Wassail away the weekend and help ensure a good cider apple harvest

Friday 15 January 2016

The National Trust want you to take part in an old pagan tradition and help to make sure the Island has a good apple harvest this year.

They’ll be out Wassailing at Hamptonne and The Elms for the first time tomorrow afternoon and want you to come along and toast the orchard.

You’ll get a Wassail (Old Norse "Ves Heil", Old English was hál, literally 'be you healthy) – that’s some hot mulled cider as part of the Medieval drinking ritual that is intended to ensure a good cider apple harvest.

The Trust say the practice of wassailing dates back centuries when villagers in England would stage elaborate ceremonies in the dead of winter. Some included hanging cider-soaked toast from the apple trees, encircling the oldest tree and singing, reciting incantations, banging pots and pans, and even firing shotguns.

If you fancy a bit of Wassailing, organisers say don’t forget to bring something noisy like a whistle or some pots and pans – anything to frighten away the evil spirits.

Here’s what they have going on:

12pm - 2pm Hamptonne Country Life Museum

•          Crown the King and Queen of the Wassail

•          Visitor will process with The King and Queen and the Jersey Lilies to the orchard

•          Pieces of bread will be dipped in warm cider and hung on the chosen tree and participants will have a small glass to ‘toast the tree’.

•          Artisan bread and cheese will be served in the Cider barn

2.30 pm – 4.30 pm The Elms, St Mary 

•          Morris Dancing with the Helier Morris Men

•          Procession to the orchard for wassailing of the trees and bees

•          Mummer’s Play, followed by cider and apple cake in the Pressoir and general merriment of singing and dancing!