Festivals - Part 29

 Nimbin Aquarius Festival 1973

The Nimbin Aquarius Festival was the fourth and last in a series of festivals organized by the Australian Union of Students.  The first three were held on college campuses in cities.  The 1973 festival was held in Nimbin, a tiny town, population 300, in the northern part of New South Wales, Australia, over ten days from May 12 to May 23, 1973.  It was a music festival, but it also celebrated alternative thinking and sustainable lifestyles.

This was the era of Vietnam, drugs, and hippies.  There was a stream flowing through the site, and swimming was "naturally naked."

A naturally naked swimmer.

A couple of saunas had been constructed for the festival attendees.  This was one of them.

And this was another.

Most attendees were not naked, but like many such festivals, some people just wandered around in the nude, like this couple ...

and this guy ...

and this guy ...

and this guy, who seems to have an itch

But the biggest impact of the Nimbin Festival was the flowering of hippie culture in Australia.  The area had been a dairy region in economic decline.  Several groups bought up land and started hippie communes, some of which still exist.  Above is a hippie in lotus position on the Nimbin Rocks.

This 2008 photo is a modern Nimbin hippie, labeled "hard at work" and "psychedelic water."

As the center of hippie culture, the town of Nimbin became associated with marijuana, which is still illegal in Australia.  Every year, Nimbin holds a "Mardi Grass" event, including a parade, above, to protest for legalization.

The local police are cool about Mardi Grass.  Above, is a Police vs Polite contest that was held at the 2011 Mardi Grass.  (They called it a tug-of-peace instead of a tug-of-war.)  Local policemen contended with local aging hippies wearing shirts saying "Polite."  The hippies won.