A quintessential English afternoon in Pirbright

The Gruffalo was torched by vandals the night before the festival

Pirbright could not have been any more English this afternoon at its 3rd annual Scarecrow Festival.

From cream teas and Pimms to Morris Dancers and miniature steam train rides.

There was a superb BBQ with meat from Pirbright butchers Fulk Bros.

Pirbright Historians opened up a house close to the green with a display of some fascinating pictures from Pirbright’s long and distinguished history. Check out their web site.

But I think everyone will agree that the highlight of the festival had to be the Scarecrows. They were simply amazing. Its clear a lot of time and effort went into each and every one. I don’t actually know how many there were but I estimate around 40-50 and all sorts of shapes and sizes. There was Sponge Bob, Bob the Builder, Mr Bump, Pluto, popeye and Olive to name but a small few.

Anyone who has driven through Pirbright over the last few weeks will have noticed the Gruffalo Scarcrow on the green by the White Heart Pub. It was used, to great effect, to publicise the event . An absolute master piece. Sadly some mindless vandals decided it would be funny to burn it down last night. A real shame as I know my daughter was looking forward to seeing the Gruffalo again as I am sure many other children would have been.

It is probably best that I let the pictures and videos do most of the talking so check out our feed page for images on Twitpic / Flickr and video on our Youtube Channel from today’s superb event.

A huge congratulations to the planning committee who did an incredible job of organising this event. If there were awards for village fete’s the Pirbright Scarecrow Festival would be a very serious contender for the top prize.