Carnivals in Somerset

It’s Carnival time!

Somerset Carnivals are the highlight of the year around here, and one of the most exciting displays of amateur entertainment anywhere in the world.

We’d like to invite you to join us for at least one evening of fun, and a chance to see what Somerset’s like when we locals let down our hair - it’ll be a completely new experience for you and the family.

There are various organised Somerset carnivals every year, some with over a hundred brilliantly lit and decorated floats – ‘carts’, we call them – and exotically dressed performers from the local carnival clubs.  The carnivals operate on a circuit, travelling from town to town, so you are sure to be able to catch one near where you are staying.

The festive spirit first breaks out in September, and we keep it up during October, with the Guy Fawkes carnivals until late November, just when your spirits need lifting - that’s how carnivals started, as one of these prehistoric ‘winter’s coming, let’s have a festival’ occasions.

They were kept up through medieval times.

In the straight-laced nineteenth century they were considered so bawdy and unruly that the Victorians banned them.

Nowadays we’re all a bit more broad minded, and your kids will love the spectacle just as much as you do.

The ingenuity and design skills of the carnival clubs will take your breath away.

Full details about Somerset carnivals can be found on the Somerset Carnivals website.

This year you can get a taste for it all with the Wessex Grand Prix circuit, beginning in Sturminster Newton on 27 August.

The Wessex GP and the South Somerset Federation then visit a dozen towns during September and October, before the Somerset County Guy Fawkes Carnival Association kicks off, with another eight during November.

Many people book an overnight stay, or catch several carnivals, making them the highlight of an enjoyable late-season holiday.

Whichever carnival you choose, check the route, arrive early as some roads may be closed, dress warm, be prepared for big crowds and a show lasting several hours.

Above all, bring plenty of loose change.

It’s all done for charity, and it’s a free show, so we all give generously.