With the return of the Stawell Gift, Stawell Cup and the Cato Park carnival, Llew Clark of Clarks Furniture said the entire town was buzzing from Friday to Monday.

"Stawell was just so vibrant; the crowds were fantastic," he said.

"Everyone was excited to be out and about. Every business owner that I spoke with during the weekend was 100 per cent positive.

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"The cafes were flat out. The streets were full of music, chatter and smiling people."

Mr Clark said the sheer volume of shoppers caused some unique problems.

"I saw Sportspower had a queue 15 people deep," he said.

"They had someone at the door with a counter because there were so many people inside the store. They had reached the store's COVID-safe capacity.

"My store was only open in the morning and it was pumping the whole time."

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The Stawell Racing Club hosted its traditional Easter Sunday race meet, and while numbers were down from pre-COVID times, organisers were still rapt with the outcome.

"Everyone was happy and that's all we can ask for," said Operations Manager Rachel Samsonenko.

"We sold more than 1800 tickets, which is down from a typical year of 3000 tickets; however, the event was only approved two weeks ago.

"We were advised to only sell tickets online, so to sell that many with minimal advertising is an amazing effort."

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