# Do many countries have holidays bracketing summer?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-many-countries-have-holidays-bracketing-summer/661576>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [June 21, 2013, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-many-countries-have-holidays-bracketing-summer/661576 "2013-06-21T18:34:40Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Hedda\_Rosa](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hedda_rosa/32/1204_2.png) [@Hedda\_Rosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hedda_Rosa)\
**Post date:** [June 21, 2013, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-many-countries-have-holidays-bracketing-summer/661576/1 "2013-06-21T18:34:40Z")

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And if so, what are the holidays?

Inspired by [this thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=694443), where **Kimmy\_Gibbler** says that Memorial Day to Labor Day is really the best way to define summer - in the US. And yep, I suspect we pretty much all think of summer that way.

What holidays if any mark the start and end of summer in other countries?

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**Author:** ![Ximenean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/aca169/32.png) [@Ximenean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ximenean)\
**Post date:** [June 21, 2013, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-many-countries-have-holidays-bracketing-summer/661576/2 "2013-06-21T18:50:16Z")

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In the UK we have a public holiday on the same Monday as Memorial Day, and then the next public holiday is near the end of August. The first is a little too early, in our climate, to mark the start of summer. The latter kind of feels like the last gasp of summer if not the absolute end, but I wouldn’t say that it is often referred to as such.

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**Author:** ![D18](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c57346/32.png) [@D18](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D18)\
**Post date:** [June 21, 2013, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-many-countries-have-holidays-bracketing-summer/661576/3 "2013-06-21T21:46:41Z")

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In Canada we have Victoria Day, usually the Monday before US Memorial Day. It is vernacularly known as “May Two Four” but it almost always falls before May 24th.

Just checked on Wiki - it’s defined as the last Monday before May 25.

At the end of the summer, we have Labour Day, the same day as Labor Day. 😉