This year’s Carnival Theme was “Restoration Riccall.” As a Carnival Committee, we felt this to be appropriate after all of the hard work that had been carried out on the restoration of St Mary’s Church. The weather played a big part over the weekend with persistent rain/drizzle on Saturday and strong to gale force winds on Sunday.
Still, the villagers came out and joined in the community spirit of the Riccall Carnival. Due to the weather, the Garden Party became just ‘Cream Teas,’ but we still had the jazz band entertaining us during the afternoon. Whilst the band had a break, a barrel organ provided us with background music. There were the usual stalls and games to keep our visitors occupied. Saturday night saw a performance by the Tuesday Singers, keeping us entertained in the Church. On Sunday the Church Service on the Millennium Green went ahead despite the high winds and we had the honour of having the Bishop of Selby to conduct the service. The annual village picnic was held on the Village Green, the hardest part of the afternoon being the high winds and the challenge of keeping your blanket flat on the floor and the sandwiches etc on the plate. Everyone kept going with entertainment by WYSIWYG and a children’s entertainer.
The church had a superb display of wedding dresses and christening gowns, loaned to them by the residents of the village. Richard Moody came up trumps again in the Methodist Chapel with a photographic display of the history of Churches and Chapels in Riccall and the Riccall Archive group did a power point presentation. Dotted around the village were the scarecrows, created by villagers.
It is not quite over yet - next Friday, we have a Country & Western evening, followed by Last Night at the Proms on Saturday night.
Thank you all for your support and let’s hope that the weather in 2009 will be kinder to us! The theme for 2009 will be “Travel.”
