70,000 pints of beer, 4,000 litres of foreign beer and 205 tubs of cider were consumed. Champion Beer of the Festival was Rockingham Dark Forest. This is the third time that Rockingham have carried off the Champions award, quite an achievement for the tiny part-time brewery in Blatherwyke, Northants. Brewer Brian Bosworth does, though, produce superbly crafted and very distinctive beers. Dark Forest, also Cham pion in 2003, is a luscious, complicated brew reminiscent of the best Belgian "dubbel" ales.

Cambridgeshire beers did well in the award with Melton's Worts and All winning Strong Bitter, Cambridge Moonshine's Red Watch getting Speciality and Sid's Brewerry, newly established at the Chequers Little Gransden, carrying off the Mild prize with its Mudcart Mild.

Another local winner was Hereward of Ely whose Sweet was cider of the festival.

The Festival charity was the East Anglian Air Ambulance and sales of Buntingford brewery's Anglia Two raised £1,000. A raffle and bucket collection boosted the total to a magnificent £9,566.

Organiser Debbie Keane thanks all the people who volunteered to help at the Festival - without them, it couldn't be done. Debbie also points out that, as ever, our Festival shows that drinkers can and do behave responsibly when in a "controlled" environment like a festival or a pub - although people had the opportunity to binge drink they didn't and there was no trouble of any kind. All goes to show how misguided are the Government's attempts to control drinking through taxation which will fuel yet more pub closures and increase unregulated drinking as more choose to drink at home or on the streets.

Planning for next year's festival is already under way and the dates will be 18- 23 May.