In pictures: Arbury Carnival celebrates the Queen’s Jubilee

This year’s Arbury Carnival celebrated Her Majesty the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee.

Held last Saturday (June 11), the event also marked chair Jason Soer’s last involvement with the organising committee after 20 years. He said: “The event went off very well; we had a rather large crowd of people join – I think we had more people than we expected.

“There was a very well-organised and successful procession that was run by Sue and Marina – and thank you to the rest of the volunteers as well because they all did a sterling job.

“There were some lovely messages from the local community thanking all the volunteers and I’ve worked with these guys for a good few years now. Thank you to Laura and Luke, Mandy, Eddie, and past committee members whom I’ve worked with over the last 20 years to make the carnival the success that it is.”

Jason estimates that between four and five thousand people – possibly more – attended throughout the day. “We think we got a lot of through traffic as well because obviously Strawberry Fair was on,” he said, “and we think we had a lot of people come through us on their way to Strawberry Fair.”

The carnival’s future has been in doubt, due to a lack of volunteers, but Jason is hopeful that it will still go ahead next year. “I’m remaining positive because in this area, we don’t go down easy!” he said.

“There’s a fighting spirit around here with things that people like to go and do. So we’re hoping that that fighting spirit will carry on and the next committee will be able to put a carnival on next June.”

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In pictures: Festival spirit shines through at Cambridge's Arbury Carnival