This event is Pay As You Feel.

What is a Wassail?

Wassailing is an ancient English tradition that involves getting together to celebrate orchards with hot apple juice, food and songs. The idea is to ‘bless’ the trees in the hope of a good harvest. Wassailing has been going on for donkey's years, with the first recorded mention being in 1585 in Kent.

People would go around the orchards, pouring cider on the roots of the trees and hanging bits of toast in the branches as an offering to the birds.Then they would make noise, singing, and banging pots and pans together to scare away any bad spirits in the orchard.

It may all sound a bit strange, but we hope our Wassail will be a fun and lively nod to this ancient tradition, and a chance to get together for some mischief in the gloom of January.

What to expect

We'll meet under the open top barn in Meanwood Valley Urban Farm and make our way to the orchard together for the Wassail ceremony, where there'll be plenty of songs to join in with.

Kids very welcome.

Food & Fire

We will provide a hot vegetarian meal and hot drinks around the fire once the Wassail ceremony is finished. 

There will be a bar where you can buy cider and hot apple juice. 

What to bring

This event will be entirely outside, so you’ll want to be dressed in warm clothing and footwear suitable for the outdoors and uneven ground.

We recommend bringing a headtorch, or even better, a lantern! 

Wassailing outfits are very much encouraged. Here are some photos for inspiration.

You may want to bring a pot and a wooden spoon to make some noise with! 

If you'd like to play an instrument, bring it along and there may be a chance to play around the fire. 

If you don't like loud noises, we recommend bringing some earplugs or headphones. 

Weather

If the weather's looking too grim, we'll postpone to the Thursday 5th Feb, same time. We'll try to give you as much notice as possible if it's looking like we need to postpone. 

Accessibility

There are toilets at the farm.

Due to the uneven ground this event is not wheelchair accessible.

There will be loud noises.

This event is Pay As You Feel. There will be card readers available. 

Parking 

We encourage you to travel by public transport, but if you're unable to, please avoid parking on Sugarwell Road as it may disturb the local residents.