors through the meadow carrying an equally tall joint, filled with a quarter-ounce of weed he picked up in the park earlier in the day for $50, a deal he called the “dirt-cheap holiday special.” He intended to spark the monstrous doobie right at 4:20 p.m. to “make sure I’m part of the cloud,” he said.
As 4:20 arrived, an extra pungent skunk-scented aroma mushroomed predictably above the now somewhat trashed lawns of Golden Gate Park. But that hardly signified the end of the party. Even at 5 p.m., hundreds of newcomers streamed into the Hippie Hill area by the tennis courts, where dozens of people lined the bleachers despite the fact that there was no tennis being played.
Alex Hill of Berkeley, who was selling marijuana-themed socks, got there at 4:15 p.m. He had planned on being there earlier — much earlier. Still, he managed to sell 10 pairs of Cheech & Chong socks in under an hour.
“When you’re high, you’re generally late for stuff, even a party,” he said.
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