It's the Easter long weekend and we're spoilt for choice; get along to the Oakbank Racing Carnival, indulge at the Easter Meadows Fair or get out in an open garden.

Giddy up
The Oakbank Racing Carnival will be held as a two-day flat racing carnival on April 8 and 10. High stakes feature races will get hearts pounding as horses take to the tracks. The track centre is the place to be, with attendees setting up picnics, tents and marquees to better enjoy the day’s races. Food vans and pop-up bars will provide eats and drinks, while live music brings trackside to life. As part of the new program, a Good Friday concert will take place before the race days begin, featuring bands such as Wolfmother and The Superjesus.

Fantastic French films
Indulge in the best of French cinema with the Alliance Francaise’s French Film Festival until April 19 at Palace Nova East End and Prospect Cinemas. With a carefully curated selection of films, this year’s festival ranges from France’s biggest box office successes to infectious tales of hope and resilience. Festival highlights include the opening night film, Masquerade, a story where glamour, sex, money and manipulation combine in a deadly vortex on the unassuming shores of the dreamy Côte d’Azur; Two Tickets to Greece, a comedy by Marc Fitoussi about estranged childhood friends who tentatively reunite for a trip to the Greek Islands; and L’Innocent, a film about tensions, criminal hijinks and unexpected romance that has taken France by storm and holds the highest number of nominations for a single film at the upcoming César awards.

Art in the park
The finalists’ exhibition of the 2023 Adelaide Park Lands Art Prize is currently showing in The Gallery at the Adelaide Festival Centre. Eighty curated pieces submitted to this year’s competition are on display with works spanning a broad range of styles. The exhibition will be on display until May 7, with artworks available to purchase with all proceeds supporting artists and contributing to the Adelaide Park Lands Association.

Meadows Easter Fair returns
From Friday, April 7 until Monday, April 10 the Meadows Memorial Hall – on Mawson Road, nestled in the Adelaide Hills – will be brought to life as the traditional Meadows Easter Fair returns. The fair will be a treasure-trove of goods, from clothing, plants and jewellery, to locally made arts and crafts and homemade foods. There will also be free activities for the kids. The fair runs across the four days from 9am to 4pm.

Do the time warp
The Adelaide Botanic Garden will be the right spot to step back in time some 66 million years, to the time of the dinosaurs. DinoFest opens on Good Friday and runs until April 30. Inside the gardens, you’ll have a “roaring good time” as part of a 90-minute show that features more than 30 life-sized dinosaurs and their babies walking among prehistoric plants featured in the garden. Don’t worry, it’s not designed to scare…but you are guaranteed to see a tyrannosaurus and a triceratops.

Marvellous in Milang
The gorgeous garden, Marchrismick (33 Stirling Street), which is completely crafted with repurposed and recycled materials, will open this weekend on April 8 and 9 from 10am to 4.30pm (until 7pm on Easter Sunday). Marchrismick features a cluster of intriguing outbuildings and structures that spread across the yard like a miniature village. The garden winds in and out of the structures; paths edged with succulents, clivia and agapanthus. An organic vegetable garden doubles as a chook run and the productive orchard produces around 50 kilograms of boysenberries each year.

Let’s go fly a kite
The annual Adelaide International Kite Festival is a free community event that thrills kids and adults alike every Easter weekend. Look to the skies above the Semaphore foreshore as they are filled with colourful and wonderfully shaped kites. Don’t let the weather forecast scare you – festival organisers have said they will forge on and will do their best to fly the kites in all conditions (except heavy rain). The action runs from 11am until 5pm daily.