THE RAIN couldn’t dampen the spirits of the 1,000 strong crowd that attended MantonFest over the weekend, with families piling through to soak up the festival atmosphere.

Now in its sixth year, MantonFest boasted a star-studded line up including Dr Feelgood and Animals and Friends who proved to be a hit with the crowds as well as the organisers. With a 12pm start families, friends and even pets walked through the gates to Manton Grange Watermeadow on Saturday (June 25).

Roger Grant, 72, of the High Street, Manton, organiser and chairman of MantonFest, said: “It was the best yet, the site was well organised and the professional staging was fantastic. Usually the stage is in a marquee but we hired a company from Swindon who did a great job. It did rain but it wouldn’t be a UK festival without the weather.”

Mr Grant continued to praise this year’s festival, especially the music and the food, also mentioning the amounts of positive feedback he has received since.

“There was not even a little bit of a problem when it came to the crowd, people kept eating and drinking and having a good time. Animals and Friends were fantastic, they played their set and left the stage when everyone realised they didn’t play one of their biggest hits. After some chanting they came back on for an encore and played House of the Rising Sun, it was fantastically fun. Glastonbury eat your heart out,” he added.

As well as thanking the crowds who turned up to take part in the event, Mr Grant also extended his thanks to the co-organiser and musician Stuart Whant.

“I’ve been doing this for five years and Stuart for six. I couldn’t be more grateful to him for all of the hard work and organisation he did, I really couldn’t do it without him. I would really like to thank Will Walder from BBC Wiltshire who came along and compared for us. I retired a few years ago and decided this is what I wanted to do,” Mr Grant said.

Already looking forward for next year, after a break for relaxation, Mr Grant has already stated that there will be a meeting over the next week to discuss plans for the following MantonFest.

“We will be talking about the next one soon but there are no definite plans as of yet. We still need to total how much was raised for Brighter Futures at Great Western Hospital,” he said.