The month of March brings with it plenty of exciting events to attend and festivals to celebrate. Here, we present some of the really unique events and festivals that take place in March. However, as always, we’re only mentiontioning the ones that start during the month so for other events happening around this time do take a look at The Most Amazing Events Happening in February.
Dates: 6th- 9th March 2020
Location: Mendoza, Argentina
Spread over six days the Grape Harvest Festival in Mendoza is one of the largest wine festivals in the world. The event draws everyone from local winemakers to national celebrities to the city of Mendoza with the main attraction of this great Mendocino festival being the ‘Central Act’ which is performed in the Greek Theater at the General San Martin Park.
It starts with an artistic display of dance, lights, and music, where hundreds of actors and dancers showcasing their art in a spectacular performance and continues with the election of the National Grape Harvest Queen. The event culminating in a magnificent exhibition of fireworks that dance to the rhythm of the music for more than 20 minutes.
With over twenty thousand attendees, the show is a spectacle of dance, music, and lights.
Dates: 6th - 9th March 2020
Location: Melbourne, Australia
Now more than half a century old, Moomba is among the longest-running community festivals in Australia, attracting around a million visitors each year. Go to take in the buffet of entirely free events, like live music, waterspouts, carnivals and parades — and to see what the fuss is all about.
Dates: 9th- 10th March 2020
Location: Countrywide, India
Called the festival of colours, Holi is celebrated on the day of a full moon on the vernal equinox. This festival is one of India's most popular festivals and celebrated by Hindus across the globe to welcome in spring and signify the victory of good over evil. Cities and towns all over India come alive with riotous color flinging, bonfires, and feasting that is held in the evenings leading up to the main day of festivities. On the first evening, people burn effigies of the demoness Holika who was defeated by on this day. The next morning, people gather in public spaces and take part in Rangwali Holi. This makes for a crazy time, where people throw coloured powders known as gulal at one another while getting drenched in water and dancing. There are many region-specific twists to celebrations such as the singing of spiritual songs in some parts or the playful ‘beating’ of townsmen by the townswomen or playing with flowers or celebrations spread across a longer period of time.
Dates: 11th - 15th March 2020
Location: St Martin, The Caribbean
SXM is a boutique festival taking place for five sunshiney days on St Martin with underground house and techno for the kind of discerning dance-music-lovers you would normally find riding a tandem through Burning Man Festival, handing out bindis at DC10 or grinning ear-to-ear at BPM in Mexico. Discover Ibizaish vibes in the Caribbean, only the beaches are even better, the drinks cheaper, and there's a whole summer's worth of DJs packed into one short, spectacular burst. After taking a year out in 2018 for the island to recover from Hurricane Irma, SXM Festival is back on track and scheduled to be bigger than ever before. The 2019 line-up had includes the likes of Ricardo Villalobos, Axel Coman and Apollonia.
Dates: 12th- 29th March 2020
Location: Glasgow, Scotland
Be prepared to get your funny bone tickled at a comedy gathering that organisers are calling “the largest event of its kind in Europe”. With top comedy stars and household names from around the world complemented by the very best emerging Scottish talents take to the stand-up stage at Glasgow to provide a laughter-packed programme of great shows and events, in some terrific venues, for visitors and locals alike.
The Glasgow Live International Comedy Festival offers everything from stand up and sketches to drama, film and children's shows. There are shows taking place daily throughout the entire festival, across over forty venues across the city, with something to suit every taste, budget, and preference.
Dates: 13th- 15th March 2020
Location: Colorado, USA
Taking place in the Colorado mountain town of Nederland the Frozen Dead Guy Days is one of the quirkiest and unique festivals in the USA. With three days of wintery gaiety focused around the thirty live bands performing in heated tents, the festival offers outrageous events like coffin races, costumed polar plunging, frozen t-shirt contests and much more. This is a festival you won’t forget soon.
The range of activities span from the survival essential skills to absurd showmanship and include things like tossing frozen salmon, and the fancy-dress dives into the icy plunge pool which are a must-see.
The Festival was inspired by a former Norwegian grandad Bredo Morstol who, by a bizarre twist of fate, ended up being cryogenically frozen alone in a shed in the US state of Colorado.
And in attending it, the event goers celebrate the joy of being alive by acknowledging death with playing strange games and major partying.
Dates: 14th March 2020
Location: Brussels, Belgium
One night, over a thousand young artists and thirty one museums, and a plethora of events. Every year museums across Brussels choose a Saturday where they turn night into day with workshops, performances, fashion shows, guided tours and social events, catering to any and every interest whether it’s entertainment or enlightenment.
Dates: 15th- 19th March 2020
Location: Valencia, Spain
This fiesta is a unique Spanish celebration where firecracker-filled papier-mâché and wood models called fallas are created and eventually set alight. This exuberant festival is rooted in traditions welcoming the arrival of spring, and in 2016 UNESCO decided to list it a Cultural Intangible World Heritage.
