Grape Harvest Festival in Lendava

The days are getting colder already, summer is saying goodbye and autumn is knocking at our doors. September is the month when autumnal labour and grape harvests take place. Saturday, September 3rd, was the day when the 43rd Grape Harvest Festival was celebrated in Lendava. It was the closing event of the so-called Vinarium Festival and the event itself is, after the Bogračfest, the second largest cultural and culinary event in Lendava. Year-on-year, it draws more and more visitors from nearby, as well as further afield.

At eleven o´clock, Lendava´s Glavna ulica filled up with visitors and the harvest parade began. Some of the participants of the parade marched on foot or sat on a bike while others sat on a tractor that pulled a decorated wagon. Several participants represented their order of wine knights, others their society or their villages while parading in a horse-drawn carriage. Alongside groups from local villages, groups from Hungary, Croatia and Serbia joined in the parade too. The marching folk dancers demonstrated their dances on several occasions during the parade. On the tractor wagons and in the horse-drawn carriages, men, women and children, dressed in folk costumes, introduced the traditions and activities of the olden days. Apart from grape picking and customs, visitors could also see funny revivals of olden small-scale crafts.

After the parade, visitors had the opportunity to delve into the rich culinary offerings of the event: there was bograč to taste, fish from Hotiza, perec, lángos and exquisite local wines. The organisers did not forget about the children either. In the courtyard of the library, the so-called fairy-tale yard and other workshops for children awaited the little ones.

The musical entertainment was provided by Ansambel Skok. They were followed by various folk dancing groups who took over the square in front of the stage while in the evening, the band of Péter Pál and the group Kingston ensured visitors had a jolly time listening and dancing to their concerts.