7. Roskilde Festival, Denmark. Roskilde, a small town near Copenhagen, is the unlikely setting for Europe’s biggest open-air rock event, held during the last weekend in June. Tens of thousands tickets are sold in advance, but they claim never to turn anyone away.

8. Brockworth Cheese Rolling Festival. Yes, “cheese rolling.”n a modern version of what is probably an ancient fertility rite,every year on the last weekend in May thousands of pectators gath-er in Brockworth, near Gloucester, England, to watch a few hardy souls risk life and limb in the pursuit of cheese. “Pursuit” is actually a pretty good description of what goes on: the contestants start at the top of a 300-yard slope with a one-in-two gradient, then chase a twenty-pound wheel of Gloucester cheese that is rolled down the slope before them.

The contest is winner-take-all: first one to grab the cheese keeps it. Three races are run for men and women, then a fourth is run with women only. Injuries abound a few seconds after the race begins as the more clumsy competitors loose their footing, pile into each other, and eat large quantities of dirt as they slide down the slope face-first. Meanwhile, the fleet of foot and deft of balance dash down the slope in search of both cheese and glory. This event is covered by media from all over the world - any non-Briton who takes home a cheese is guaranteed to be a national hero, if only for a few minutes on the evening news.