Village and Town Carnivals

Carnival season is one of the better reasons to be here in July. Almost every town and a lot of the villages hold one: Milford Haven, Neyland, Llangwm, Fishguard, Newport, Solva and plenty of smaller places all run their own version, usually on a Saturday, usually raising money for the lifeboat, the school or the village hall.

The format is consistent. A procession of floats built on farm trailers, a jazz band or a pipe band, a carnival queen and her attendants, children in costume, and a good deal of water pistol usage. It ends at a field or a square with a fete — coconut shy, cake stall, bouncy castle, dog show, tug of war.

Why go. This is the county being itself rather than performing for visitors. Nobody is charging admission, nothing is themed, and the float that has clearly taken one family three weeks to build is the best thing you will see that day.

Finding one. There is no central listing that covers all of them. They are advertised on lamp posts, in village shops and on local Facebook pages, usually a fortnight in advance. Ask in the pub or the post office in whichever village you are staying near.

The honest bit. Some of these are twenty minutes long. The procession through a village of two hundred people is not a spectacle on any national scale and it is not meant to be. Go for the atmosphere, buy something from the cake stall, and do not drive through a carnival village at the wrong time unless you enjoy sitting still.