Pismo forecast: Kind of clammy

Pismo Beach, Calif.

Oct. 21-22: Time flies when you’re clamming. The Pismo Beach Clam Festival turns 60 this year, and the city will salute its favorite bivalve mollusk with chowder, a parade, live music and more. Local restaurants will face off during a clam chowder cook-off. Children can tunnel toward China during the festival clam dig, and vendors will have an assortment of non-clam fare, including barbecue, Thai and Chinese food and fried artichokes.

Pismo Beach Pier parking lot, Pomeroy Street and Hinds Avenue. 9 a.m.-5 p.m. both days. Free. (805) 773-4382, www.pismoevents.com.

*

Bozeman, Mont.

Oct. 3-8: There’s room for artists of virtually every stripe under the HATCHfest umbrella. Film, music, fine art, design, fashion, photography, dance and writing are featured at the festival, now in its third year. New artists as well as old pros perform, display their works and compete, with hundreds of art and film schools from around the world invited to take part. Activities take place at sites throughout downtown Bozeman, with the 10 entries in the student-film competition screening at a historic theater. Among highlights: an architecture showcase, musical performances, a children’s art display and an outdoor fashion show.

“We’re trying to discover new talent” and become a place where industry professionals can send scouts, says Brian Skuletich, executive director of HATCHfest. “We look at ourselves like a AAA ball club.”

Downtown locations. Event admission ranges from free to $10 for adults for screenings. (406) 586-2635, www.hatchfest.org.

*

Santa Cruz, Calif.

Oct. 27-28: Doors creak open after dark to reveal a massive skeleton, and the redwoods are haunted as Santa Cruz County puts its spin on Halloween. Among planned activities is the Oct. 27 Marine Masquerade and Night of Scary Aquary, when the Seymour Marine Discovery Center keeps night hours. Costumed workers tell stories of shipwrecks and point up some of the lab’s spookier residents, such as spider crabs and a blue whale skeleton. Oct. 28, a local legend is revived: a walk through Big Basin Redwoods State Park, decorated for the occasion. Actors play out the tale of William Wadell, an 1800s pioneer who lost his arm in an encounter with a grizzly. Legend has it the limb was later found and buried in the woods. Wadell’s ghost roams the park in search of it.

Seymour Marine Discovery Center at Long Marine Lab, 100 Shaffer Road. 6:30-9:30 p.m. Oct. 27. $6, $4 ages 4-16, children younger than 4 free. (831) 459-3800. Big Basin Redwoods State Park, 21600 Big Basin Way, Boulder Creek. 7 p.m. Oct. 28. Free. (831) 338-8861.

-- Amy Hubbard

Send information to itinerary@latimes.com.