More than 1500 people have enjoyed this year’s Ripon Cathedral Beer Festival which took place on Bank Holiday Monday in the ‘Dean’s Garden’ next to the Cathedral (previously known as the Cathedral Deer Park).
The annual fundraiser in aid of Ripon Cathedral raised a record £13,500, which this year will benefit Ripon Cathedral Renewed, a campaign supporting the Dean’s development plans for the cathedral.
Organisers calculate that 3000 pints of Yorkshire real ales were enjoyed and 500 pints of “Old Slippage” a local cider grown and produced at Old Sleningford near Ripon.
Entertaining the adults was music from ‘Two Well Worn’, ‘King Courgette’, the Elders Band, the Tom Coxhead Singers, and Leon Marshall.
Entertaining the children there was a bouncy castle, a craft table and a team of face painters led by the Dean’s secretary Judith Bustard.
One happy Festival attender commented, “I live just outside Ripon and for many years I have heard about the Ripon Cathedral Beer Festival. This year was the first time that my family have attended and we will certainly come back again next year with a group of friends from our village. The whole atmosphere of the Festival is fantastic, very family friendly, with great music and great food and drink”.
Another said, “The Cathedral Beer Festival is excellent. I can’t believe that I have never been before. Amazing music, live bands playing continuously from 11.30 to 5pm. Good choice of beers, I was on the cider. Delicious food, burgers sausages and roast pork sandwiches. Well done to the organisers, it will be my diary next year.”