The August calendar in Camas looks nearly identical to last year on paper. Wine Walk on a Saturday, Sips & Bites on a Thursday, Farmers Market every Wednesday afternoon, First Friday downtown. If you have lived here more than a season, you already know the rhythm. What has changed is where those things now sit on the map. Three specific shifts — a market that moved off its usual block, a state highway paving window, and a broken loop at Lacamas — have rewritten the routes residents use to move through a normal week. This post is about those three, and what still works exactly the way it did last August.
The Farmers Market is not where you left it
For the first time in nearly two decades, the Wednesday market is not on the library lawn. It moved because the city broke ground on a new fire station, and the 2026 season is running out of a temporary footprint on Birch Street between Third and Fourth avenues, plus Fourth Avenue between Adams and Birch. The ribbon cutting on June 3 was done by Mayor Steve Hogan and market board president Shannon Van Horn, and the season runs 3 to 7 p.m. every Wednesday through September 30.
The relocation is worth understanding as more than a logistics note. Market manager Leah Nichelson has said the market draws between 1,500 and 3,000 people each week, and over the course of an 18-week season, that has a significant economic impact on local businesses. Organizers looked at renovated Crown Park and passed, keeping the market downtown on purpose so the foot traffic stays in the shop corridor.
A few practical consequences for August Wednesdays:
- Parking pressure has shifted one block south. If you always parked near the library, plan for the Adams and Birch side instead.
- Vendors are working a tighter footprint. Steve Inzalaco of Camas's Shady Grove Farms noted that the new arrangement has created logistical challenges, particularly because he can no longer keep his cooler trailer adjacent to his booth, so early shoppers will see the freshest inventory.
- Merchants on the south end who used to feel forgotten now sit inside the market's foot traffic. If you have never been inside the shops on that block, this is the summer to walk them.
Three August evenings worth blocking off
Downtown Camas is running a compressed calendar between mid-August and Labor Day. All three of these are hosted or coordinated through the Downtown Camas Association and share the same walkable footprint, which means you can plan them as a set rather than three separate outings.
| Date | Event | Window | What it actually is |
|---|---|---|---|
| Thu, Aug 13 | Summer Nights Sips & Bites | 5–9 p.m. | Ticketed tropical cocktail crawl with live island music and small bites across participating downtown venues |
| Sat, Aug 22 | Camas Wine Walk | 3–7 p.m. | Merchant-hosted pours moving from shop to shop, organized by Downtown Camas Merchants |
| Sat, Aug 29 | Camas Vintage & Art Street Faire | 9 a.m.–3 p.m. | Antique dealers, upcycled goods, and a wide slate of art vendors setting up on the street |
If you can only pick one, the Vintage & Art Street Faire is the outlier. The other two are drink-and-stroll formats you can catch some version of most summers. The street faire is a once-a-year daytime hunt that pairs naturally with a stop at RedDoor Gallery, which is also the host for the Camas Plein Air event coming up on September 26.
The regular monthly anchors are still running underneath all of this. Camas First Friday on August 7 keeps its 5 to 8 p.m. window with themed activities and after-hours shopping. The Camas Farmer's Market at its Birch Street location is on August 5, 12, 19, and 26.
The SR-14 paving week to plan the commute around
This is the one that will catch people off guard. The City of Camas has posted notice that beginning the week of August 10, the Washington Department of Transportation is doing paving work at the SR-14 Slough Bridge. If your normal drive to Vancouver or Portland runs SR-14 westbound out of Camas, expect lane restrictions and delay windows to land squarely inside a workweek that also contains Thursday's Sips & Bites.
Two practical reads on this. First, if you have out-of-town guests coming in for the Wine Walk on August 22, the paving window is a week earlier, so it shouldn't affect the weekend event traffic. Second, the SR-14 corridor is the primary connection between downtown Camas and I-205, so residents in Prune Hill and Grass Valley who normally cut down to SR-14 through downtown will feel this before residents on the north end of town who tend to run NE Everett Street up to SR-500 already. A Grand Fir latte from downtown at 7:15 a.m. that week is probably a Prune Hill latte instead.
The Lake to Lake loop is not a loop right now
If your Saturday morning is a walk at Lacamas Regional Park, you already know the park is running with a partial closure. As of March 2026, a portion of the route at the upper dam at Round Lake is closed, but you can still enjoy other portions of the route, and Clark County Public Works has been the reference point for updates. The practical translation:
- The 4.8-mile Lake to Lake Trail Loop via Lacamas Creek cannot be walked as a full loop. It works as an out-and-back instead.
- The 2.5-mile Camas Potholes and Waterfall Loop is similarly interrupted where it crosses the upper dam.
- The Lacamas Heritage Trail, the 6.7-mile out-and-back that runs the north shore from Camas Heritage Park, is unaffected by the dam closure and is the cleanest August substitute if you want distance without doubling back through the park interior.
Round Lake, Pothole Falls, Lower Falls, and Woodburn Falls are all still reachable. The change is only that you retrace steps instead of closing the loop. For a first-time visitor you brought in from out of town, the shorter Round Lake Loop from the main parking lot on NE Lake Road is still the highest ratio of scenery to effort in the park.
Two other outdoor notes for August. Crown Park held its grand opening on July 2 after its renovation, and it is now the closest full playground and picnic footprint to downtown for anyone with kids in tow between market and dinner. Grains of Wrath Brewery on NE 3rd Avenue is the Camas leg of the Oregon Brewery Running Series 5K Beer Run on November 7, which is worth mentioning now because sign-ups fill through late summer.
What has not changed at all
The base layer of a Camas summer is the same as it was in 2025. First Friday still runs 5 to 8 p.m. downtown. The Farmers Market still runs every Wednesday afternoon through September 30. The Downtown Camas Association is still the single best source of truth for what is happening on any given block on any given weekend, and its printable 2026 event calendar is the one to bookmark if you want a paper copy on the fridge. The restaurant lineup that carries the downtown evening economy — Feast at 316, The Hammond Kitchen & Craft Bar, Natalia's Cafe, Roots Restaurant & Bar, Tommy O's at the Camas Hotel, Adams Street Bar & Grill — is intact and open.
The two-line summary a new neighbor should hear from you this month is straightforward. The Wednesday market is on Birch Street now, not the library lawn. Give yourself an extra fifteen minutes on SR-14 the week of August 10. Everything else is the Camas you already know.
Planning something bigger than a Saturday
Most people reading this are just planning the next couple of weekends. If you happen to be past that and starting to think about what a next chapter in Camas actually looks like — a first home near downtown, a move up on Prune Hill, or a quieter stretch closer to Lacamas Lake — that is the conversation Daniel Treacy is here for. Reach out through the Camas neighborhood page or the home valuation tool when you are ready. Let's Connect.
