IWA's National Festival and Boat Show

Burton-upon-Trent, in east Staffordshire, is to host the 2011 National Festival & Boat Show over the weekend of 29 – 31 July 2011 on Shobnall Fields.  This new date is a change from the normal practice in recent years of holding it over the August Bank Holiday, and has come after significant consultation with exhibitors, attending public and IWA volunteers who are all vital to the staging of the event.

The Festival was last held in Burton-upon-Trent in 2004 and it then attracted over 300 visiting boats, a similar number of campers and exhibitors and was visited by thousands of people from the area around the town, and waterways enthusiasts from all over the country.

Trent & Mersey Canal, which runs through Burton-on-Trent, offers many of the visiting craft a wide choice of cruising routes.  The area also has a significant number of restoration projects including plans to link the isolated section of the Ashby Canal at Moira to the rest of the waterways system at Snarestone.  Work is in the early phases of bringing the Uttoxeter Canal back into water, and just a few miles down the Trent and Mersey Canal is the start of the Derby Canal which will link Derby City and the Derbyshire Derwent to the Erewash Canal forming a circular cruising route with the Trent when complete.

General Enquiries:  0845 862 1083. For email enquiries click here

The 2010 Festival at Beale Park 

The 2010 IWA Waterways Festival & Boat Show at Beale Park, Reading, held over 28th to 30th August 2010 was graced with sunny weather and has been aclaimed a great success ... with over 450 visiting boats, a lovely riverside campsite, a great range of exciting entertainments and exhibitors, all with the fantastic Thames backdrop.  IWA’s 2010 Beale Park National Festival was indeed an event to remember for all the right reasons.

Here's a full list of the 2010 exhibitors (updated 27th August). 

Check out what happened at the festival. 

Find out more about the 2010 event sponsors.

There is a daily blog, with lots of photos, from Festival worker Bruce Napier who is staying on his boat at the Festival for two weeks before the event, helping the build-up, and for the week afterwards clearing up.