There is a great variety of events and festivals during the entire year in Auckland city. Well, it is the most vibrant city in the country with lots of cultural activities and sporting events that see the image of the city as the most alive metropolis in New Zealand.
|
| Auckland regatta |
At this time of year, some leading tennis players in the country prepare for the Australian Open. This includes women and men in Heineken Open and ASB Classic. These tournaments are of international character with numerous players ranked in the top 30 in the world and they are held at the ASB Tennis Center in Parnell.
At the end of January, more exact, January, the 28th, Auckland celebrates its birthday and the beginning of the regatta. It was in 1840 when the first regatta took place on the Waitemata Harbour that welcomes a wide range of different craft including centre-boarders, classic vessels, keelboats and multi-hulls. Visitors can participate in race as sailors or just watch from excellent harbour vantage points at Tamaki Dive, Orakei Wharf, Bastion Point, North Head or East Coast Bays. This is considered as one of the oldest sporting events in New Zealand, the event that truly defines Auckland as the City of Sails and reflects its magnificent maritime heritage.
Just a couple of days before the city celebrates its birthday, the three days seafood festival offers plenty of entertainment, education and culture to compliment the array of delicious seafood. This event also celebrates the city’s maritime heritage, especially through various Maori tribes who survived in the past times from this delicious food. That was one of the reasons why they decided to settle here, at this isthmus that abounds with various seafood thanks to the location between the Tasman Sea and the Pacific.
Besides the Auckland Lantern Festival, one of Auckland’s most popular summer events that welcomes Chinese New Year, there is another most spectacular event in the city held in February too - HERO Festival. This event celebrates various gay events and it is held late February each year.
This event welcomes bands from all over the country that provide a great opportunity to enjoy jazz and blues on a Kiwi way. With bands lined on both sides of Selwyn Reserve and Tamaki drive, one can reveal an array of food and beverage stalls, but with no alcohol.
This annual event that exists more than 25 years, gathers the entire family members with entertainment for all. Teddy Bears Picnic is supported by the Auckland Kindergarten Association and presents the longest running and largest event of its kind in New Zealand and Australasia. Entertainment throughout the day includes two main stages of performances bouncy castles, face painting and everyone’s favorite strolling characters.
|
| A lot of Kiwis, Maori and other people from the Pacific enjoy the day dedicated to them, especially by the Auckland city. Pasifika Festival attracts more than 200,000 visitors each year |
This is the major event in horse racing in the country that blends sport, fashion, celebration and glamour. Since the first time it was held in 1874, the event makes one great parade of former Auckland Cup winners and racing celebrities, equine and human, that march through Broadway and Newmarket.
This event that celebrates everything connected to Polynesia through music, dancing and food, is regarded as one of the largest community events in the South Pacific. The festival was first produced by Auckland City Council in 1993 and has rapidly become a highlight for Auckland, initially attended by 30,000 people, now attracting over 225,000 people and hundreds of performers from all over the Auckland region and the Pacific. A week long series of events, exhibitions, workshops, play readings and film screenings has a regional character, but its aim is to promote the Pacific culture in an international way.
The event that takes place in Auckland every two years gathers more than 350,000 people at the two week show that combines arts and culture through dance, music, cabaret, burlesque, theatre, ballet, visual arts, films and public forums. Artists from all over the country, the Pacific, Asia and beyond are welcome to come and present their newest works of art, as well as the older ones that have marked a record number of sells-out, including local seasons of Taki Rua's new production Strange Resting Places or Silo Theatre's Ensemble Project.
The 1915 was the year when New Zealand’s military troops went into battle at Gallipoli and many of them lost their lives there. The Dawn Service is today the most popular of the ANZAC Day observances. It is timed to coincide with the initial landings at Gallipoli on 25 April 1915. The time is also poignant for veterans who recall the routine dawn "stand-to" of their war service. The added symbolism of darkness breaking into sunrise makes this a compelling and emotional experience for everyone. This day is celebrated across the country and abroad, but in Auckland War Memorial Museum it bears a special significance since the museum was built as a memorial to the 12,000 people from Auckland province that died during the first and second world wars.
The Auckland Harbour splashes into life every May with twin V8 boats (11 meters high and with 1300 horsepower going up to 190kph) that race from the viaduct Harbour under the Auckland Harbour Bridge. This type of racing is the water equivalent of Formula 1, attracting mass audience for this fabulous close up spectator event. This race is part of a series of races that are driven across the country.
Besides from this attractive sporting event, May is the month of music in New Zealand, especially in Auckland, since it is the home of major record companies, live music performance venues and music video production houses. These include more than 35 free Music in Parks concerts that are held throughout the year in Auckland city’s parks.
