Autumn in England is supposed to be a heart-warming time filled with different shades of red and brown and green and stuff. What a British Autumn actually is is sodden wet leaves blown around a world of grey, a plummeting temperature and a population left fantasising about a summer that never happened.
Down Under on the other hand, Aussies bemoan the freezing 25 degree temperatures, the paltry 13 hours of sunlight and the fact that it's always raining (where always, in this case, equates to about the frequency of an eclipse).
So if you're Down Under this autumn, you'll need some stuff to do. Here's a look at some of the best events going on around Australia in April.
This film never came on. Everyone died in
the end.
Outdoor 3d cinema - McLaren Vale - until the 7th of April
Outdoor cinemas are one of those things everyone thinks are cool but no one's ever been to one (or is that just me? I've got mates alright). Your typical cinema experience is a very wintery affair; no one wants to sit in a dark room for three hours while it's nice outside, which is why Australia's cinematic output is limited to Baz Lurhmann and Home n Away (quick, name an Australian film since Crocodile Dundee).
However, combine the two and you've got a great day out. So if you're in Adelaide before the 7th, head on down to the internationally renowned wine region of McLaren Vale for the Cinema Under the Stars season in which plenty of 3D films will be shown every evening.
Everybody was Kung Fu Fighting - Western Australia - 7th of April
Don't pretend you didn't just sing that in your head.
Everyone wishes they could do Kung Fu, even the ones that can already do it know they'll never feel as cool as they did smashing their bedrooms wearing dressing gowns when they were seven(teen).
People often say the martial art they're studying weeknights at the dojo is an 'ancient art' when they're really doing Boxercise in the gym with Sarah from HR.
However, if you're in Perth on the 7th of the month and want to see a genuine ancient art that is also the coolest, head on down to the town of Bunbury to see the Shaolin Kung Fu show.
You know this all ended in tears
BMX Championships - Mount Gambier South Australia 12th to the 22nd
BMX has grown to be one of the most popular extreme sports in the world and, like all other extreme sports, is only made all the more entertaining when it goes wrong and someone goes head over heels with nothing to save them but a few planks of very unforgiving wood.
If BMXing was your extreme sport of choice during that slightly rebellious stage of your youth when you hung outside shops and tried to intimidate pensioners, head on down to Mount Gambier between the 12th and the 22nd for the Subaru Australian National BMX Championships.
Floating Football - Sydney - 12th to the 22nd
Whether you love football and miss it, or hate it but have been in Australia so long that you'll take any reminder of home, Sydney is the place to get that fix this month.
The Big Issue Street Football Festival isn't your average kickabout either, people hate football because they say it's boring but there's none of that here as the games are played on a floating pitch and the focus is on showing off as much as possible.
Held in the Darling Harbour, the 12 day festival is the perfect opportunity to show off to the Australians that just because we can't play cricket or rugby even though we invented them, we don't half know some insulting chants.
Lastly, if you want extreme, and we mean the sort of extreme that would make having a picture of your Nan’s face tattooed on your back during a bungee jump look like an evening in with your Nan listening to her views on tattoos, the sort of extreme that would make playing chicken with your space helmet in low orbit look like watching a chicken defrost, the sort of extreme that would make riding a nuclear bomb look like a ship in a bottle building competition then you need to get to Adelaide (in the most extreme way possible) by the 28th of April for the CROQUET WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS!!!!1!!
Or not, whatever.
- Dominic Ladden-Powell is Online Editor with the Australian Visa Bureau, an independent migration consultancy specialising in helping people lodge applications for a Working Holiday Visa to Australia.
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