Show Highlights

Despite the not very favourable weather, rain on Wednesday, cold on Thursday and cold and windy on Friday just over 100,000 visited the 2011 Canterbury A&P Show. Breakdown is approximately 14,000 Wednesday, 25,000 Thursday and 61,000 Friday.

In the livestock and competition area entry numbers increased for sheep, alpaca, wool, shearing, wine and gourmet oil. The slight drop in cattle and equestrian numbers took the pressure off the judging timetables and livestock accommodation which had been at absolute capacity.

Once of the biggest highlights of the Show would have to be the Ballantynes Grand Parade on Friday – a huge congratulations to all those involved in making this such a great spectacle for our Show visitors, it was well attended, well organised and enjoyed by the thousands of spectators. Other highlights were the Wedding on Show and the Amazing Quake Race, both were successful. The international events in Shearing and Woodchopping also attracted excellent attention from visitors, as did the entertainment line up provided by DB for the BaaBaa Bar.

The new BaaBaa Bar location worked well although the cold wind on Friday deterred many from sitting outside and enjoying the view of the lake and the entertainment provided by Tui. On the whole the changes to layout worked well including the new Lake Turnstiles although the wind made the turnstiles in the marquees difficult to operate.

Our thanks and congratulations to 2011 President Peter and Nancy Gardner for all the hard work they put into the Show, it was an absolute delight and privilege to work with them both.

On the whole we achieved our objective for 2011 which was to encourage people out post-earthquakes to celebrate at an event they were familiar with, to run an efficient and cost effective Show and to provide a good solid platform from which to launch the 150th Show.

Our thanks to the Committee personnel, judges and stewards who put in an enormous amount of time and effort to making their sections and competition run so smoothly. The feedback from competitors and participants has been excellent.

The Canterbury A&P Association will host its 150th Show Wednesday 14 to Friday 16 November 2012.