The Ekka

It's the Ekka and it's South East Queensland's largest annual event. The Ekka's official name is the Royal Queensland Show, but it's known by Queenslaners as 'The Exhibition' and the term ekka is short for exhibition.

It's held in August in Brisbane and along with the shows of Sydney and Melbourne, the Ekka is one of the top three agricultural shows in Australia and draws more than 600,000 visitors each year. Much like the Sydney Royal Easter Show, the New South Wales equivalent, the Ekka is both a festive, carnival style event with sideshows, showbags, thrill rides and food stalls along with a wide range of agricultural exhibitions including arts, crafts, farm animals.

These are some amazing arrangements of preserved fruit and vegetables.

The produce hall was a great splash of colour and a lot of work must always go into these displays.

Real banana benders . . .

Prize Queensland pineapples

Then of course its always fun down sideshow alley

Some interesting mobiles . .

mmm honey energy drink