Stanthorpe Apple and Grape Harvest Festival
February 26, 2022 @ 5:00 pm - March 6, 2022 @ 5:00 pm
Australia’s most loved foot-stomping, grape-crushing festival will ‘crush-it’ again in 2022, with plans underway to deliver the crunchiest ever Stanthorpe Apple and Grape Harvest Festival on 25 February – 6 March 2022.
In the cool high altitude of Queensland’s Granite Belt, Stanthorpe has been literally “crushing-it” since 1966, welcoming 70,000+ visitors from across Australia to celebrate the bounty of the apple harvest and the wine region’s grape crushing.
Known for its messy grape-stomping antics, the 2022 festival program delivers all the favourite harvest events: the fun of grape crushing; a hotly contested apple peeling competition; plus a 3-day Queensland Country Bank Food and Wine Fiesta on 4 to 6 March. The Food and Wine Fiesta brings together the Granite Belt’s gourmet foods, award-winning wines and craft beer all to one location under the shady trees and picnic tables, all to the tunes of non-stop live entertainment.
Festival entertainment and the party-filled atmosphere will spill out into the streets on the big finale weekend 4 – 6 March. Crowds will gather for the must-see Grand Parade that runs through the very centre of Stanthorpe and once it’s rolled on by, in it’s place the program of free entertainment continues with the highlight grape crushing championships and the Rebel Breeze FM Street Carnival.
A line-up of live bands and an eclectic mix of buskers will fill the air, though the most impressive musical spectacle is the gathering of hundreds of musicians grouped in brass bands, pipe bands and thunderous marching drum bands who hit the streets en-masse immediately after the street parade on Saturday 5 March.
The first weekend of the festival, sees emerging young stars join seasoned buskers as they gather in Stanthorpe for the South East Qld Finals of the Australian National Busking Championships. Buskers on every street corner Saturday 26 February is reason enough to be in Stanthorpe on the first festival weekend, but you can be sure the crowds come just as much for Sunday’s Banchetto Italiano (Italian Long Lunch) which celebrate’s Stanthorpe’s Italian heritage in such a riot of fun that you can guarantee it will sell out!
Highlights of the festival program include:
the Grape Crush Championships
Queensland Country Bank Food & Wine Fiesta
Channel 7 Grand Parade, Rebel FM Street Carnival
Apple & Grape Gala Ball
Apple Peeling and Apple Pie Competitions
Orchard Tours
Open Gardens
Meet the Winemaker Events and much more, filling 10 exciting days.
Stanthorpe Apple and Grape Harvest Festival is supported by the Queensland Government through Tourism and Events Queensland and features on the It’s Live! in Queensland events calendar.
