Late last year we booked the Beardy Folk Festival in Hopton Wafers, near Cleobury Mortimer, in Shropshire. We thoroughly enjoyed this festival last year and, as it is only 4 miles or so from Jenny's house in Knowbury, the planning included a short stopover with her before the event. However - our darling niece decided that Sat 15 Jun would be an excellent day to get spliced, so we had to interrupt our festival to attend her wedding and mini-festival in Knowbury.
On Mon 11 Jun we packed up after our short visit to Halfpenny Green and trundled over the Shropshire Hills to Knowbury. The hills, and narrow, twisty, roads didn't do the fuel consumption much good, particularly with Mr Toad on the back. We arrived at Jenny's and immediately found ourselves set to work to construct the mini-festival. This setting up carried on for the next two days, albeit we were able to sneak out for a quick nip into Ludlow and visit the fantastic liquorice and cheese stalls.
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| Ludlow |
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| Mini Festival |
On Thursday we managed to escape and trundled up and over Clee Hill to set up at the Beardy Festival. The weather was freezing cold. We sat outside dressed for mid-winter and were still chilled. Flaming June my bottom!
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| Arctic survival in Shropshire |
On Friday it was a little bit warmer, but still on the chilly side. We enjoyed some good music, albeit it wasn't quite as good as last year. Later in the evening the heavens opened with a terrific thunderstorm and we were concerned at the amount of rain and whether or not we would be able to get off in the morning to get to the wedding. Whilst others braved the limited shelter at the festival site, we sat in the van and watched the rain.
In the morning we set off for the wedding in Tenbury Wells. Luckily Mr Toad skipped over the mud and escaped quite easily, but the road down the hill was incredibly wet with very large puddles as there had been so much rain. Luckily the sun came out for the wedding and lunch in the Bennetts End pub. From there is was back to the mini-fest in Jenny's garden where, once again, the rain decided to visit. Bloody weather! We returned to the Beardy late at night after being let down by the local taxi driver. Luckily we didn't drink as we had a suspicion that this may be the case.
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| Wedding Style |
On Sunday, typically, the weather improved a bit and we were able to finally remove a layer or two. We relaxed after a very strenuous week.
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| A tractor towing vans off of the site |
The festival closed on Monday, albeit they extended the departure time until late afternoon to try and preserve the muddy ground. There was a tractor towing vans off of the rally field, but we managed to get off quite easily and moved back across to Knowbury once again to spend a couple more days with Jenny and my mother, who was also staying over for a few days. We assisted with the last of the clearing up on the Monday and just relaxed on the Tuesday, although the weather had taken a turn for the worse again and it was quite chilly. On Tuesday evening we trundled across the hill again in Mr Toad to collect a delicious takeaway curry from a place in Cleobury Mortimer.
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| Last off (nearly) |
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| Mini festival site (Jenny's garden) nearly clear |
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| Clee Hill |
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| Cleobury Mortimer |
On Wednesday we packed up, said goodbye to Mum and Jenny and set off, negotiating the dreadful, narrow, main street of Cleobury Mortimer (with a knob of a delivery driver parking his truck right in the middle of town) and completed an uneventful journey home.
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