Cheese and Chilli Festival has 10th birthday in Christchurch

Thousands headed to the Cheese and Chilli Festival on Parley Lane, Christchurch, to help the event celebrate its tenth birthday on May 18 and 19. 

Organised by Simon Stewart, 45, the festival also travels to Winchester, Swindon, Guilford and Chichester but was founded in Christchurch which made this year's event all the more special. 

Simon said: "We started off with three to four thousand people coming to the shows and last year this show had a 12,000 people turnout which was incredible. 

"Christchurch is its home and we've been here since day one. It's great that it's also our busiest show because it feels like the local town has supported us throughout."

CCF has run 40 festivals since its genesis with the key motive to provide a 'budget-friendly', 'family focussed' festival. 

This year's event saw a wide variety of events, activities and 150 stalls selling a wide variety of cheese and chilli items plus more. 

Owner of Dorset Chili Shop, Russell Williams, was one of four chilli sellers at the first event and stated that since then, interest in chilli items has boomed. 

He said: "Only four of us turned up and the first one and we had a superb weekend, then obviously word got around which meant more competition. 

"It's good that there's a mix here with cheese stalls, some charities and some people do cakes because the only pure chilli festival that used to exist was in Brighton but sadly the guy who ran it passed away and that festival no longer exists."

On the cheese side of the festival, Paul Chorlton, sales for Great British Cheese Company, 45, said that he always comes down for the festival despite living in Manchester. 

His third time at the festival, he praised Simon for running the festival and said they are 'well run and busy shows'.

The show also held a wrestling event for the first time and had several acts on its main stage providing music entertainment.