Every year in August Budapest hosts the Sziget Festival which since its beginnings in 1993 as a rather small student event has transformed into one of the biggest and most beloved music festivals in Europe. It takes place on Óbudai-sziget (“Old-Buda Island”), a leafy island on the Danube which encouraged some over-eager (and maybe broke) festival enthusiast in the past to enter by swimming or paddling across the river. Don’t try it, it has never worked and it could be very dangerous to make an attempt to cross a fast-flowing river like the Danube.

This year the festival takes place from the 11th until the 16th of August. It has a huge variety of music genres, and bands from all over come to perform. There will be several stages including a main stage where the recent popular acts perform, a world music stage and a so-called Party Arena where great DJs will play beats that get your feet moving. Some of the main artists that are scheduled to perform this year are: 30 Seconds to Mars, The Hives, Faithless, Iron Maiden and Bad Religion. The organizers expect around 400 000 people to come to the festival.

Apart from the program of the 5 official days the festival has a “Day -1 and 0” which are additional two days at the beginning. On Day -1 Kispál és a Borz will perform their last concert. And the big programme points for Day 0 are a Reggae celebration, Cseh Tamás memorial concert and a Day of Hungarian Jazz. In addition to great music, the festival offers other activities including cinema, dance, theatre, tattooing, Internet access, volleyball, tennis, football, bungee jumping and a life-sized foosball and Budapest is easily reachable to take a break and explore the city.

You can get all information about the festival on the website http://www.sziget.hu/festival_english Make sure you rent apartments in Budapest to save you money for the tickets. We wouldn’t want you trying to swim over there.