100+ faces from the 2023 Swan Hill Cup

Thousands turned out for the return of the 2023 Swan Hill Cup, the first in a long list of country cups we’ll cover this year. See our gallery from the event.

See all the fashions from the 2023 Swan Hill Cup.

After two years of lockdowns and another of flooding, Swan Hill was booked out ahead of a significant country racing event over the King’s Birthday long weekend.

Manager of the Big Four riverside campground in Swan Hill Dan O’Bryan said it was expected to be one of the best weekends they’d had in a while.

“We are completely booked out for cabins, although there are a few powered campsites left, but that’s pretty normal for the long weekend. Over Easter we were completely booked out,” he said.

“The racing carnival is the major draw over the June long weekend, but yeah it was a difficult few years there for a while.

“We probably won’t have a weekend this big again until the Christmas / New Year period which does bring in a lot of people.”

Swan Hill director of development and planning Heather Green also spoke about how the racing carnival was a draw card for the region.

“The annual June Racing Carnival is a huge drawcard for attracting visitors for the long weekend, but the rest of the region always reaps from this with visitors taking the opportunity to visit our retail outlets, experience our local dining, and fill their weekend with additional activities such as visiting the Catalina Museum, Pioneer Settlement, Art Gallery,” she said.

Ms Green said the unprecedented difficulties the region faced due to Covid induced lockdowns and flooding had drastically impacted the area.

“Our local economy has faced great adversity due to Covid and more recently the floods, and it‘s great to see the community rewarded for their resilience. We are extremely excited to see visitors flocking to the region for a great weekend.”