Abergavenny Community Orchard is planning its ‘biggest and best’ annual wassail ceremony at the Laurie Jones Community Orchard on Saturday January 23 at 4pm.

Everyone’s welcome to the event, where there will be cider made from local apples collected and pressed at the Abergavenny Transition Town apple pressing day in October last year.

There will also be an opportunity to help prune the apple trees, starting at 2pm.

The orchard, at the bottom of Mill Street, is named in memory of one of its founders.

Wassail means good health, and wassailing refers to a traditional ceremony that involves singing and drinking the health of apple trees.

The purpose of wassailing, which dates from the middle ages, was to awaken the cider apple trees and to scare away any ‘evil spirits’ to ensure a good harvest of fruit in the autumn.

The wassail is intended as an inclusive, community celebration and will involve music, food, cider and a traditional wassail ceremony in which a piece of toast soaked in cider will be placed in one of the trees and cider will be poured onto the roots.

There will be a procession around the orchard, involving music and as much noise as possible to scare away the ‘spirits’!

Everyone is welcome to attend and bring their own tankard and mugs to enjoy the cider. People are also encouraged to bring musical instruments, things to bang to make lots of noise, and to dress up in colourful clothes.

Abergavenny Community Orchard hopes that this will be the most successful wassail ceremony yet!