TRAVEL: WHAT'S ON WORLDWIDE

MAY

Bulgaria

The beautiful Valley of the Roses provides the backdrop for this month- long rose-harvest festival. Thousands converge on the rose fields to pick the delicate petals. Processions, parades, feasts, and a demonstration of rose-picking rituals take place throughout the month in Kazanluk and Karlovo. This early summer festival is held in the valley that supplies the world's perfume industry with 70 per cent of its rose oil. Kazanluk, a rather dull and dirty city most of the year, spruces itself up during the festival. Make sure you take a tour of the Museum of Roses. You can also tour the rose factory, which produces liqueurs, rose-water, jams, and Turkish Delight.

12-23

France

The first Cannes Film Festival got off to a pretty bad start as the screening which opened the festival also closed it. The problem was timing; it took place on 1 September 1939 - the day Hitler invaded Poland. Only since it was moved to May, in 1951, have things run relatively smoothly. Among the hot favourites for this year's coveted Palm D'Or is The Cookie Thief, staring Scottish model Honor Fraser. Miss Fraser took the part to help out her friends, film makers Toby Leslie and Hugo Curry, and is now up for a share in an international award. This little exercise in back-scratching also proved cost effective as The Cookie Thief (budget pounds 2,500), would have cost pounds 86,000 if its makers had not called in favours from model friends and the like.

12 -5 JUNE

Czech Republic

The Prague International Music Festival - the Czech Republic's greatest classical music festival - offers the perfect excuse to visit this stunning European city. Since the event began more than 50 years ago, it has grown to become one of the most prestigious of its kind. National and international orchestras of world-renown are invited to perform at various venues throughout the city. This year's festival kicks off in the city's beautiful art nouveau Municipal House with "Ma Vlast" ("My Country"), a traditional version of Smetana's "Ode to Bohemia", performed by the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra. Others to listen out for are James Levine and orchestra of the New York Metropolitan Opera and violin virtuoso Catherine Mackintosh.

14

Holland

The World Brass Festival banishes the long-ridiculed "oom pah pah" bands from its programme, replacing them with some of the world's most innovative brass bands. The festival includes exotic fanfares from ensembles such as Krishna Das and the Modern Light Music Brass Band, from Kathmandu (which plays rhythms from Hindi film music and Nepalese folk songs), and Moldovian turbo-brass (a genre, apparently) from the acclaimed "Romanian Fanfare Din Zece Prajini". Plus, the alternately merry and melancholic music featured in the Golden Palm-winning film The Time of the Gypsies, courtesy of the Macedonian Orkestar Braka Kadrievi. Call for information (tel: 00 31 20 568 8500.)

15

Italy

If you're into bizarre team sports with incomprehensible rules then head for Gubbio in central Italy where the Corsa dei Ceri (Candle Race) will take place. Second only to Siena's Palio horse race in terms of medieval fervour, the Corsa is a lively three-way race between teams of "rival" saints. The event starts at 6pm when the three teams, each carrying cero (literally "candle", though they are wooden pillars weighing around 400kg, each bearing a statue of a saint), race through the city streets from the piazza up a mountain track to the basilica. Each team's 10 official bearers have to be replaced every 10 metres without loosing pace. The object and rules of the race are something of a mystery and competition is fierce - scuffling often breaks out between supporters of rival teams. However, St Ubaldo always triumphs over his co-racers (getting into the church first and shutting the door in the face of following ceri), as he is the city's patron saint and festivities are dedicated to him. His remains (minus three fingers chopped off by a souvenir hunter), overlook the contest from the finish-post at the basilica.

15-23

Britain

Food, travel and treasures are the three special themes of exhibits to be found in museums nation-wide as part of Museums Week. Supported by the department of Culture Media and Sport and chaired by Loyd Grossman, this promotion is an effort to encourage the public to pay a visit to some of the country's 1,000 museums. Visitors to the American Museum in Bath can discover how North American Indians and early European settlers prepared the food needed to survive in harsh environments. Abstemious souls can take a taste of the frugal forties and Second World War recipes, in the Cotswold Countryside Collection and at the Rotunda Museum in Scarborough there will be "Food Fit For Romans". For museum listings and further information call the Campaign for Museums (tel: 01795 414731; lines open from 11 - 21 May, weekdays 9.30am to 5.30pm).

15 -29

Spain

The two-week Fiesta de San Isidro, in honour of the city's patron saint, marks the start of the bull-fighting season and is one of the biggest festivals in Spain. There's a non-stop round of carnival events with concerts, parades and loads of free entertainment. Bands play every night in the Jardines de las Vistillas. Now is also the time for the unwell to head for the hermitage in San Isidro meadow to partake of the miraculous, curative fountain waters.

16 -1 AUGUST

Germany

Berlin looks "Through The Iron Curtain" with a show that aims to put the spotlight on the history of theatre in East and West Germany from the end of the Second World War up to reunification in 1990. "Durch den Eisernen Vorhang" uses photos, texts and excerpts from productions to juxtapose theatrical developments in the communist East and the capitalist West, focusing on works by Brecht and the controversial director Gustav Grundgens. This show will take place Tuesday to Sunday throughout the summer at Berlin's Academy of Arts.