PUNTERS packed into a Wanborough pub to enjoy a tipple or two as a popular beer festival returned.

The New Calley Arms hosted its second annual beer festival and staff were swept off their feet serving up a wide range of drinks to the merry crowd for two busy days.

Villagers Dave Ewart, Richard Hughes and Paul Craven-Jones enjoyed the sunshine in the pub's beer garden.

Dave said: “It seemed like the whole village was there with people from out of town too, there was a wonderful selection of ales and most of them were really good, even better than last year’s range. There was lovely weather and it was a lot busier this time, it was good fun.

“This is a great pub, they’ve really turned it around beyond belief, we’re regulars here and we’re really proud of it, it brings the whole community together, you’re guaranteed a good time and there’s never any trouble."

Richard said: “I had my 50th birthday party here and it was great, people come from all over the place to events held here like the New Year's Eve party but the beer festival is the biggest one, this village is all about community spirit.”

Paul joked: "This event is just going to keep growing, it’ll be like Glastonbury in a few years.”

More than 30 local residents and businesses got to choose the names of different beers and ciders by sponsoring them. Hairdresser Sue Hillier’s Half-Cut was the fastest selling cider on Saturday while Grumpy Old Bitter and Beer-hemian Rhapsody both proved to be popular beers. Proceeds from all sales went towards replacing the boiler at St Andrew’s Church.

Barry Hillier from The Old Boilers group said: “The church needed £18,000 and we raised £6,0000 last year so we thought we’d try it again and we were really pleased with the turnout, there was enough variety of drinks to suit everyone.”

“As a committee, we treat the money we raise as a lottery and invite local people to approach us and see if we can help them in some way.