There are many stories about the origins of the festival with most popular version stating that Las Fallas comes from a Valencian tradition where carpenters would burn old useless materials before the day of St. Joseph, the patron saint of carpenters. While others claim it is to celebrate equinoxes and solstices or that it follows from a tradition in a which figures representing a persona non grata would be hung from posts before being flung into a fire.
Today one of the most fun parts is the unveiling of towering fallas with their accompanying puppets called ninots. The sculptures are as intricate as they are gigantic and you can find a variety of differently themed installations every year. These Fallas standing up to thirty meters tall are paraded through the streets as people dressed in traditional garb dance to the tunes played by live bands, with pyrotechnics and gunpowder blasts punctuating the festivities at intervals.
Las Fallas de Valencia is an incredible display of elaborate sculptures, pyrotechnics, and live music. The festival concludes when a huge bonfire is lit on which the sculptures are burned. The flames can run so hot that the neighbouring buildings have to be continually hosed with water to keep them from crumbling. Afterward everyone in the city parties the night away.
Dates: 17th March 2020
Location: Dublin, Ireland
This holiday observing the death of Saint Patrick the patron saint of Ireland, celebrates Irish culture with parades, costumes, music, comedy, films, drinking and a whole lot of green. It is a festival like no other and that needs to be added to your bucket list. The weekend of Saint Patrick’s Day is traditionally the potato planting weekend in Ireland.
Interestingly, the first St Patrick’s Day parade was not held in Ireland at all, but in the United States by Irish Settlers, however, the parades have since become a popular event across Ireland. The theme for this year’s parade is ‘Storytelling’ and along with music and marching bands from all over the world, there’ll be plenty of colourful floats, dancers and costumes. Everyone, Irish and non-Irish alike participate in the ‘wearing of the green’, that is, sporting an item of green clothing or a shamrock, the Irish national plant, in the lapel.
With giant, colourful puppets, fantastic street entertainers and marching bands this parade is one to remember.
Dates: 20th - 22nd March 2020
Location: Toronto, Canada
Comic lovers rejoice! It's time to break out your favourite cosplay outfit and shine. Enjoy a fun time at the Comic Convention in Toronto where you will get to meet like minded people and enjoy an event dedicated to the hidden fan in all of us. This annual event has been going on for almost two decades and you can expect a star-studded guest list attending this year as well. Stars from popular shows and movies like Terminator, Dr, Who, Firefly and many more will be attending this three day event to sign autographs, host Q&As and pose for photos with fans. Also be sure to check out comic art sketching duels, take a look at the goods made by the artisans who have set up stalls there and attend how-to workshops on storytelling or sketch art. And definitely visit the photo booths there to get some instantly Instagrammable pics with your faves.
Located in the Metro Toronto Convention Centre, and spread across a sprawling area, the show will be boasting unique exhibitors, presentations, workshops, and many celebrity guests. You can purchase tickets online before you visit.
Dates: 29th March - 5rd April 2020
Location: Ubud, Bali, Indonesia
So over the whole festival scene? Can’t even begin to imagine partying for 3 days on end? Perhaps BaliSpirit is more your style. Seeking to rejuvenate, invigorate and enlighten participants, BaliFest emphasises exploration and renewal through wellness, activities and connection with fellow travellers. Yoga, nutrition and health workshops, music lessons, art classes, excursions to local temples and spiritual sites are just some of the options that you can explore during the festival.
Dates: 30th March - 5th April 2020
Location: Vancouver, Canada
The movers and shakers of Canadian fashion hold their own at this increasingly high profile event. Expect a blizzard of flash photography at glamorous social gatherings and runway shows, tempered by a hearty helping of Canadian hospitality.
Dates: 29th March - 13th April 2020
Location: Lech Zürs, Austria
The breathtaking landscape of Lech Zürs serves as the setting for the Tanzcafé Arlberg Music Festival. Sun terraces, in the ski huts and hotel bars play host to amazing shows performed by great artists, making for a truly cozy and unique ambience for both bands and audiences. During this remarkable music festival, leading international musicians meet music lovers, dance enthusiasts and sun-skiers. Together they celebrate the approaching spring as the event pays homage to the region's Twenties boom years, which saw the small town of Lech overrun by Jazz bands and Swing orchestras. The highlights of this end-of-season musical extravaganza include performances by well known Jazz icons.
Dates: 30th March - 3rd April 2020
Location: Mayrhofen, Austria
The Altitude Comedy Festival, The Funniest Show on Snow, has returned to Mayrhofen in 2020. Hilarious shows will keep the good times going in Mayrhofen, where comedy and powder skiing will combine for the ultimate performances. Marcus Brigstocke, Andrew Maxwell, Rachel Parris, Terry Alderton, Zoe Lyons, and Emmanuel Sonubi are some of names that have performed at the Altitude Comedy Festival earlier so get ready to laugh your socks off at this entertaining event.
If you enjoyed reading this also do go through The Top Destinations to Visit in March.