Reach Fair

Mayday bank holiday weekend was a scorcher...temperatures in the low twenties and sunshine! Had to dig up the sunscreen to protect our delicate white skins from third degree burns. We cycled over to Midsummer common for a look at the fair on Saturday...the highlight was watching a man opening the lock gates on thre river.
On Monday we drove out to the village of Reach for their fair. This is supposedly the oldest fair in England - started in 1201.

They had local kids dancing round a maypole - this is quite a complicated thing and they make complicated patterns with the ribbons - bit like a game of cats cradle. Perhaps the most amazing thing was that the 10-15yr olds didnt make a single mistake in their 20min routine.

The morris dancing was a bit of a mystery to J until they started hitting each other with sticks, then he was interested!

The traction engine was fascinating - especially wathcing them get it off the low loader - which was not much newer than the traction engine. Kids insisted on a picture for Grandpa.

Just in case you were worried, there were of course lots of rides, bouncy castles, ice cream vans etc. J and little M were pretty shattered after a couple of hours, as were we.

See if can spot little M's haircut in the following picture...she had about 6 inches off and is hoping to donate her hair to a charity that makes wigs for kids on chemotherapy.