If you are looking for things to do on Long Island this weekend, September 12–13 is the first real post-Labor Day weekend of the year, and it is a heavy one. Two sold-leaning nights at Jones Beach, two arena shows at UBS, a seafood festival on the Montauk Green, and the North Fork Foodie Tour hitting its 20th anniversary. The summer crowds are gone from the beaches. They are not gone from the parking lots.

Here is what is on, and the honest transportation picture for each.

Wu-Tang Clan and Bone Thugs-N-Harmony at Jones Beach — Wantagh

Sunday, September 13, 7:30 PM | Northwell at Jones Beach Theater, 895 Bay Pkwy, Wantagh

This is the big one. Wu-Tang Forever: The Final Chamber is billed as the last run, and the Jones Beach stop brings RZA, GZA, Raekwon, Ghostface Killah, Method Man, Inspectah Deck, U-God, Masta Killa and Cappadonna, with Young Dirty Bastard on for his father. Bone Thugs-N-Harmony opens. If you grew up anywhere in the five boroughs or on the Island in the nineties, you already know whether you are going.

Now the part people forget every single time. Jones Beach is a barrier island. The Wantagh Parkway and Ocean Parkway are the only ways off it, there is no alternate route, and about 15,000 people decide to leave inside the same twenty minutes. A Sunday night show makes that worse, not better, because everyone in that lot has work Monday morning and nobody is waiting it out.

Drop at the gate, agree on a pickup spot before the show starts, and skip the hour in the parking field. We run this venue all season and cover all of Nassau County. It is the same call every time here, and it is the right one.

John Fogerty and Steve Winwood at Jones Beach — Wantagh

Saturday, September 12, 7:30 PM | Northwell at Jones Beach Theater, 895 Bay Pkwy, Wantagh

Saturday night at the same venue is the Legacy Tour, with John Fogerty and Steve Winwood on one bill. Creedence catalog and "Gimme Some Lovin'" with the Atlantic behind the stage in mid-September, which is genuinely the best weather window Jones Beach gets all year.

Different crowd from Sunday, same road. The Wantagh Parkway southbound backs up from Sunrise onto the causeway starting around 6 PM on a show night, and the walk from the far lots to the gate is about fifteen minutes in the dark on the way back. If there are four of you coming from Massapequa, Bethpage or Garden City, one car is cheaper than you think and it puts you at the gate instead of at Field 5.

UBS Arena Doubleheader: Bryson Tiller and Chayanne — Elmont

Bryson Tiller, The Neo Trapsoul Tour: Saturday, September 12, 7:30 PM Chayanne, Bailemos Otra Vez Tour: Sunday, September 13, 7 PM UBS Arena, 2400 Hempstead Tpke, Belmont Park, Elmont

UBS goes back-to-back this weekend. Bryson Tiller Saturday, Chayanne Sunday. The Chayanne show in particular pulls hard from Queens, Nassau and Westchester, and it is a dress-up night for a lot of the room.

Parking at UBS is the thing. The Belmont lots are prepaid, they route everybody through the same handful of entrances off the Cross Island and Hempstead Turnpike, and the exit after a full arena empties is a single controlled crawl. The LIRR Elmont station helps if the schedule happens to line up with your night, and often it does not.

The drop-off loop at UBS takes about forty seconds. Then the car is gone and it comes back when you text. If you are coming from Garden City, Valley Stream, Manhasset or anywhere along the Southern State, this is the trip where a car service pays for itself in the exit lane alone.

Montauk Seafood Festival — Montauk

Saturday and Sunday, September 12–13, 12 to 5 PM | The Montauk Green, Montauk

Montauk closes out its season with the Seafood Festival on the Green both days. Local vendors, live music, beer and wine, and the specific end-of-summer feeling you only get out there after the August renters have cleared out.

Here is the local math. Montauk Highway east of Amagansett is one lane each way and it is the only road. Village parking in Montauk is metered, enforced, and full by noon on a festival Saturday, and the lots near the Green are the first to go. Add a couple of hours of beer and wine in the sun and the drive home to Nassau starts looking like a bad idea around 4 PM.

We run the Hamptons and the East End all season, and the Montauk day trip is one of our most-requested fall runs. You get the festival, the sunset, and a back seat for the two hours west.

North Fork Foodie Tour, 20th Anniversary — North Fork

Sunday, September 13, 10 AM to 4 PM | 20 locations across the North Fork

The Foodie Tour turns 20 this year. It is a self-guided route through about 20 stops, farms, flower and herb growers, animal farms, beverage and wine producers, with demos and tastings along the way. Tickets run $35, kids 12 and under free.

Self-guided is the operative word. You are driving between stops on Sound Avenue and Route 25 all day, and several of those stops pour wine. Sound Avenue is two lanes carrying the entire fork, harvest season traffic is already building, and the farm lots spill onto the shoulder by late morning. This is the textbook designated-driver day, and the version where one car does the whole loop for your group is simply a better day out.

We cover Suffolk County end to end, including the North Fork wine trail, which is the other reason people call us in September and October.

Dockside Family Festival at Captree — Captree State Park

Saturday, September 12, 11 AM to 5 PM, rain date Sunday | Captree State Park, Babylon

The annual Dockside Family Festival is free all day at Captree. Pirate shows, Little Mermaid meet-and-greets, RC car racing, pony rides, magic, boat rides, and craft and food vendors along the docks. There is an $8 vehicle use fee at the park. If you have kids under ten, this is the easiest yes on the list.

Captree sits at the eastern tip of the Ocean Parkway strip, past Robert Moses. Free admission plus good September weather means the lots fill early, and the Robert Moses Causeway southbound from Southern State is a single stack once they do. Going early is the free fix. If you are coming out of Bay Shore, Babylon or West Islip with a group, a Sprinter van gets everybody there in one trip and nobody circles the lot.

Also on this weekend

The Setauket Country Craft Fair is on the village green Saturday with about 70 vendors, live music, a plant sale and free parking. The Long Island Woodworkers Show runs Sunday at the Cradle of Aviation in Garden City with free kids' activities. The Paramount in Huntington has Chad Gray Saturday night with Butcher Babies and Devil's Cut, and New York Avenue parking will be what it always is. Patchogue Theatre has Napoleon Dynamite Live Sunday with the cast and a full screening. The Long Beach arts festival runs Saturday morning on the boardwalk, and the carnival at John Walsh Park in East Northport goes both days.

The Week Ahead

One thing worth flagging if you fly. The UN General Assembly high-level week starts in Manhattan right after this weekend, and the motorcade closures around Midtown East and the FDR push traffic onto every alternate at unpredictable hours. If you have a flight out early next week, build in the extra time now rather than discovering it on the Van Wyck.

We have been running these roads for 20 years, from the Jones Beach causeway to Montauk Highway to the Belmont lots, and we plan the drop and the pickup around how each of those places actually fills and empties. We cover Nassau and Suffolk, the Hamptons and the North Fork, and if your week ends at a terminal we handle the JFK and LGA runs too. See our Long Island car service details, or request a quote and we will take it from there. The car will be there.

Best Things To Do on Long Island This Weekend — September 12–13, 2026