The nationally syndicated radio host Tom Joyner brought his Morning Show crew to West Atlantic City early Friday morning, June 1, to broadcast live from the WTTH studio inside the Bayport One building and kick-off this weekend’s Atlantic City Multi-Cultural Heritage Festival.

Here are some photos; see a photo gallery with more photos by clicking here.

Introducing … The Atlantic City Coffee & Tea Festival

Atlantic City will soon welcome an array of international teas and coffees from around the world at its the inaugural Atlantic City Coffee and Tea Festival in November. Tourists and local residents will have the opportunity to sample unique flavors and aromas of their favorite hot beverages.

Regularly held in New York City and produced by Starfish Junction Productions, the festival is planned to impress with a large selection of vendors, entertainment, and educational seminars. As the Jersey shore readies for its normally cold winter, its visitors will be well prepared with lots of warm tea, delicious coffee, and the sounds of the soothing oceanfront. There will be an endless of amount of activities and excitement for visitors to experience.

Hosted by Bally’s Atlantic City, this event is sure to please avid tea and coffee drinkers. Its success in New York City has lead to the festival’s debut in Atlantic City. In fact, The 7th Annual Coffee and Tea Festival in New York City completely sold out at around 5,000 tickets this year in Manhattan.

“It is exactly this kind of event that will be of interest to those visiting and those who live near Atlantic City,” says Jon Henderson, director of marketing partnerships & business development for Caesars Entertainment.

The Atlantic City Coffee and Tea Festival will be held on Saturday, Nov. 3 and Sunday, Nov. 4,  at Bally’s. Tickets go on sale in June and are $20 per person. Each ticket will include the sampling of beverages and tasty treats. Classes, and seminars related to the industry will also be available. Some workshops will require early registration and material fees. Free gifts will be given to the first 1000 people on both days. — Shana Vanegas

ATLANTIC CITY — If you were to walk down Albany Avenue from West Atlantic City at a few minutes past noon today, the Dave Matthews Band Caravan was on the minds of nearly everybody — motel owners and guests, the landscaping crew at McDonald’s (see great pic of one of the gentlemen in front of the McDonald’s near Bader Field on our live stream of photo coverage of the DMBC today and this weekend), the people packed in cars whirling down the busy street, heading towards to the festival site just outside of the main city area of Atlantic City.

In front of one nearby motel, Pleasantville’s Pistol Pete’s had a BBQ stand set up for patrons walking or driving by. A few other vendors had also set up “shop” in front of other businesses with flags and signage.

Friday 1pm is when doors were officially opened and the music (on all three stages, named “Boardwalk,” “Pacific,” and “Atlantic” respectively) went on as scheduled.

The AC Weekly crew, after locating Will Call, and then running into NJN’s Jerry Henry and finding out where the media tent was located, headed into the festival grounds, alive with a variety of tents hawking beer, merch, and other food and beverage items.

Frozen margaritas (for $11), pizza, funnel cake were just a few of the tents we passed by.

In the distance, near the Atlantic stage, Jeeps were available for test drives by festival goers. (Hopefully they ensure the sobriety of the drivers first) in a specially created dirt-filled driving area.

The first whiff of music we encountered was the solo acoustic sounds of David Ryan Harris. With a cap on and glasses, he strummed his acoustic and sang — with a heavy dose of soul — a medley including Prince’s “The Most Beautiful Girl in the World,” Sam Cooke’s “You Send Me,” and (I think) Marvin Gaye’s “Let’s Get it On.”

Meanwhile, on the Atlantic stage, Mu’tet was killing it with guitar wizardry.

Luckily for us, the media tent is situated next to the Boardwalk stage, and as we set up our computers and slowly gained access to the available wi-fi connection — and located room in the crowded power strip to plug in — we were treated to the blues-folk-sounds — just about 150 yards away from the stage — of the Carolina Chocolate Drops.

This is a band I really wanted to check out and they killed it.

Read next post for more on the Carolina Chocolate Drops. I’m going to go catch them.