Specials!
In 2008 we were thrilled to welcome Scrapheap Challenge on Saturday and BBC's Blue Peter on Sunday!
Channel 4’s Scrapheap Challenge will be coming to Bristol’s renowned international Kite Festival on Saturday, 30 Aug (only). Alongside the amazing aerial spectaculars, six teams will be vying for glory with some engineering mayhem and madness with their blow football machines.
Scrapheap Challenge is currently filming its 11th series with Dick Strawbridge at the helm of the new-look Scrapheap. Dick, a veteran of Scrapheap and with a distinguished military background, is based at a scrapheap in Gloucestershire. With his right hand man, engineer Jim Milner, and a guest star scrapper, he’s building a machine that he hopes will trounce the competition. With a specific brief, six teams will take him on – using the skills and ingenuity for which Scrapheap is renowned. They each have a month to build their machines at home and £450 towards costs. Dick’s Diamonds get the same money – but only have a week to build theirs.
Any team that beats Dick is challenged to a return match in the semi-finals and then the finals in October to discover who is the Scrapheap champ of the series. Can Dick’s Diamonds triumph or will they be well and truly trounced? There’s some serious competition out there determined to give him a run for his money.
Blue Peter, the BBC’s flagship children’s television programme, has chosen the Bristol International Festival of Kites & Air Creations as one of the locations to film activities to celebrate the programme’s 50th anniversary, on Sunday, 31 August (only).
Blue Peter presenters, including Andy Akinwolere, will spend the day at the festival on Sunday 31 August joining in the fun and trying out their flying skills.
As part of the activities to mark Blue Peter’s special birthday a group of local children paint designs onto 50 kites which have been specially made by kite expert Karl Longbottom. These kites will then be bridled and assembled into a spectacular long train ready for the children and presenters to fly in the main arena in the afternoon.
The Blue Peter presenters will also be taking part in the exciting Japanese kite fighting battles. Flying their large hexagonal kites, sporting the programme’s distinctive ship logo, the Blue Peter teams will join other experienced flyers in mock aerial combat vying to be the last kite flying in the sky.
