A small, secluded island in New Zealand, Queenstown is famous for its annual winter carnival, the Queenstown Winter Festival, and has been a prime tourist spot for party lovers worldwide for several years. The carnivalesque event was first conducted in 1974, with subsequent editions only growing more extensive than its predecessor. The festival usually happens in June, when winter sets in and blankets New Zealand.
The Queenstown Winter's biggest winter festival could be a way to embrace winters the way they deserve, a four-day long fiesta ranging from grooving music fests, mirth chuckles through stand-ups, writhing theatre shows, debates, wacky and bizarre to-dos, and various other things.
This festival brings together a mass of party lovers from all corners of the world to party like a free-spirited, gypsy-souled Queenstown. The main events are free of cost for participation, and some others require entry passes of variable cost. Few events collect money for donations and charity purposes.
The legacy stands for good a stretch of forty-five years now, the enthusiasm not slightly budget even in the current time.
The conception of this festival four decades back is a tale as goofy as the festival itself. It is said that the then town had a population of just 5000 which turned out to be conducive to organize a low key yet vibrant celebration at the beginning of winter-mid June.
The celebration was a hit the very first year that included live musical performances by local musicians, Peter Doyle. It was primarily the brainchild of Laurie Wilde who compounded the event to wider and like-minded masses.
It was like any normal winter carnival for a quiet little town but uninhibited and enthusiastic participation from its residents made it be the most anticipated carnival festival of the calendar year.