Where to go in June
Sing for the solstices – join the Inca in Peru or the druids of Stonehenge to celebrate
Events & festivals
BEST OF BRITISH – June is definitely festival month in the UK, from the literary festival at Hay on Wye to music festivals galore – Glastonbury, Isle of Wight and Wychwood, for starters.
SOLAR SENSATIONS – The summer solstice on 21 June is indelibly linked with the sun rising over the heel stone at Stonehenge. Access to the stones is now allowed on the night of 20 June until the following morning, with tens of thousands congregating to watch the sun rise around 4.45am, while many thousands more watch sunrise at nearby Avebury stone circle.
Of course, June also marks the winter solstice in the southern hemisphere. In Peru it is celebrated with Inti Raymi – Festival of the Sun – held among the ruins of the fortress of Sacsayhuaman near Cusco. Dating back to Inca times, the festival honours the god Inti, as well as marking the winter solstice and new year; week-long celebrations culminate in major events on 24 June.
WORLD MUSIC – Whatever grooves you choose, you'll find something to fascinate you at the World Festival of Sacred Music at Fès. Musicians and dancers from around the world flock to Morocco's spiritual capital to perform devotional music ranging from local Sufi chants to Spanish gypsy songs.
Morocco is also home to the Gnaoua World Music Festival in lovely Essaouira. Gnaoua is a mix of Arabic, Berber and African rhythms; musicians join in to mix gnaoua with rock, jazz, reggae, blues and countless other genres.
OIL BE BLOWED – Watch hundreds of topless men covered in oil trying to flip each other to the ground. The Kirkpinar Festival in Edirne is host to the Turkish national championships and claims to be the oldest oil wrestling festival in the world… in 2012 it celebrates the 651st festival, while 2013 will be the 652nd.
Wildlife
DRY TIMES – In Southern Africa this is the start of the dry season, the days are still cool, and the animals get easier to spot. This is the perfect time to visit Botswana’s Okavango Delta or to take a walking safari in Zambia’s South Luangwa National Park.
BEAR NECESSITIES – The salmon have returned to the rivers of Alaska to spawn, so join the hordes of hungry brown and black bears that congregate to take advantage of this bounteous fishy feast as the salmon head upriver.
Activities
BARE BACK BIKES – In over a hundred cities around the world, people ride bikes naked to celebrate cycling and the human body. The ride demonstrates the vulnerability of cyclists on the road and is a protest against car culture. However, you don’t need to bike in the buff to enjoy a cycling holiday.
June is the perfect time in most of Europe to take to the road – or mountain trails or disused railway track – on two wheels.
You could take a leisurely tour of the vineyards of the Loire Valley, go mountain biking in the Pyrenees, or be king of the road in bike-friendly (and fairly flat) Denmark.
Natural phenomena
LIGHT NIGHTS – This is the month for midnight sun in the far north so head to Iceland, Greenland or Lapland to really make the most of it.
Or you could take an expedition cruise around Spitsbergen (Svalbard), watching out for polar bears and marvelling at how people live this far north year round.
Think what you could be doing at midnight: in Iceland you could be spotting whales; in northern Sweden you could be skiing; and in Russia’s St Petersburg you could be leaving a concert performance, part of their annual White Nights Festival, and strolling the still-busy streets.
The weather is nice in...
BEIRUT, Lebanon 22-29°C
DAR ES SALAAM, Tanzania 21-30°C
MADRID, Spain 16-28°C
TANNA, Vanuatu 19-25°C
LIJIANG, China 19°C and clear skies
With warmer weather coming to the northern hemisphere, June is the perfect time to visit the parts of Europe that get too hot – and too crowded – at the height of summer. Madrid and Rome are surprisingly manageable and the Dalmatian Coast of Croatia literally sparkles. In North America Montreal, Canada kicks off the summer with a Jazz Festival and average daytime temperatures of around 21°C.
The coming winter in Australia makes the Northern Territory a more comfortable proposition – there really is no better time to gaze upon Uluru or visit Kakadu. The cooler weather makes hiking to Machu Picchu a more enjoyable prospect too.
Conventional wisdom says:
It's getting chilly in Chile.
Wanderlust says:
Andean skiing is amongst the best in the world. Grab your skis and hit the slopes.