Peterborough Beer Festival gets underway today with over 300 beers and longest ever 100 metre bar

The forty-third annual Peterborough Beer Festival returns to The Embankment for the first time since 2019 today – with over 300 different beers to choose from and the “longest bar ever.”

Organisers say this year’s bar is “over 100 metres” long, making it the biggest bar in the history of the Peterborough Beer Festival.

After a three year hiatus because of the pandemic, the festival is back once again to showcase the best real ales, cider, key keg beer, wine and gin on offer from breweries across the UK.

SEE MORE: All you need to know about this year's Peterborough Beer Festival

"After a three year break it’s good to be back,” Mike Lane, chair of the Peterborough Beer Festival organising committee said while speaking to the Peterborough Telegraph at a behind the scenes first-look at the festival ahead its official opening.

"We’ve changed the layout. It’s given us the opportunity to have a rethink and try to do things differently.

"The tents are considerably larger than they were three years ago and we’ve got a massive bar this year – the longest we’ve ever had at over 100 metres long.”

The festival will open its doors to the public at 5pm tomorrow and will run for five days until Saturday (August 27).

Upon arrival at the main marquee entrance on The Embankment, beer-lovers can pick up their commemorative beer festival glasses and head through to the main tent where there will be a choice of over 300 beers, wine and gin bars and soft drinks.

There will be Adnams, Woodfordes, Nene Valley and Ossett Ales brewery bars, a world beer bar and key keg bar – serving cold beer at around four degrees.

"It’s a different way of serving craft beer,” Mike said. “You get some amazing beers there – some high gravity stuff and some interesting concoctions.

“It’s always an interesting stop-off point.

“There will also be entertainment each night. There’s a fantastic list of entertainment and most of the bands playing are from within 30-mile radius of Peterborough.”

Over 350 volunteers have worked for the last week leading up to the festival to get it ready to open on-time.

“We started the build on August 15. We’ve budgeted for about 24,000 people – but we do have some emergency stocks of beer hidden away.”

The festival will be open from 5pm today and from 12 noon every other day until Saturday. It will be open until 11pm on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, and 11.30pm on Friday and Saturday.

The Peterborough Telegraph has put together a collection of photos to give you a first look behind the scenes of this year’s event: