Nottingham Riverside Festival At Victoria Embankment August 5-7 2011

There's already a heady aroma of candy floss and burgers in the air down at Nottingham's beautiful Victoria Embankment by the River Trent where stall and ride holders are busy setting up for the Riverside Festival which opens today at 6pm.

Confidentially, we're keeping our fingers crossed the good weather holds for this lovely summer event which features street entertainment and live bands all mixed together with fairground rides, craft stalls and a range of festival food.

Over the weekend the event is open from noon till 11.30pm on the Saturday and noon till 6.30pm on the Sunday. Entertaining events will be going on all around the site and here are our Nottingham Confidential Top Five Recommendations.

1. FIREWORKS Yes, at number one it has to be the festival's famous Saturday night fireworks at 10.30pm. Everybody and everything stops to oooh and ahhh at this spectacular spectacle. Nottingham City Transport will be providing shuttle buses that will return straight to the city centre after the fireworks.

2.MANIERE DES BOHEMIENS Nottingham's very own and very finest gypsy-swing-folk band. Go and see them whilst they're still free and see if you can stop yourself dancing into a festival-frenzy to these extraordinary musicians at 6.20pm on the Monument Stage on Saturday 6th August

3.ZUMBA If you've managed to escape the clutches of the latest dance craze, there couldn't really be a lovelier place to succumb than the Riverside Festival. Hannah Nissan will be demonstrating the Latin inspired fitness dance at the bandstand regularly over the weekend.

4. NOTTINGHAM MELA With a Bollywood movie currently filming right now in Nottingham see here the timing couldn't be better for a celebration of South Asian culture with dance, music food and markets on Sunday August 7 which is headlined  by Desi Masti on the Bandstand Stage from 4.30pm

5.CHARITY DUCK RACE Sponsor a duck and see it chucked into the River Trent for the Aye Up My Duck race in aid of Macmillan nurses and the Nottingham University Hospital Charities Cystic Fibrosis Unit.


Full details of all the Festival events can also be found on the Riverside Festival website at http://www.nottinghamcity.gov.uk/index.aspx?articleid=14480

Manière des Bohémiens at Nottingham Riverside Festival