Three days of festivities ended with a bang as Aldeburgh Carnival filled the streets of one of Suffolk’s most picturesque seaside towns.
Three days of festivities ended with a bang as Aldeburgh Carnival filled the streets of one of Suffolk’s most picturesque seaside towns.
Yesterday’s events were kicked off by swimmers racing on the coast and dramatic displays from Aldeburgh Lifeboats as they showed visitors life saving techniques.
The space-age themed carnival parade came after a weekend of music and merriment – with live bands performing across the town on Saturday and a 10km race down the seafront and high street on Sunday.
Carnival committee chairman and mayor John Digby said: “This was one of the best turnouts and carnivals in recent years, and may have even surpassed the fantastic celebrations for our 75th anniversary last year.
“Everyone has taken great advantage of our ‘fly me to the moon’ theme, and we have had 17 very well turned-out floats covered in astronauts, rockets and all sorts.”
The band of the King’s Division marched on to lead the grand procession after a fanfare for crowning carnival queen Taylor-Paige Briggs, who was joined by her attendants Rosie Smith and Holly Philpot, all on their specially built moon-scape carriage.
The trio are now parts of royal families as Taylor-Paige, 17, is the daughter of Lisa Warner, former Carnival Queen in 1984.
Rosie, 11, is the daughter of Sally Foyster, who led the procession in 1996, and attendant Holly, nine, is the daughter of Louise Tibbenham, who reigned in 2000.
An impressive variety of costumed characters and clever floats made their way through Aldeburgh, many proudly displaying their rosettes as worthy prize winners in one of the largest and best processions of recent years.
Evening entertainment was provided by the Samba Band and the East Suffolk Morris Men before the military band Beat Retreat and then led the carnival queen and a huge procession of glowing Chinese lanterns to an impressive fireworks display on the beach.
Youngsters helped to publicise the event by taking part in a poster competition, and Mayor Digby complemented the young artists from Aldeburgh Primary School for making rocket science look easy with their designs on the theme.
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