Peninsula This Weekend - 23 to 24 May

Peninsula This Weekend is our weekly dispatch: the plan we’d actually make for the weekend ahead, the booking worth locking in, and the bit of weekend thinking we’d happily do for you.

The Saturday market circuit is dark this weekend. Red Hill, Boneo, Emu Plains: all closed. Truffle season opens next Saturday at Red Hill Truffles. In between, the Peninsula settles into a different register - not thin, but unhurried, with a particular quality of light and pace that the busier weekends rarely allow.

Cool and overcast, probably 13 degrees, some chance of rain on Sunday. There is one session worth booking before it closes, one gallery with a fortnight of life left, and a final Sunday reason to drive south to Flinders.

The booking worth locking in

Wild Mushroom Forage and Lunch with The Kitchen, Saturday 23 May

This is the penultimate session of the season. The format is guided forage through the Red Hill and Main Ridge forests, then lunch built from what the morning found: mushrooms, butter, warm bread, herbs, cooked at the table. Groups are capped at fifteen. It runs 11am to 1:30pm, ticketed. Bookings required.

The final session is May 30. If this Saturday is already full, the Mush-Meander (9:30am Saturday, independent operator, Humanitix) is the active alternative. But The Kitchen’s forage-to-table format is the more complete version of a mushroom morning on the Peninsula. Worth checking availability now rather than at the end of the week.

The slower companion move

Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery, Saturday or Sunday

Both exhibitions at MPRG close May 31. New Wave 26 is the gallery’s annual survey of contemporary graduate work from Peninsula-adjacent institutions. Michael Vale’s solo show runs alongside it. Free entry, no booking required.

The natural shape: arrive late morning, spend an hour through both shows, then down Main Street Mornington for coffee or lunch. No crowd on a late May Saturday. The gallery is one of the Peninsula’s most underused planning options in the cooler months; the closing window is a reasonable prompt to fix that. Works on either day, and works if the weather shifts plans.

The local edge

Rocky Road Festival, final Sunday tasting sessions, Flinders Chocolaterie

The Rocky Road Festival’s general drop-in runs through May 31, but the structured tasting sessions (eight flavour samples, make your own rocky road) run Sundays only through May. Sunday 24 May is the last one. Sessions at 11am, 12pm and 1:30pm. Ticketed, per person plus booking fee; current prices with the chocolaterie.

Flinders is a short drive south of Red Hill and a consistently underused Peninsula destination. Flinders Sourdough is a short walk from the chocolaterie and worth a stop before or after. If Sunday is the more open day of the weekend, this is a clear reason to be in Flinders rather than anywhere else.

Wild Mushroom Forage and Lunch with The Kitchen Sat 23 May, 11am–1:30pm, ticketed, groups capped at 15 Book via visitmorningtonpeninsula.org, footwear suited to forest terrain

Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery Dunns Road, Mornington, Tue–Sun 11am–4pm New Wave 26 + Michael Vale, both closing 31 May, free entry, no booking

Rocky Road Festival, Sunday Tasting Sessions Flinders Chocolaterie, Sun 24 May, 11:00 / 12:00 / 13:30, ticketed plus booking fee Final Sunday of the structured sessions, bookings required

Saturday evening at Peninsula Hot Springs Chloe Gill live from 19:00, amphitheatre pool, Fingal, complimentary with bathing

Prices may change. Confirm current rates directly with each operator before booking.