By Lauren Henry

Horsham’s 150km Feast organisers will look to ‘reimagine’ next year’s event after Saturday night’s event was described as a ‘food, wine and flood adventure’.

With heavy rain on Friday night causing havoc for organisers, an army of volunteers showed up on Saturday morning to make sure Horsham Showground was able to host the food and wine festival and ‘Dinner under the Stars’.

In its sixth year, the event celebrated the region, bringing together food, wine and produce grown within 150 kilometres of Horsham.

Local growers, winemakers, brewers, distillers, chefs, food producers and musicians all came together, with the event moved indoors across Maydale Pavilion, The Stables and The Poultry Shed.

But despite the huge effort of volunteers to ensure the event went ahead, poor numbers at the festival will see organiser Andrea Cross rethink her plans and her involvement for next year.

“Overall, it’s a beautiful event. We had people from Port Arlington, from Berlin, from Geelong, and they don’t want to see it ever finish,” she said.

“But from my personal perspective – I’ve always said use it or lose it – and I think it’s pretty evident the food and wine festival will finish. 

“That this will be the last food and wine festival element of the feast, and we may just revert next year back to the dinner.”

The Dinner under the Stars offered guests a five-course meal, with a bottle of local wine or beer, to enjoy.

When The Stable started to flood as more rain tumbled down on Saturday evening, guests moved onto the Maydale Pavilion, complete with live music, to continue to enjoy the night.

Mrs Cross could not thank all the volunteers enough for helping set-up and work on the night.

She said her and offsider Luke had to clear out drains on Friday night but much of it to no avail. They regrouped on Saturday morning, and with the help of another volunteer Britt who had worked on the logistics team for the fires base camp last year, worked out a plan on how to ensure the event would go ahead.

Her call-out on Friday night for help resulted in about 60 people showing up to clean-up, mitigate flooding, and set up a quickly revamped plan for the festival and dinner.

“Once the rain actually hit, I hit a wall and I couldn’t even think about what I had to do. I had a jobs list that had to be done but  I was down there by myself at that stage,” she said.

“But when  that wall of people came to uphold the event, it was incredible.”

“There were other challenges that we had to face behind the scenes too, and I guess this is what really shows that community spirit. 

“Behind it all are the people, the humans –  people are so kind.”

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