Festivals in Traverse City and surrounding areas
The National Cherry Festival is the granddaddy of Traverse City's celebrations. It begins the first Saturday of July and runs for 8 days. It includes a wide variety of parades, contests, music performances, food, drink, games, a street sale and an annual air show that features the U.S. Navy Blue Angels in even-numbered years.
The Traverse City Film Festival was held for the first time in 2005 and has returned bigger and better each year. The week-long event is held in late July and runs through early August. Interest in this event is spreading across the nation. Films of all kinds are shown during the event: New, classic, documentary, art. Venues include the venerable State Theater in downtown Traverse City, the newly renovated historic City Opera House, the Old Town Playhouse, Lars Hockstad Auditorium and the Open Space Park, located right on the beautiful Grand Traverse Bay where classic movies are shown free of charge each night on a huge inflatable screen.
Horse Shows by the Bay Equestrian Festival features more than 1200 world-class riders & horses from throughout the country competing for three weeks in the Olympic Disciplines of Show Jumping & Dressage. Public weekend events & demonstrations kick off at 2:00 pm. The Festival is located at Flintfields Horse Park - 3 miles east of Acme 1/2 mile north of M-72 on Bates Rd near the Turtle Creek Casino (just minutes from Traverse City). Enjoy concession amenities provided by Mabels and a unique boutique vendor row. General admission is just $5 per person. Please see the web site for individual calendar of events and this year's dates.
Other festivals keep Traverse City and the surrounding area hopping all year 'round. There's Kalkaska Winterfest in January, the Mesick Mushroom Festival in May, the National Trout Festival in April, the Elk Rapids Harbor Days, Empire Anchor Days in mid-July, the Sleeping Bear Dunegrass and Blues Festival in early August, the Peshawbestown Traditional Pow Wow in mid-August, and many more events throughout the year. To find out what's happening during your visit, please use our online Events , accessible via a link at the top right corner of every page on this website.