Matariki is the star cluster significant to Maori as this was the time when they celebrated the new year. Traditionally, this was a time to connect Maori to land and seafood harvesting what is done even today at this event that takes place throughout Auckland and embodies the way Maori commemorate and celebrate this ancient tradition with the context of contemporary city life in Tamaki Makaurau, Maori name for Auckland. The event includes numerous activities such as contemporary and traditional performance, film, food, exhibitions and provide an opportunity for Aucklanders and visitors to share rituals, entertainment, hospitality and learnings.
|
| One Tree Hill, a place where all races to several Auckland’s volcano peaks start and finish |
Since the territory of the city lies in the area of eleven dormant volcanoes that have a great cultural importance, it is important to celebrate their nature and topography. This event invites competitors who run to and up Auckland’s volcanoes, but they must stick to established tracks and paths to avoid the corrosion of these peaks. All multiple volcano events start and finish in One Tree Hill, an important memorial place for both Maori and other Kiwis. The area around the One Tree Hill comprises ancient Maori pa and several parks including most important Cornwall Park, that is, among many other things, home of the Stardoem Observatory.
This event is the most prestigious fashion happening in the country and its host is Auckland, the country’s premier fashion city. This glamorous and internationally-recognised event provides a forum for New Zealand's leading fashion designers to showcase their new collections, taking them to the next level both internationally and locally. It all began eight years ago as a platform for promoting fashion and creative industries, but today it celebrates the exhilarating mix of creative flair, technical prowess and business expertise that is the New Zealand fashion industry. Auckland is full of fantastic world-class fashion, with hot spots for local designers including the CBD, Newmarket and Ponsonby. Thousands of fashion lovers come to this annual event that lasts for a week filled with catwalk shows, seminars, the Beauty Zone and Rupmus Room, the New Zealand Herald Designer Garage Sale and many other activities. From mid to late September Auckland hosts some of the famous Kiwi designers such as Karen Walker or Kate Sylvester.
This is an opportunity for the cultured and the curious to view the best of what New Zealand’s and invited Australian galleries have to offer in terms of Kiwi, Pacific and Maori contemporary visual artworks. This prestigious three day event is the country’s national art fair located in Viaduct Harbour. The anticipated 10,000 visitors to the event include enthusiasts, collectors, curators, artists and media who enjoy a showcase of the best contemporary art ever presented in New Zealand, all in one place. In addition of guest speakers and a lecture series Auckland Art Fair proudly presents the best of 60 galleries in the city, as well as 73% of the region’s creative industry sector, not to mention other movements, galeries and artists from across the country and abroad. There is a sculpture court that displays up to 20 sculptural works, including kinetic works and cast iron creations from a line-up of New Zealand and Australian artists.
Auckland Heritage Festival abounds with more than hundred events and activities across the city which are all related to unique stories and secrets of Auckland. There is everything on offer: from art and architecture to fashion and music, therefore suitable for all generations. The festival celebrates the unique heritage of Auckland city and its region with the main aim to protect heritage areas and buildings and to encourage Aucklanders to celebrate the city’s history.
|
| African Daisy also found its place in numerous botanical gardens in Auckland, as well as on the horticultural event of the year - Auckland Flower Show |
This beautiful event is the biggest horticultural event in the country that presents something for everybody: from casual gardens to experts and special activities for children. There are numeorus outdoor activities and the two new indoor facilities that comprise Exhibition Gardens, Courtyard Gardens, Kiwi Back Gardens and Planted Borders. The mid November is the time of the year when this festival takes place with lots of flowers, music and food that attract crowds of visitors from all over the country and overseas too.
At this time of the year, Christmas songs can be heard all over the world and it is the similar situation in Auckland and its neighbouring islands. There is much to see if one decides to take a ferry trip to some of the Gulf islands such as the Great Barrier Island or Waiheke Island. With lots of music, street performances, hand-made art crafts, this is the perfect time of the year to set aside all problems and enjoy the atmosphere with just one thing on the mind - what to give to the beloved ones. That’s possible too, whether in Auckland city or in the islands with the abundance of market stalls or large shopping centers.
Although held late November continuously for more than 75 years, the Farmers Santa Parade is the biggest Christmas event in the country which traditionally attracts more than 250,000 visitors from all over New Zealand. A long history goes back to the time when Queen Street was revelling in the fun and excitement of the parade with many floats, characters and special guest stars that join the New Zealand’s A-list of celebrities. In the 1934, at the time when first parade took place, the parade was led by highly decorated carts pulled by horses and accompanied by a pack of colourful characters. The situation is quite the same today, in difference to a number of visitors that today counts over 300,000 people, 4,000 participants and 280 creations on a 2,2 kilometers long route. All of this has one main aim - to promote this milestone in the parade’s history.
