Clevedon Tides Marlens Festival

Living in Clevedon is good.  It's a lovely town.  Yes, it's not the most exciting place in the world, but it's on the coast, it's close to Bristol and it has wonderful community spirit.

This weekend just gone Clevedon held it's annual Marlens (Marine Lake Enthusiasts) Tides Festival.  We've made a point of attending the festival on previous years.  It's lovely to see the town come together and it's such a family friendly event.  The main part of the festival is held at the seafront on the Salthouse Fields and at the Marine Lake.  There are stalls, a stage with live music, bouncy castles, children's activities.  The festival lasts for the whole weekend and on the Saturday night there is always a large firework display.

Our favorite activities are held at the Marine lake.  Last year Ethan went in a huge zorb ball and floated around on the water.   This year he wanted to have a go on a kayak.  At first, I wasn't sure.  Ethan is a little small for his age and though the water in the lake isn't deep, I didn't want him falling in and giving himself a fright.  I told myself that he'd be fine though and thought that really, it was too good an opportunity to pass by.  Doing something like this would actually be confidence boosting for both of us I decided!

Ethan was super excited getting kitted out to go on the water, helmet and life vest on!  At first one of the members of the Sailing Club took pulled him along with a rope but he was soon trying to figure out using the paddles.  One of the Sailing Club members had told me he'd be too small to be able to use them effectively but he proved them wrong!  Ethan impressed everybody!

Felix wanted to get in on the action as well.  At 16 months he was certainly too small to paddle and not to jump in the water but on seeing how desperate he was to have a go, one of the helpers offered to take him out and pull him around for a while!

He adored it.  Ethan too, they were both buzzing for the rest of the afternoon!

After enjoying the festival we popped into the playground for a little while where the boys let off a little more steam.

It was a lovely afternoon, so nice to feel part of a community!

Linking up with Coombe Mill for Country Kids.