While Tucson is a great place to visit year-round, there are a few special events that really bring the city alive, and may be worth planning a trip around.

Event listings can be found on the web pages of the Metropolitan Tucson Convention and Visitors Bureau. On the left sidebar of the linked web page, select "Major Events" and "Community Events" which allow you to browse by month.

Come to Tucson for a week in mid-February, and you might just find a city straight out of the Old West rather than a modern, cosmopolitan metropolis. Fiesta de los Vaqueros, the Tucson Rodeo, is much more than a sporting competition. Seven days of parades, food and events, the event even changes how Tucson residents dress—walking around town you’ll see plenty of ten gallon hats and cowboy boots.

Showcasing another side of the city’s personality, the Tucson Folk Festival, held in May downtown, draws in more than a hundred folk acts from the area and across the country. It is a great way to enjoy the spring weather and hear some great music, all for free.

September features Tucson's Greek Festival, held at the Saint Demetrios Greek Orthodox Church at 1145 East Fort Lowell Road, between First and Mountain Avenues. Admission is typically $2 for adults (children are free) and parking generally runs about $5. The festival features food, music and events and is very popular, so get there early.

Typically the second weekend in October, Tucson Meet Yourself is a free 3-day festival of music, events and, especially food, showcasing Tucson's diversity. Food vendors from countries around the world cook and sell their cuisine. Typical booths include Polish, Thai, Indian, Native American, Swedish, Costa Rican, Jamaican, Italian, Greek, Swedish and many more. The festival is held in Presidio Plaza on West Alameda Street, behind the Pima County Courthouse. The festival begins each day at about noon and runs until about 9pm on Friday and Saturday night, and 5pm on Sunday night.

Also normally the second weekend of October is Pride in the Desert, Tucson's Gay/LGBT Pride festival (formerly called OUToberFEST) held in Reid Park in central Tucson near the intersection of 22nd St and Country Club Rd. 2007 marked the 30th anniversary of the Tucson Pride organization, and the 31st annual pride festival. The festival includes day-long entertainment with local, regional and national music celebrities, food and beer booths, retail vendors, and information booths of many non-profit organizations in Tucson. Attendance in 2007 was over 6000.

One of the city’s most popular (and bizarre) events, the All Souls Procession, inspired by Mexico's Dia de los Muertos holiday and nurtured by the artistic community, is a “sanctuary for community members from all walks of life to express their grief and loss in a celebration of creative energy and the rejoice of living.” In practice, this means thousands don costumes of deceased people and take to the streets at sundown the first Sunday in November. The procession has become so popular that, starting in 2006, it will be a week-long event.

The Christmas season brings holiday festivals to the Old Pueblo. The Downtown Parade of Lights occurs on a Saturday in early December (December 8th in 2007) and features a parade of music and floats put on by local businesses and organizations. The parade begins at Jacome Plaza, in front of the Main Library, where the city's Christmas tree is illuminated. Also, typically beginning two weeks before Christmas and lasting until Christmas Day, the best place to see Christmas lights in the city is in the neighborhood of Winterhaven, which puts on its free Winterhaven Festival of Lights featuring holiday light displays as well as hay rides, for children and adults, circling the neighborhood serving hot apple cider. The neighborhood is located along Fort Lowell Road between Tucson Boulevard and Country Club Drive. Parking is available at the nearby businesses, normally for a small fee.