NEW BERN, N.C. (WITN) – As the bear lowered and clock struck midnight, thousands packed downtown and erupted in cheers to ring in 2026. <\/p>\n
It\u2019s all part of New Bern\u2019s New Year\u2019s Eve Block Party where park and recreation crew prepared Wednesday to host thousands for their annual bear drop. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve seen anywhere from 5000 to 8000 people, so we\u2019re hoping, of course, to get that if not more,\u201d New Bern Parks and Recreation director Kari Warren said. <\/p>\n
As the sun set one last time in 2025 on Wednesday, crowds poured into the intersection of Craven and Pollock streets, turning downtown into one giant party. <\/p>\n
People from across the county and even as far as Yemen and Belize made their way to celebrate. <\/p>\n
The New Year\u2019s Eve celebration offered over a dozen food trucks, magic shows, beer garden, live music, kid zones, and street performances. <\/p>\n
New Bern resident Brandon Whelan says it\u2019s what drew him and his family out to celebrate. <\/p>\n
\u201cNew Bern puts on a great community event and it\u2019s nice to support them. Get the family out here and hopefully events like this continue to grow with our presence,\u201d Whelan said. <\/p>\n
Children got their own moment at 9:00 PM with the bear cub drop, bringing cheers and a head start on the New Year. <\/p>\n
\u201cHaving the kids involved out here is what drives us to come out. It\u2019s the reason why we started coming out to New Bern in general because of how family-friendly New Bern is,\u201d Havelock resident Cassie Mosley said. <\/p>\n
Copyright 2025 WITN. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NEW BERN, N.C. (WITN) – As the bear lowered and clock struck midnight, thousands packed downtown and erupted…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3920,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[1431,104,108,107,3464,3466,3465,105,106],"class_list":{"0":"post-3919","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-bern","8":"tag-1431","9":"tag-bern","10":"tag-craven-county","11":"tag-new-bern","12":"tag-new-bern-new-years-eve-block-party","13":"tag-new-years-eve","14":"tag-new-years","15":"tag-witn","16":"tag-witn-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3919","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3919"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3919\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3920"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3919"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3919"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3919"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}