Lauren Westwood

Lincoln received a drenching over the past week, but we have it on good authority that summer is well on the way. Take a sneak peek at The Lincolnite’s list of the city’s finest seasonal delights and start scheduling your summer shenanigans.

The Lincolnshire Show (June 22-23)

This traditional county show is a massive event on Lincoln’s calendar, attracting tens of thousands of visitors every year. Watch a round of show jumping, visit the petting zoo and inspect some agricultural machinery, before heading to the food court to gorge yourself on local delicacies. This year dogs are welcome too, so there’s no need to leave the pooch at home.

— Price: £18 Adult, £5.50 Child

Armed Forces Day (June 23)

The High Street will be hosting an honourable medal ceremony, where the public can meet members of the military and watch displays from a local RAF base.

— Price: Free

The Waddington Air Show (July 2-3)

Prepare for some serious neck ache as the Red Arrows and other impressive planes streak across the sky and show off their incredible skills. Airborne antics at its best. Find out more here.

— Price: Adult £20, Child £10

Race for Life (July 9)

Whether you’re running, jogging or sitting on the sidelines cheering like a lunatic, Race for Life promotes a mighty cause and makes for a cracking day out. Those with an aversion to the colour pink, however, may wish to stay at home. Those running can find some fun (and pink!) outfits in Peacocks on the High Street.

Regional Food Fair (monthly)

If free-range pork and organic vegetables invade your dreams at night, we recommend stocking up on some delectable nibbles from across the region at the food fairs taking place in St Mark’s shopping centre on the first Saturday of every month. Fill your boots!

— Price: Free

Artists Market (throughout summer)

Satisfy your appetite for art with a mooch about St Mark’s Square, where local artists will be showcasing their work at monthly markets throughout summer. A crew of buskers has also been assembled to make this a feast for the eyes and the ears.

— Price: Free to attend, stalls from £20

Bangers and Mash Ball (August 28)

If you fancy something fancy, why not head to the Drill Hall’s annual Bangers and Mash Ball where you’ll be treated to a winning combination of fantastic food, live music and dancing? This year the theme is 1920s so throw on your posh frocks and snazzy suits and get into character.

— Price: £48

(E-mail [email protected] for more information)

Beam! Festival (July 2-9)

Lincoln’s Children and Young People’s festival returns to the High Street this summer, bringing with it an array of live music, drama and dance activities for youngsters to take part in. Organised by Lincoln BIG, this event promises to be exactly that.

— Price: Free

Drill Hall Sleepover (July 30-31)

Tonight The Drill Hall laughs in the face of all that is sensible and asks (bravely) ‘how many is too many’, by opening its doors for an action-packed all-night slumber party. Drama, dance and art activities, as well as a late night film await kids over 8 and their grown up chaperones. Don’t forget to pack sleeping bags and pillows. Warning: sleep not necessarily included.

— Price: £25 (£18 for accompanying adults)

Community Picnic (Every second Sunday until September)

Dust off the blanket, grab yourselves a hamper of scotch eggs and cocktail sausages and head to the West Common for a good old fashioned family picnic. Who doesn’t love alfresco dining on a sunny day?

— Price: Free

We couldn’t let you go cold turkey! To prevent end-of-summer-sadness setting in we’ve included a couple of events taking place in early autumn:

Digital Arts Festival (begins September)

As summer draws to a close, Lincoln plans to host its very own celebration of all things digital. This unusual festival, entitled ‘Unlocking the City’, kicks off its three month stint in September and will transform a host of the city’s best venues, including the Usher Gallery, the Drill Hall and the Cathedral, into a stage for the digital arts.

The Co-op’s 150th Big Birthday Bash (September 3)

The Lincolnshire food store shows no signs of slowing down as it races towards the ripe old age of 150. Instead it plans to celebrate in style; with fairground rides, fireworks and live music from Lulu and Scouting For Girls, this promises to be one heck of a shindig.

— Price: From £33.50

John Sampson and Carol Ann Duffy

The Collection museum hosted this weekend 12 hours of talks and workshops as part of Lincoln’s one-day Hay Festival.

The event concluded in spectacular style, with a performance from Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy and instrumentalist John Sampson, who delivered an engaging hybrid of poetry and music.

Sampson delighted the audience with a playful demonstration of some unusual pipes and horns, and Duffy read from celebrated collections The World’s Wife and Rapture, before sharing poems from unpublished collection The Bees.

Duffy has held the prestigious title of Poet Laureate for almost two years, but reveals that her day-to-day life has not changed too dramatically.

She said: “I think that the important thing about being a poet is you write poetry. I don’t think that poets should be on ‘I’m a Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here’. I’ve managed to keep my relationship with my own work as normal as it used to be.

“I love being Poet Laureate; what’s wonderful is that it allows you to celebrate even more the thing that you love most of in the world, which is poetry. I think it is our national art.”

Being Laureate has allowed Duffy to bring together numerous other poets to cover events such as the Royal Wedding.

“I think there were 23 poets who each wrote a new poem that could be used at a civil partnership or a wedding. Things like that are lovely to be able to do; to bring poetry to the table, have it sit down and join in.”

Duffy has some exciting projects in the pipeline, and not least the publication of her latest compilation. September will see the launch of Anthologise!, a national competition that will encourage secondary school students to produce their own poetry. Duffy and Welsh Laureate Gillian Clarke will head the judging panel to decide which collection will win the prize.

“The winning book will be published by Picador so it will be in all the shops: an anthology done by children themselves for teenagers to read,” Duffy said.

“We’ve got a very exciting patron who you will find out about in September. I’m not allowed to say.”

Although Duffy was only in Lincoln for one night, she has been familiar with the city for many years:

“I really love the city and I’ve been coming here since I was 17. I just like mooching around the streets. It’s got lots of lovely old pubs. [The Collection] is a fantastic place. I love everything being under one roof and it’s a beautiful building.”

Lincoln will play a significant role in another upcoming project with artist Stephen Raw: “I’m going to write a poem for every English cathedral and he’s going to do an artwork of the poems. Lincoln is one of the ones we want to do first.”

Duffy’s latest collection, The Bees, will be published in Autumn 2011.

— Additional reporting from Chelsea Buckthorp