Queen’s Birthday Long-Weekend critical to past and future of Cooktown and Cape York
For 53 years Cooktown has celebrated the nationally significant Re-enactment of Captain Cook’s landing at the Endeavour River in 1770, on the Queen’s Birthday weekend.
Cooktown Discovery Festival
This is the closest weekend to the true date of Cook’s arrival in 1770 of 17th June and the First Reconciliation between Europeans and Aboriginal people - an historic event of great significance for Australia, and Queensland in particular.
Locally and regionally heralded as the start of the tourism season for Cape York, the weekend is known as the Cooktown Discovery Festival and attracts thousands of people from far and wide. Apart from watching the famous Re-enactment on the Sunday morning, the town comes alive with a number of wonderful events including country music concerts, Billy Kart races, sporting competitions, a Grand Parade, markets stalls and kids’ entertainment, sunset Corroboree and fireworks on the Sunday evening.
The negative economic impacts of cancelling the Queen’s Birthday Public Holiday will also be widely felt across the region. The Discovery Festival is part of a Regional Events' Strategy which encourages visitors, in particular the grey nomad market, to stay in the area for the Port Douglas Carnivale (May) - Cooktown Discovery Festival (Queen's Birthday Weekend) - Laura Dance Festival & Laura Races & Rodeo (June/July).
The Festival also marks the beginning of the 4WD season for Cape York Peninsula, with the self-drive adventure market enjoying the weekend before continuing north. Many Festival visitors live around the Cairns area, taking advantage of the long weekend to make the 350 kms drive to Cooktown, and returning home on the holiday Monday. If there is no Public Holiday, many of these visitors will be lost.
Tour operators and overseas visitors plan itineraries years in advance to include the Discovery Festival - and Cooktown accommodation and tour operators already have bookings for the 2012 event. Any date change will cause disruption, disappointment and bad publicity for Queensland, and further hit the pockets of the region's already struggling tourism industry.
With the nature of our climate, together with recent Queensland disasters, Cooktown and Cape York rely on the Cooktown Discovery Festival as a three-day weekend to draw the visitors and give them the time to attend all the events. Changing the holiday weekend would be a potential economic disaster in what is already a fragile tourism economy.
To have your say, please complete the brief online survey on www.qld.gov.au/holidayproposal before 31 October 2011
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Cooktown Chamber of Commerce and Tourism Media Release
20 October 2011
Media Enquiries – Vanessa Gillen PR, Cooktown – 0412 318690 vanessagillenpr@gmail.com
