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The Christmas and Easter holiday periods, especially, are marked by celebrations all over the country.
All cities and towns have their own Agricultural Shows, which are high points of the local calendar.
Each mainland capital has a regular celebration and showcase of Art and Culture, of which the biennial Adelaide Arts Festival is the best known.
January
Festival of Sydney , NSW. A month of festivities, with various events, including open air concerts, street theatre and fireworks.
Montsalvat Jazz Festival , Eltham, VIC. Australia’s premier jazz festival, which takes place on the Montsalvat Estate over Australia Day weekend.
Tamworth Country Music Festival , Tamworth, NSW. A week long celebration of country music, culminating in the Australian Country Music Awards.
Australian Open, tennis championship takes place in Melbourne during January.
Midsumma Festival, Melbourne’s gay festival, is held during January/February.
February
Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras , NSW. Sydney’s gay community’s massive and outlandish festival begins at the end of February and lasts three weeks, ending with an extravagant parade and an all-night dance party.
Festival of Perth , WA. A month of "low-brow arts" at venues across the city.
Womadelaide, Adelaide’s outdoor festival of world music and dance, takes place in February, in odd numbered years.
Bindoon Rock Festival, Bindoon , WA. Western Australia’s equivalent to Woodstock or Reading, including some visiting overseas bands.
March
Adelaide Arts Festival , SA. Australia’s best-known and most innovative arts festival is biennial and takes place in even numbered years.
Melbourne Moomba Festival , VIC. Eleven days of partying, beginning and ending with fireworks plus lots of fun in between.
Australian Grand Prix, takes place in Melbourne in March.
Australian Rules Football, takes place around the country from March to September.
April
Barossa Valley Vintage Festival , SA. Germanic festival set in the country’s viticultural heart, biennially in odd numbered years.
Melbourne International Comedy Festival , VIC. Opening on April Fools’ Day, comics from around the world gather for three weeks.
May
Bangtail Muster , Alice Springs, NT. Funny parades and Outback silliness.
June
Melbourne International Film Festival , VIC. Australia’s largest and most prestigious film festival takes place over two weeks.
Sydney International Film Festival , NSW. An important film festival, running for over two weeks in June based at the State Theatre.
Barunga Wugularr Sports & Cultural Festival, held near Katherine, Beswick Aboriginal Land, NT. An opportunity to enjoy Aboriginal arts and culture in the Northern Territory. (No alcohol.)
Cape York Aboriginal Dance Festival , QLD. Three-day (alcohol-free) celebration of authentic Aboriginal culture. Held biennially, in odd-numbered years.
July
Camel Cup, Alice Springs, NT. Camel-racing down the dry Todd River.
Darwin Beer Can Regatta , NT. Mindil Beach is the venue (July/August) for series of boat races held for craft constructed of beer cans! Also, a thong-throwing contest, territorian eccentricity personified.
August
Shinju Matsuri Festival , Broome, WA. Probably the most remote big festival, however, this does not prevent the town being “packed” for this Oriental-themed pearl festival.
Mount Isa Rodeo , Mount Isa, QLD. Australia’s largest rodeo, offering the chance to encounter bulls, horses and their riders.
September
Bathurst 1000 Road Races , Bathurst, NSW. Australia’s premier weekend of car and bike street racing.
Birdsville Races , QLD. Once a year the remote Outback town of Birdsville (population 120) comes alive for a weekend of drinking and horse racing, a well-known Australian oddity.
Warana , Brisbane, QLD. Huge, two-week arts festival centred in the city’s Botanic Gardens with food, wine, beer, music, writing and children’s events culminating in fireworks and a wacky Concours de Decadence.
Melbourne International Festival of the Arts , VIC. Two-week celebration of visual, performing and written arts in venues all over the city.
October
Henley-on-Todd Regatta , Alice Springs, NT. Wacky races, in bottomless boats, running down the dry Todd riverbed.
Manly Jazz Festival , Sydney, NSW. A 3 day jazz festival with artists from all over the world.
November
Australian Grand Prix, Melbourne, VIC. Formula One street-racing which follows a week of partying, Albert Park in Melbourne.
Melbourne Cup, Flemington Racecourse, VIC. Australia’s Ascot, a 130-year-old horse race which brings the country to a standstill around the radio or TV.
December
Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race, Sydney, NSW. Crowds flock to the harbour to see the start of this classic regatta, which departs Sydney on Boxing Day and arrives in Hobart three days later.
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