You can’t just show up for Garma. The fact that Australia’s most consequential festival for Indigenous arts and culture takes place at the northernmost tip of the Northern Territory, a seven-hour flight from the nearest big city, and sells out six months in advance, are a couple of reasons. But the big reason is that, while you may elect to sleep in a tent in the bush for four days, it’s the organizers who ultimately decide whether to let you—all 2000 of you, Indigenous and not, young and old. Garma isn’t just about showcasing the arts of the Yolngu (the collective name for distinct northern Australian indigenous groups). Yes, the didgeridoo will sound exactly where a tinkerer first thought to blow through a hollow branch some 20,000 years ago, and gangly old Yolngu men, with their wide-eyed kin in tow, will stamp out ritual dances on a sea of red sand before sunset every day. But the workshops and performances, the conferences and the walks through the blossoming stringybark trees, are also meant to disseminate this enchanting ancient culture. The Yolngu want it in good hands. Slots for next year become available in February 2027. —Apollinaire Scherr