Adventures on a bench at Wessex Folk Festival, Weymouth, Dorset

Folk festivals are wonderful for music, sessions and workshops but, at the end of the day, it is the people that are brought together by the event that produce the fondest memories.

The Wessex Folk Festival last weekend (6 - 8 June 2008) was favoured by bright sunshine and thousands of people visiting Weymouth, Dorset from all parts of the UK. It was an ideal opportunity for me to find somewhere to have an Adventure on a Bench.

The bench I chose was alongside the Old Harbour and close to where the bridge opens to let tall craft through.

Before very long, an old chap sat next to me to drink his pint and to watch the ships. We got to chatting and he explained that he had first come to Weymouth in 1949 to train on an aircraft carrier. He told me how he went on to have a career in the Navy and then the Coastguard.

He has been an avid sailor all his life and was currently getting rid of some spare sailing equipment which he had decided to give away. Sometimes it is better for equipment to go to a good home, he said, than to make a little bit of money. You could see that he loved sailing.

The clincher was that every day at 6.00 p.m, he liked to visit this bench, drink a pint of beer and watch the bridge open to allow the tall craft through. The challenge every day was to see if the craft could handle being bunched up and get through without having an accident. The thought of the boats banging together obviously tickled his fancy and like many sea dogs he had a great chuckle.

It's quite amazing the range of people you meet if you're willing to sit on a bench and just talk to people who join you and, strangely, this old man, who is now in his '80s, has now given me a new thought each day.

When 6.00 in the evening comes, I'll wonder whether that old man is still there drinking his pint of beer and chuckling on the bench at Weymouth Town Bridge, waiting for the boats to arrive, queue and wondering whether they will get through the bridge safely.

Bye for now

Rob
(Rob Hopcott - online author and avid folk festival goer)