Monday 28 May 2012

Fun in the sun ...

... at The Willow Festival in Peterborough, and boy did the sun shine!  It was big time hot - great for pulling in crowds, not so good if they like their drink!! 

Good friends of ours were running this fabulous event, with help from various sponsors and the City Council - they have done an amazing job.  Not only all the preparation (and there certainly was a huge amount of that), arranging 123 bands to play over Friday evening and all day Saturday and Sunday, but Mark, the Mr. of the two, also found time to dabble in some band playing as well as coordinate the actually running of the three days along with his wife and a small number of volunteer helpers.  Security and police presence was excellent, catering was top notch (Ben and I had chilli con carne on the Saturday night that nearly blew our heads off - it was fresh and extremely tasty). 

Katie and her friend programme selling.
Paul offered to help out and was given the post of BBQer for the VIP tent.  Initially he thought he'd have some help but as I waved him off through the tent opening on the Saturday evening, it appeared he would be all alone, just him, his BBQ, burgers, sausages and a very steady stream of hungry VIPs.  At clocking off time he was completely shattered, stank of burgers and was splattered all over with oil.  He'd coped brilliantly but it had been a bit stressful, even if he had been plied with several free drinks and food along the way!  I helped out on the Sunday, but (luckily for moi) it wasn't half as busy.  We got to meet some lovely, friendly people including the leader of Peterborough City Council, Marco Cereste.

Katie and Ben enjoyed themselves too.  Katie and her friend spent most of Saturday evening as volunteers selling programmes, but all the youngsters had fun on the fairground rides on Sunday with some shopping too the alternative shopping section.

Willow Festival - Ben chilling
Here's hoping 2013 will be just as successful, if not more so, come rain or shine.  Well done Mark and Teresa!

2 comments:

FourHappyBunnies said...

wonderful - I really wanted to go to this but unfortunately we had a very busy weekend. I heard good reports from friends who visited, so well done to your friends! xx

Elaine, Ellies Treasures said...

Thank you. Hopefully you'll be able to make next year's festival - it'll be worth it!