cuba st carnivalHope­fully Wel­ling­ton’s glor­i­ous sum­mer weath­er will hold on for anoth­er few days, and treat the city’s cit­izens to what prom­ises to be a fant­ast­ic Cuba St Car­ni­val, this Sat­urday (Sat 26 Feb).

It’s the last Car­ni­val before the south end of Cuba St will be irre­voc­ably altered by the impend­ing bypass, so there’s bound to be a few emo­tion­al per­form­ances and trib­utes to the old end of the street over the week­end.

One of the high­lights of this year’s event will be Sat­urday night’s parade, which begins at the Courtenay/Cambridge Corner and going along Cour­tenay, up Tarana­ki, into Ghuznee and then onto Cuba, end­ing at Abel Smith Street.

The indie kids might want to be aware that the Phoenix Found­a­tion and SJD are play­ing the main stage in the middle of the day (12.30pm and 2.30pm respect­ively). There’s also a pleth­ora of world, dub and dance acts play­ing tunes on the Cuba and World stages from early in the day ’til around mid­night, so whatever your tastes, you’ll prob­ably find some­thing you like over the course of the day. Except maybe coun­try. Or clas­sic­al.

Anway, there’ll also no doubt be a big selec­tion of ran­dom stalls down the length of the street selling an equally ran­dom num­ber of goods and food. Look­ing for a hemp hat or a new crys­tal for your col­lec­tion? Maybe a yummy vegan nosh-up? Per­haps a new pair of fire-pois? You’ll prob­ably find it all at the Car­ni­val.