Boats and bottle kicking – it's Easter

By Kate Simon

The Easter machine is cranking into action. Soon the UK will be overrun with bunnies, lambs, and chicks – fluffy, chocolate and real. From stately homes to city museums, routes are being plotted for egg hunts as cash-strapped attractions capitalise on this seasonal opportunity. Who can blame them? Swell the reserves by getting bored families through the doors – and engage with the next generation of potential visitors while you’re at it.

You won’t need much help to find such traditional Easter entertainment, but alternatives are a little thinner on the ground. One worthwhile diversion is taking place at the National Waterways Museum, Ellesmere Port, where owners of narrowboats and barges will converge on the historic complex of locks for the annual Easter Boat Gathering, 18-21 April.

It’s a multicoloured sight to see, with music and sideshows adding to the sense of occasion. Plus, there’s plenty more to explore – a forge, workers’ cottages, the museum itself – at these historic basins built in the 18th Century by Thomas Telford to connect the River Severn to the Dee and Mersey and, ultimately, the world.

Across the Pennines, the air will fill with music on Kelham Island when the Sheffield Folk Sessions take over pubs, bars and taps, 18-20 April, with more than 100 events, including ceilidhs. Further south, Dvořák’s oratorio ‘Stabat Mater’, works by Bach and Janáček, and music from the 1920s – from Bax to Villa-Lobos – are the Easter weekend concerts at the St Endellion Festivals in Port Isaac in Cornwall.

The first Beacon for the Arts Festival in the North York Moors is running exhibitions and events throughout April that connect the arts and nature, including the unveiling of a sculpture trail, Old Friends, created by the artist Emma Smith with members of the local community, on a stretch of the Cinder Track, a walking route between Scarborough and Whitby.

So far so conventional. But there’s some reassuring English eccentricity in the mix. The British and World Marbles Championships take place on Good Friday at The Greyhound in Tinsley Green, West Sussex, which has been hosting the contest since 1932. Bring your own realies and steelies – no experience necessary.

But the strangest celebration of the season is surely the Hare Pie Scramble and Bottle Kicking event at Hallaton in Leicestershire on Easter Monday. After the local vicar blesses a large hare pie and then chucks lumps of it at the assembled crowd, there’s a fight for beer barrels – aka bottles – in a brutal ‘game’ between the good people of Hallaton and villagers from neighbouring Medbourne. It might be safer looking for those eggs, after all.

Phil’s Beer Notes

Ellesmere Port’s hot beer destination currently is Bondie’s Bar, which has been scooping up the awards since opening in 2021 thanks to a well-balanced choice of cask ales, including locals such as Peerless, and craft on tap.

Kelham Island is one of the country’s top beer destinations, so plenty to choose from here. You’ll, of course, want a pint of the local brewer’s ale at the Fat Cat. You should also try the Harlequin, recently taken over by the people at Sheffield’s legendary Rutland Arms, who have installed a great range on the pumps and the taps.

Also founded in 2021 (it might’ve been a good year after all), Bluntrock Brewery has a taproom at Wadebridge, down the road from Port Isaac, that’s built out of yellow shipping containers, which should make it easy to spot. Ten beer lines showcase the range plus exclusives you can only drink here.

And while you’re chucking pie about in the depths of Leicestershire it might be worth nipping into Market Harborough to check out Braybrooke Brewery’s new taproom. Braybrooke’s focus is on high-quality German-style lagers, and you’ll also find local cask ales on the bar

Photo courtesy of National Waterways Museum