Brixham Pirate Festival 2018





Over the May bank holiday weekend we headed over to Brixham with our two little pirates for some swashbuckling fun, at this years Pirate Festival. Leaving the car park and making our way down to the marina, I understood why the area is known as the English Riviera, we could easily have just arrived in the Mediterranean! Unusually for a bank holiday in the UK, it was a lovely 20 degrees, so of course, legs, sun cream and sun hats were all out! The sun was shining brightly with barely a cloud in the sky and the sea glistened beautifully beneath it. Just stunning!

 We strolled through the marina down towards the harbour, soon spotting the magnificent El Galeon (Spanish pirate ship, pictured above). As we wandered, we took in the stalls selling various pirate wears, saw female pirates on stilts creating bubbles and modelling balloon swords to entertain the kids, in the family area. Passing apartments decorated with pirate skeletons dressed in costumes helped to set the scene. There was singing along with grog or cocktails at the Velvet Buccaneer and a  second ship the Golden Hind, soon came in to sight around at the harbour. 

 If dressing up is your thing, you certainly wouldn’t have been alone. There were more adult 'pirates' wandering around than kiddies, some really getting in to character firing their pistols and yelling the odd ‘argh’ or ‘yo-ho-ho’ to one another. Master S’s pirate hat, eye patch and sword and Miss S’s sword didn’t quite match up to some of the full blown, in full character, ‘pirates’ walking around.

Music from the main stage round by the harbour could be heard throughout, with bands such as Captain’s Beard, Pyrates and Hornswaggle entertaining the crowd. 



Admission:
Free! The festival is a free event and you can easily spend a few hours taking a wander round the stalls, grabbing a bite to eat at one of the many temporary food offerings as well as the Prince William pub, taking in some of the live music as you ate.
If you wanted to get on board El Galeon, it would have cost you some of those hard earned gold coins - £8 per adult, £4 per child or £20 for a family ticket. Thankfully Master S wasn’t fussed as Miss S would have had to miss out.
Timings:
From Sat 5th - Mon 7th (inclusive). The Pirate Festival aims to run every year over the early May bank holiday. This year the festival was in danger of being cancelled until the funds were raised just in time. Hopefully it will run again next year. 
Accessibility:
It wasn’t all plain sailing (!) as we thought we’d have to turn around and come home due to the lack of disabled parking. We almost had two very upset children. Three car parks, (1 without any disabled bays and another with very few), an angry Tweet to Brixham council and some very good timing later, we managed to nab a disabled space someone had just left at the Marina car park. Someone thought the disabled parking area was an ideal place to dump some, what I assume were storage units and in doing so, blocked the majority of the disabled bays!
It was a good job Miss S didn't need changing whilst we were out as I didn't spot any suitable facilities. We will go back and investigate Brixham itself, properly. 
Unsurprisingly the El Galeon wasn't an option for Miss S as it just wasn't doable with a wheelchair.
Tips:
The Marina car park is a large multi-storey and probably the best bet to grab a parking space, unless you arrive very early in the morning. The harbour and central car parks are much smaller car parks. We couldn’t see any disabled bays in the Harbour car park and the Central car park had a handful scattered around. If Brixham council shift those ridiculous storage units it will be a safer bet for a disabled bay. 

All in all, we had an enjoyable few hours experiencing something a little different with bits to entertain both the kids and adults,  with the added bonus of beautiful sunshine! I'll leave you with a few photos, enjoy me Hearties!

 To read more about our adventures in the South West, have a look at our St Ives review and our stay at the Polurrian Bay Hotel. 



It's not every day you see a 6ft parrot!

Decorated apartments along the marina
A pirate on a jet ski! 

Main stage



































































































































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