If you have blond hair, love playing with fire and donning a pointed helmet, with or without horns then this first festival is made for you. Spectacular Shetland’s UP HELLY AA dates back to the early 1880’s and features a night of dancing, singing and as you would expect in Scotland consumption of alcohol! If you are one of the guizer squad and there are usually about 1000 then you can get dressed up in Viking clobber and join the torch lit procession through Lerwick down to the waters edge. 
A boat, the Galley, a Viking replica is specially built for the festival. After a final bugle call all torches are tossed into the boat setting it alight. The revelry continues late into the night and early morning long after the ship resembles a pile of ash. It is always on the last Tuesday of January. www.uphellyaa.org
Scotland’s big party night is of course Hogmanay. In Stonehaven near Aberdeen in the Grampians at the stroke of midnight the festival of SWINGING THE FIREBALLS begins. Chicken wire nets stuffed with wood, clothes and anything else combustible are doused with paraffin and set alight. There then follows a spectacular procession through the town as these baskets are swing wildly around the heads of the brave. St John’s Ambulance and the local Fire Brigade look anxiously on. www.stonehavenfireballs.com
Down in Devon on 5th November flaming tar-soaked barrels are carried through the streets in Ottery St Mary. www.tarbarrels.co.uk
Talking of street carrying. Dorking hosts the UK WIFE CARRYING RACE in April. Husbands up for a challenge carry their beloved up and around an almost 400 metre course. ww.trionium.com
And if you think these people have lost their marbles then head for THE BRITISH AND WORLD MARBLE CHAMPIONSHIP held in Tinsley Green, West Sussex held in March to find many more. www.greyhoundmarbles.com
Over in Olney in Buckinghamshire on Shrove Tuesday ladies from the area sprint through the village whilst hanging on to a frying pan! First to compete the course and successfully toss the pancake wins the event. www.olneyonline.com
On a slightly heavier note Oxenhope in Yorkshire is now host to the annual straw race. Fancy dress is not optional. Last year Trump and little rocket man Kim Jong-un were two of the competitors carrying straw bales from one pub to another. www.strawrace.com
Here in my native Yorkshire we are canny shoppers and don’t like to waste food. But over in neighbouring Lancashire, in Ramsbottom, competitors throw black puddings at a plinth piled high with Yorkshire puds. The Wars of the Roses still goes on. I can quite see why black pudding is thrown – it is awful ! Oh the blood! www.visitmanchester.com
Back in Mytholmroyd we Yorkies eat the food. The WORLD DOCK PUDDING CHAMPIONSHIPS are held here around the third weekend in April. Dock pudding is only found here in Calderdale. It is made from dock leaves and nettles and oatmeal and onions and butter and special seasoning. Looking like spinach it is served with bacon and eggs as part of a traditional English breakfast. Superb. www.visitcalderdale.com
Ever enticed or wanted to entice worms? No neither have I and as I enter my 7th decade I have no intention of doing so. But In Willaston, near Nantwich, Cheshire contestants flock from around the globe to compete in THE WORLD WORM CHARMING CHAMPIONSHIPS. All competing to take home the coveted golden worm. Contestants have 30 mins to charm/ entice/ seduce as many worms as they can out of a 3 square metre plot -by any means and by any technique. No animals are hurt in this annual event and all are returned back from whence they came. The record is an impressive 567 worms set in 2009. www.rove.me
Take flight to Bognor to watch aspiring birdmen and women leap off the pier in their slightly wacky flying machines. Lets hope that rogue drone activity doesn’t prevent play this year. www.bognorbirdman.com
Ely, city of the Fens, has a wonderfully impressive cathedral and is host to THE WORLD EEL THROWING CHAMPIONSHIP held over the May Bank Holiday. Do relax because no eels are harmed in this activity only stuffed toy eels! Phew! www.elyeelfestival.co.uk
The Hebden Bridge HANDMADE PARADE held in June is a wonderful event. A cast of at least 1000 dance and parade through the streets highlighting their handmade creations, watched by many thousands more. It is fun, it is colourful and it is great. Come early as parking can be a nightmare. www.handmadeparade.co.uk
Perhaps the daftest and most dangerous event of the year – but which easily sums up the eccentricities of British Life – is the rolling of the cheese in Gloucestershire. The venue is Cooper’s Hill near Brockworth. A concave incline with a gradient of 1 in 3. There are numerous races depending on how many cheeses there are. And can you guess which cheese is used? Yes it’s Double Gloucester. Rounds of cheese weighing 7 to 8 pounds are rolled down the hill . Imagine the Nectar points! People come from all over the world to chase after it once it has been lobbed down the hill. First to the bottom, intact wins the cheese. There are falls aplenty , often broken bones but the spirit of these wacky, some may say foolish Brits, remains strong and unwavering. www.radseason.com
Horn dances, All Hallows, scarecrow festivals, well dressing, green man, country fairs, may poles, morris men, flower shows, summer solstice, Obby Oss festival,duck racing, rush bearing. So many events take place in Britain each year far too many to mention here.
But may they continue to be enjoyed and bring a smile to everybody who takes part in or who visit these British traditions.
