TIDAL Seafood Festival 2026: San Remo's Spring Celebration Returns

A working fishing village on the coast is preparing to host a spring festival built around its maritime heritage and local seafood.

The event is staged on the town's foreshore and jetty, where commercial boats still operate. For residents, it is both a celebration and a showcase of a trade that has shaped the local identity for generations.

What the festival is and when it runs

The TIDAL Seafood Festival runs from 18 to 20 September 2026 at the San Remo Foreshore Reserve on Marine Parade in San Remo. Gates open from 9am to 4pm on both Saturday and Sunday.

Entry costs $7.50 per adult per day, and children aged 16 and under are admitted free. Organisers expect major segments and the premium dinner to sell out, so early booking is advised. Gate times and entry tickets are listed on the festival's official booking page.

The event is presented in partnership with Bass Coast Shire Council. Organisers pledge all proceeds from the weekend's seafood spinning wheels to regional emergency services, including the SES and the CFA.

The festival recently won the seafood experience award at the 2026 Victorian Seafood Industry Awards. Organisers have credited volunteers, vendors and attendees for carrying the event through a difficult run of weather the previous year.

Image credit: San Remo Jetty Victoria Australia by Shuicai, sourced from Wikimedia Commons, licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0. The file page is available at https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:San_Remo_Jetty_Victoria_Australia_-_panoramio.jpg.

History on the jetty: the Blessing of the Fleet

Saturday's headline event is the Blessing of the Fleet on the San Remo Jetty. The custom began in Sicily hundreds of years ago and prays for a safe and bountiful fishing season.

San Remo's own blessing has a long local record. The festival's history page dates the jetty ceremony to the early 1960s, when competition among the large couta fleet was fierce, while its dedicated event page records a first blessing in 1955. Both commercial and recreational vessels can register to take part at no cost through the festival's Blessing of the Fleet page.

The wider fishing story reaches back much further. The Bunurong people travelled to this coast each spring for fish, crayfish, abalone and mutton bird. Commercial fishing has run here for just over eighty years, and the San Remo Fisherman's Co-op was founded in 1948. It is one of only three remaining fishing cooperatives in Victoria. Couta was the original target species, and gummy shark is the main catch today, alongside crayfish, scallops, squid and wrasse.

Vessels taking part in the blessing line up on the water before the ceremony, giving spectators a view of both working boats and recreational craft. It is the one part of the program that depends directly on conditions on the day.

Family program and free fishing clinics

Sunday is set aside for families at the foreshore, with live music running across the day.

Fishcare Victoria hosts free one-hour educational fishing workshops on the jetty. The sessions cover Victorian fishing regulations and sustainable catch-and-release techniques, and rods and bait are provided.

Children can also work towards a Junior Deckie Certification. The activity revives the historic Deckie Race, with young participants trying deckhand tasks such as rolling crab pots and tying ropes to earn an honorary certificate.

The broader program includes marine conservation displays, touch-tank experiences and maritime-themed face painting. Most activities sit within the ticketed festival footprint, so families can move between them without a separate booking. The fishing clinics and the dinner are the main exceptions.

Pelican feeding on the foreshore has long been a fixture of the town, and it remains part of the weekend's draw for families arriving early.

Friday's Taste of TIDAL dinner

The weekend opens on Friday evening with the curated Taste of TIDAL multi-course dinner. Regional chefs design the menu around sustainably caught seafood from Bass Strait waters.

The format changed this year in response to community feedback. Shared platters are served directly to tables rather than plated individually. A dessert bar, live music and a lucky door prize featuring a deluxe seafood platter round out the evening.

Group bookings are available for tables of four, six or ten, and single and couple ticket holders are given allocated seating. The dinner is billed as a premium ticketed experience, and organisers have urged patrons to book early because they expect it to fill.

A separate cocktail night has also been promoted for the Friday, and organisers have warned that it sells out quickly.

Marketplace, heritage and the local economy

An artisan marketplace runs alongside the main program, with local produce, marine-themed crafts and regional wines on offer. Cooking demonstrations and food stalls fill the gaps between the scheduled events.

The scale of the weekend matters to the town. Thousands of visitors are expected across the three days, giving local businesses a substantial boost during an otherwise quieter part of the year. The festival leans on volunteers and local businesses, a model organisers say has kept the event running since the San Remo Fishing Festival began in 1978.

Heritage is treated as part of the draw rather than a side attraction. Working boat displays and the jetty ceremony give visitors a reason to stay for the full weekend instead of a single afternoon, and local cafes and restaurants build seafood specials around the same period.

Planning your visit

San Remo sits at the gateway to Phillip Island and Bass Coast, so the festival works well as the first stop on a longer spring trip. Coastal walks, wildlife viewing and accommodation are all close by.

Parking near the foreshore fills quickly on event days, and the 9am to 4pm gate window means most visitors arrive within a few hours of opening. Organisers recommend checking the program before travelling, because timings for individual activities can shift.

Anyone planning a wider look at the region can compare local services and localities through the Victoria local guide.

Works Cited

Wardley, Bruce. "TIDAL Seafood Festival returns to San Remo this September." San Remo Golden Sun Times, 3 Sept. 2026, https://www.sgst.com.au/tidal-seafood-festival-returns-to-san-remo-this-september/.

TIDAL Seafood Festival. "History." TIDAL Seafood Festival, n.d., https://tidalseafoodfest.com.au/history.

TIDAL Seafood Festival. "Blessing of the Fleet." TIDAL Seafood Festival, n.d., https://tidalseafoodfest.com.au/blessing-of-the-fleet.

TIDAL Seafood Festival. "TIDAL Seafood Festival 2026, Saturday and Sunday Entry." TryBooking, n.d., https://www.trybooking.com/au/event/1625851.

Shuicai. "San Remo Jetty Victoria Australia." Wikimedia Commons, 6 Oct. 2013, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:San_Remo_Jetty_Victoria_Australia_-_panoramio.jpg.