BelgiumThis weekend’s brocante — a combination antique, bric-a-brac and flea market — in Temploux is touted as the country’s largest and most popular annual outdoor market.
Not only does the market stretch more than 3  ½ miles, but it also goes around the clock. More than 1,500 international stalls will be open from 7 a.m. Saturday until 6 p.m. Sunday. Add entertainment, food, drink and Saturday night fireworks to the shopping, and you have a flea market festival.
For more details, go to www.temploux.be/brocante, which has an English option.
IrelandNational Heritage Week celebrations kick off Saturday with the National Tell Tale Story Telling Competition, capitalizing on Ireland’s rich tradition of storytelling.
Participants from all over the country will tell their tales via the National Heritage Facebook page, and the public will be asked to “like” their favorites in each category of the competition.
During National Heritage Week, which runs until Aug. 28, more than 1,300 events will spotlight Ireland’s cultural heritage. There will be nature and history walks, music recitals, poetry readings, lectures, medieval festivals, children’s activities, a boat-building workshop, dingy races and more. There is even a tour retracing the footsteps of President Barack Obama during his visit in May to his ancestral home of Offaly.
For a list of Irish events, see heritageweek.ie. For more on heritage days events in other European countries, see www.coe.int/t/dg4/cultureheritage/ heritage/EHD/default_en.asp .
WalesSoak up the atmosphere of the Victorian era at Llandrindod Wells’ annual Victorian Festival, which will celebrate its 30th birthday Saturday through Aug. 25. The town, a popular spa resort in the 1800s, will re-create those bygone days with street artists, music halls, Victorian tea dances, exhibitions, bandstand concerts, a Gilbert and Sullivan evening, balls, male choir concerts, crafts stalls, a Suffragettes march and a Victorian-costume parade.Find program highlights at the festival website, www.victorianfestival.co.uk.
