Candelo Markets

The first Candelo Market was held in 1982, which makes it the longest running market on the Sapphire Coast by a comfortable margin and, more than forty years later, still one of the largest. It trades on the first Sunday of every month under the old creekside trees on William Street, 8.30am to 12.30pm.

Livestock to skincare, under the trees

The stall list is wider than almost anything else on this coast: livestock and plants at one end, bric-a-brac, books, new and recycled clothing, health food and treatments, jewellery and skincare through the middle, and local produce running throughout. Food and coffee are properly covered and roaming musicians and entertainers work the ground rather than playing from a stage. That breadth is what has kept it going for four decades in a village of a few hundred people: there is no single reason to come, so people come anyway. Money raised goes into community projects rather than to an operator, and the market has disabled access and is both family and pet friendly.

Candelo runs on volunteer energy well beyond the market: the village also stages a festival, an arts society program and an agricultural, horticultural and dairy show, and the monthly market sits inside all of that rather than apart from it. For a place this small to sustain that many separate community institutions is unusual, and the market is both the most visible of them and the one that helps pay for the others.

Practical notes

First Sunday, 8.30am to 12.30pm. Bring cash and bags, since a market with livestock and bric-a-brac at one end will always include sellers who take nothing else. William Street is the village main street and parking is along it and the surrounding blocks. Candelo is inland from Bega and Merimbula, about twenty minutes from either, so this is a deliberate trip rather than a coastal drive-by. Dogs are welcome and the ground is accessible. This is Yuin country.