With the introduction of the new Desert Festival event in Update 1.6, Spring in Stardew Valley has never been livelier. Between Spring 15 and 17, players can take a long bus ride into the Desert to find a festival of delights, where Pelican Town’s villagers have set up their own stalls. Activities and quests allow you to earn Calico Eggs, which you can spend on special items.

New festivals are among the highlights of Stardew Valley’s 1.6 update, and the Desert Festival is perhaps the biggest of them all. However, players must have repaired the Bus to the Desert before they can visit the Festival. Once you’re in the Desert, you’ll find many different activities to do, including earning and spending Calico Eggs and visiting many different stalls.

How To Visit The Calico Desert In Stardew Valley

Repair The Bus

You will have to repair the Bus before you can visit the Desert. There are two ways to do this, depending on whether you want to save Pelican Town’s Community Center or sell it off to Joja.

If you’ve chosen to restore the Community Center to its former glory, repairing the Bus involves completing the Vault Bundles. Completing the Community Center Bundles isn’t easy, as you need to source a wide variety of different resources. However, the Vault Bundles are fairly simple since they only require donations of Gold. Once you donate 42,500 Gold, the Bus will be repaired.

If you sell the Community Center to Joja, purchase the Bus Repair from the Joja Community Development Project Form inside the JojaMart. This is comparatively cheaper at 40,000 Gold, but you will also have taken one step further along the path to selling your new home to a faceless corporation.

The Desert Festival starts at 10 AM and lasts the whole day.

How To Earn Calico Eggs At Stardew Valley’s Desert Festival

Desert Festival's Main Currency

Among the many attractions at the Desert Festival is the Calico Egg Merchant, who exchanges Calico Eggs for special items. As such, your main goal is to complete activities to earn Calico Eggs so you can purchase the best items.

Bet On Races

You can find a race between three animals in the eastern part of the Calico Desert. You can place free bets on the race and earn 20 Calico Egg if your chosen animal wins. The bets don’t cost you anything, and you can bet on more than one race a day until the final race occurs at 11 PM.

If you don’t mind a bit of cheating, you can pay the Suspicious Man near the Oasis a Calico Egg to ensure that one of the three animals loses the race. This gives you a 50-50 chance of winning.

Complete Quests For The Adventurer’s Guild

Returning Stardew Valley players may already be familiar with the Skull Cavern, a procedurally generated dungeon with infinite levels in the northwestern part of the Desert. During the Festival, the Skull Cavern is open to all, and the Adventurer’s Guild, led by Gil and Marlon, has set up a stall near the entrance.

You can descend into the depths of the Skull Cavern to mine Calico Eggs. Marlon will also let you choose between two random daily quests you can complete for Eggs. These typically involve slaying monsters, reaching certain levels of the Skull Cavern, or mining Ore. In addition, every time you descend five levels, you increase your Egg Rating. You can submit your Egg Rating for the day by talking to Gil and earn prizes, including more Calico Eggs.

The Skull Cavern is notoriously tough, so stock up with food items and equip combat-boosting items such as Stardew Valley’s Savage Ring.

Scattered throughout the Skull Cavern are Calico Statues, which players can activate to raise their Egg Rating. These can give you small amounts of Gold or provide useful buffs such as reduced monster damage. However, they may also have no effect or even inflict debuffs with various negative effects. As such, you’ll want to balance the chance of receiving a helpful buff with the risk of receiving a potentially fatal debuff.

Complete Fishing Quests For Willy

Similarly, you can also visit Willy, the local angler, near the bus stop. The Desert might not seem like an angler’s natural habitat, but Willy has set up near a pond and offers a fishing quest every day of the Festival:

• Catch 3 Sandfish (Spring 15)
• Catch 1 Scorpion Carp (Spring 16)
• Find the Golden Bobber by fishing up a Treasure Chest (Spring 17)

Your Fishing Skill must be at least Level 4 before you catch Scorpion Carp.

The Sandfish and Scorpion Carp aren’t as hard to catch as use the new Fish Smoker to make them into Smoked Fish.

Beat The Scholar’s Quiz

The Scholar can be found in the northeastern corner of the Desert. By speaking to him, players can try a quiz consisting of four questions generated at random. ing the quiz earns you 50 Calico Eggs. The questions and answers are below, courtesy of the Stardew Valley Wiki:

The Scholar may ask how many steps you've taken. Unfortunately, since there's no way to track your steps in Stardew Valley, you will have to guess at random.

How To Spend Calico Eggs At Stardew Valley’s Desert Festival

Redeem Eggs For Prismatic Shards & Skill Books

The Calico Egg Merchant sells many items; however, if you see them in stock, a few should be your priority. Ten of Stardew Valley's new Mystery Boxes can be bought for 20 Eggs, a great deal as Boxes can contain a wide range of useful items, including cooked meals, farm equipment, and even a Prismatic Shard.

Magic Rock Candy can be bought for 250 Eggs. This rare food item buffs your mining skill, luck, speed, defense, and attack stats. The Desert Trader typically sells it for 3 Prismatic Shards. Prismatic Shards are extraordinarily rare and have many late-game uses. As such, spending Eggs to get Magic Rock Candy allows you to save Shards for more important things.

The Woodcutter’s Weekly skill book costs 100 Eggs, which gives you an extra 250 Foraging XP. Other items are available, and you should also visit the stalls your friends and acquaintances set up.

What To Buy From Villager Stalls At Stardew Valley’s Desert Festival

Every Item Available During The Desert Festival

Several villagers, including Stardew Valley’s bachelors and bachelorettes, run their own stalls from 12 PM to midnight at the Desert Festival. They won’t run all at once; instead, the game selects two at random every day. Lots of useful items are sold, so keep an eye out for the following:

Other Activities Available At Stardew Valley’s Desert Festival

Visit Emily And Sandy For A New Outfit

Emily and Sandy have set up inside a giant cardboard box. Players can chat with Emily for a total wardrobe change once a day and will receive a new outfit. Your old clothes will be placed in your inventory.

Have A Meal From The Chef

Left of the bus stop, players can get specially cooked meals from the Chef. When prompted, the Chef will ask you to pick from five different ingredients:

He will then ask about the sauce, giving you five different options.

While it doesn’t beat installing Stardew Valley mods for more detailed cooking mechanics, the Chef’s meals are free. The only restriction is that you can’t combine ingredients with the same effect. For example, the defense-boosting Hearty Beans can’t be combined with the Rich Marinara. Your character will eat the meal immediately, receiving buffs from the main ingredient and sauce.

Get A Free Cactus

The Cactus Man can be found on the southern cliffs of the Calico Desert. When spoken to, he provides a decorative cactus plant for free, but only once every Festival.

Visit The Traveling Cart

The Traveling Cart is at the Desert Festival every day from 12 PM. She sells her usual randomized stock. If you’re looking for rare items to complete your Bundles, this is a fantastic opportunity to visit the Traveling Cart multiple times.

The Desert Festival runs for three days, giving you plenty of opportunities to visit. It’s a lovely event and one of Stardew Valley’s best festivals. Additionally, if you want to see everything the Desert Festival has on offer, check out PhilChill's video on YouTube:

Source: Stardew Valley Wiki

Video Credit: PhilChill/YouTube