The Lake Wedowee Year: An Events Calendar from Frog Level to the New Year's Eve Fish Drop

People who are thinking about buying here usually ask us the same two questions. What is there to do, and what is it like when the summer crowd goes home? This calendar is our attempt at answering both. It follows the lake through a full year, from the spring refill to the fish drop on the last night of December.

One caution before we start. Small town events move. Organizers change dates, weather pushes things back a week, and a festival that ran one weekend last year may run a different weekend this year. We have linked to a source for every event below, but please treat the dates as a starting point and confirm with the Randolph County Chamber of Commerce or the event’s own page before you load the boat or book a room.

Spring: the lake comes back

Spring on Lake Wedowee starts with water. Alabama Power (whose official name for the lake is R.L. Harris Reservoir, or Harris Lake) draws the lake down each fall, and Lake Wedowee Life magazine puts April 1 as the point when the water starts coming back to full pool. By late April the coves are full again, the docks are floating, and the first boats of the year are out.

The season’s big event is the Frog Level Music Festival in downtown Wedowee on Memorial Day weekend. The festival grew out of a 5K, and it has kept that small town feel even as it has grown. In 2025, the fifth annual festival expected roughly 15,000 visitors in a town of about 830 residents, with a morning run, a cruise-in, a memorial service, a wood chopping contest, vendors, food trucks and an evening concert. The 2026 race listing put the sixth annual festival on Saturday, May 23, 2026, with free daytime admission and a ticketed evening concert. If you want to see the town at its busiest, this is the day.

Also in spring, Kids Fishing Day is held at Rice Pavilion on the last day of school in Randolph County, for children under 16. It is a good excuse to introduce a grandchild to the lake.

Summer: Sundays on the water and the Fourth

Summer is the season most visitors know. Two things anchor it for us.

The first is Worship on the Water at Lakeside Marina on Highway 431. The service is hosted by SIFAT (Servants in Faith and Technology), and in 2025 it ran Sundays at 9 a.m. from Memorial Day weekend through Labor Day weekend, with a different speaker and musician each week. Their motto says it well: come by boat, come by car, come as you are. We have watched a lot of newcomers meet their first neighbors at these services.

The second is the Fourth of July. There is a Fourth of July parade in downtown Wedowee, and Lake Wedowee Life describes a Patriot Parade on the Saturday of the holiday weekend along US Highway 431. There has also been a boat parade on the lake over the July 4 holiday in past years, and we have watched it from our own dock. We could not find a current organizer page to link to, so check with the Chamber for this year’s date and route before planning around it.

The rest of the summer calendar, from the same Lake Wedowee Life roundup, includes the Woodland fireworks show in July, the Clay County Arts League’s Summer Sizzle on Thursdays in July, and Concert in the Cove in August, a fundraiser for the Shellie Roden Memorial Foundation.

The second Saturday in June brings Art on the Median, a show of original art and handmade crafts put on by the East Alabama Arts Society on the grassy median in downtown Wedowee. It returns in October, which we cover below.

Early August is Vern Fest in Woodland, a few miles up the road. It is a tribute to country singer Vern Gosdin, held the first weekend in August and put on by the town. The Town of Woodland’s own page describes it as a ticketed concert presented by the Woodland Area Civic Club, though the page we loaded still showed a past year’s lineup, so treat the date as one to confirm.

Fall: the drawdown, the median, and the witches

Fall is our favorite season here, and it is also the one visitors know least. The lake starts dropping on October 1. Under Alabama Power’s fall 2024 schedule, which is the most recent lake-wide schedule we could load, Harris Lake goes from a summer pool of 793 feet to a winter pool of 785 feet, beginning October 1 and reaching winter pool by November 30. The water is still warm well into October, the boat traffic thins, and the leaves turn on the hills above the Little Tallapoosa.

The second Saturday in October brings Arts and Crafts on the Median back to downtown Wedowee. It is a manageable size, a couple of hours of browsing, and it pairs well with lunch on Main Street.

Mid October is Witches of Wedowee. The only written mention we could find is in Lake Wedowee Life’s seasonal roundup, which places it in mid October. Check with the Chamber for this year’s date.

Halloween itself is a downtown affair. The annual trick or treat on Main Street is championed by Miss Amber’s Cafe at 15 Main Street South, with merchants handing out candy. Lake Wedowee Life also lists a Trunk or Treat organized by Tanner Hospital.

Across the county line, Roanoke’s Fall on Main festival is worth the drive. The Chamber lists the 18th annual Fall on Main for Saturday, October 24, 2026, from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Main Street in Roanoke.

Winter: lights, a parade, and a fish

The holidays in Wedowee are compact and easy to enjoy. Lake Wedowee Life’s roundup lists a Christmas Open House in early November, a tree lighting on the Friday after Thanksgiving, and a Christmas parade on Main Street in December. The Open House date in that roundup was specific to 2025, so check with the Chamber or the downtown merchants for this year’s weekend. The Christmas parade is also on the Alabama Small Towns list.

Then there is the fish drop. On December 31, downtown Wedowee counts down the final moments of the year by lowering a fish. Lake Wedowee Life mentions cookies, cocoa and live music. It is the kind of thing that sounds a little silly until you are standing in the crowd with a cup of cocoa, and then it makes complete sense.

The rest of winter is quiet, and we mean that as a compliment. The lake is at winter pool, which is the best time of year to walk a shoreline and see what a lot really looks like. Lake Wedowee Life suggests birding at Fox Creek and Flat Rock, shoreline walks, campfires and stargazing, and that matches how we spend January.

The busiest weekends, from our experience

This part is our observation after years of living on the lake full time, not a statistic from anyone’s records.

Memorial Day weekend is the busiest weekend of the year on the water and in town, and Frog Level is the reason. If you are coming to look at property, we would suggest another weekend so you can see the lake the way it is most of the year.
The Fourth of July weekend is a close second. Expect full ramps by mid morning.
Labor Day weekend is busy but noticeably calmer than the two above.
Most other summer Saturdays are lively in the main channel and quiet in the coves.
From the drawdown in October until the refill in April, weekends are quiet. You will have most ramps and most of the lake to yourself.

If you are buying, we actually like to show property on both a busy weekend and a quiet weekday, because the difference tells you a lot about a cove.

A word on how to use this list

Print it, put it on the refrigerator at the lake house, and expect to cross things out. Every year something moves. The Chamber’s calendar page and the organizers’ own pages are the final word, and we update this post when we hear of changes.

If you are new to the area and want to know what a given weekend is really like before you drive over, call us at 404-317-5120 or reach us through the contact page. We live here year round, we go to most of these, and we are happy to tell you which ones are worth planning a trip around.