Issue #22 | Thursday 16 July 2026

Good morning, Mendips! The Godney Gathering throws open its gates at Garslade Farm this weekend with The Wurzels, The Pigeon Detectives and more, Queen by Candlelight rocks Wells Cathedral tonight, and Glastonbury's regeneration project marks its first completed stage on Saturday.

Somerset's young footballers have earned an England call-up, Glastonbury Abbey has some buzzy new residents, and Wells councillors have knocked back a 24-hour Budgens plan — read on for the full lowdown.

📸 The Godney Gathering - Today's featured event

📅 What's On This Week — across the Mendips

Somerset's young footballers earn an England chance

Glastonbury Abbey's new honey makers

Shepton residents asked to help shape a climate plan

Glastonbury's regeneration project opens its first stage

Wells 24-hour Budgens plan refused

🌡️ Weather — Wells BA5 forecast

Garslade Farm at Godney springs into life this Friday and Saturday for the return of The Godney Gathering, Somerset's own home-grown music festival held on the doorstep of Glastonbury and Wells.

Friday runs 6pm to midnight, Saturday noon to midnight, with headline sets from Reverend and the Makers, The Pigeon Detectives, Dodgy, The Wurzels and Fun Lovin' Criminals spread across the Main Stage, the This Feeling stage, Glastonbury Calling and a Silent Disco.

What started as a modest local get-together has grown into one of the Mendips' best-loved summer weekends, with a dedicated Playground area for younger festival-goers on the Saturday and food and bars trading throughout.

Somerset Council is putting a temporary one-way system in place around Godney Road, Crannel Lane and Polsham Lane from 5pm Friday to 1am Saturday, and again from 11am Saturday to 1am Sunday, so allow extra time if you're driving in from Wells or Glastonbury.

Weekend tickets are £55 (plus booking fee), Saturday-only £45, with concessions for 11-17s and free entry for under-11s with a paying adult. Camping at Garslade Farm is £12.50 per adult per night and runs separately from the festival ticket — gates open from noon on Thursday. No alcohol, dogs or glass can be brought onto site, so check the full rules before you set off.

→ Full details at thegodneygathering.com

It's just 140 metres long, tucked beside the cathedral, and most people walk past it without realising they've just visited the oldest continuously inhabited street in the whole of Europe. But Vicars' Close in Wells is far more than a pretty postcard — it's a street packed with
- plague survivors,
- optical trickery,
- ghostly choristers,
- and a bishop with a very firm opinion on where his clergy should sleep.

Bishop Ralph of Shrewsbury began constructing Vicars' Close in 1348 — the very year the Black Death arrived in England. Half the country would be dead within a few years, yet here was Bishop Ralph, calmly commissioning a purpose-built housing development.

Ralph's vision was essentially a medieval halls-of-residence. He had a problem: his Vicars Choral — the professional singers paid to belt out services in the cathedral eight times a day — were lodging freely around town, "succumbing to worldly temptations" as the cathedral's own history diplomatically puts it.

The solution? Move them all into identical two-storey terraced houses on a single supervised street, where communal meals were served in a shared hall. No kitchen in your house, no sneaking off to the tavern for a late supper. Each house had a fireplace on each floor, washing facilities, and — luxury of luxuries — a latrine emptying into a drain at the back.

Walk to the cathedral end of Vicars' Close and peer northwards. The street appears short, intimate, almost compact. Now walk to the other end and look south toward the cathedral. Suddenly it stretches away into the distance, far longer than you thought possible.

You are not losing your mind. This is entirely deliberate. The cobbled street gradually widens as you walk away from the cathedral, an intentional false perspective engineered to impress visitors approaching from the cathedral. Medieval builders were, it turns out, perfectly capable of showing off.

Those magnificent, soaring chimney stacks — the ones that make Vicars' Close look like a row of particularly stately smoking pipes — weren't part of the original design. They were added in the 15th century, possibly because the vicars had switched from burning wood to coal, which produces considerably nastier fumes and demands taller chimneys.

Look carefully and you'll spot something else: each chimney stack features two square stone panels carved with heraldic shields — essentially a Who's Who of Wells bishops, immortalised in stonework 30 feet above the ground where almost nobody thinks to look.

And then there are the stories. On still evenings, some residents and visitors report hearing faint choral singing — not from the cathedral, but from somewhere along the Close itself, impossible to locate. Others describe the sensation of footsteps behind them on the cobbles, only to turn and find the street empty.

The most frequently reported figure is a hooded man in clerical dress, moving silently before vanishing entirely. One resident reportedly awoke in the night to find a pale figure in ecclesiastical robes standing at the foot of her bed, utterly motionless, before simply fading away.

The cobblestones have carried the footsteps of medieval priests, Victorian restorers, and today's world-class choristers. Whatever you believe, when you stand at the cathedral end of Vicars' Close as evening falls, you'll find yourself glancing over your shoulder. Just in case.

The Vicars' Close restoration project is currently underway, with plans to open a visitor centre and show visitors what medieval life looked like inside these extraordinary houses — expected to complete by spring 2027.

→ Full listings and booking at Wells Film Centre

Eighteen young people in care and care leavers from Somerset made the county's first-ever appearance at the national Pro Alliance Champions Cup, reaching the quarter-finals at MK Dons Stadium. Two players, including 17-year-old Lewis, have now been picked to represent England against Wales later this year and will train at St George's Park. The trip was organised through Somerset Council's fostering service with Somerset Activity and Sports Partnership.

Read full story → (Somerset Council)

Four hives of honey bees have moved into the abbey orchard, reviving a monastic tradition of beekeeping for mead, medicine and candle wax. Somerset Beekeepers Association member Richard Longworth will care for the colony, with an emergency anaphylaxis kit funded by Tesco Glastonbury now in place beside the hives.

Read full story → (Somerset Leveller)

Shepton Mallet residents are being invited to help build a community climate adaptation plan for the town. Somerset Wildlife Trust is running a free Act to Adapt workshop at the Art Bank Café on Monday, 20 July, where residents will work in groups on practical local responses to flooding, extreme heat and other climate pressures.

Read full story → (Shepton Mallet Nub News)

The first phase of the Baily's Buildings regeneration is complete, and Glastonbury Town Council is throwing open the doors on Saturday. Five local choirs — including the Glastonbury Community Choir and Glastonbury Male Voice Choir — will sing 'Jerusalem' together to mark the refurbished West Building's new commercial space, with more phases still to come.

Read full story → (Glastonbury Nub News)

Wells city councillors have thrown out plans for a 24-hour Budgens and late-night petrol station on Bath Road, going against their own officers' recommendation to approve it. Concerns over noise and disturbance to nearby homes won out, months after the scheme first divided opinion locally.

Read full story → (Wells Nub News)

🌡️ Wells BA5 Weather — Week of 16 July 2026

Another warm, largely dry spell is in store after the recent heatwave, with highs in the low-to-mid twenties and plenty of sunny spells through the working week. It should stay settled for the Godney Gathering weekend, though it's worth packing a light layer for Saturday night — check the forecast before you head out for the day.

→ Full 7-day forecast on BBC Weather

[email protected]

07912 499433