From 11.30am the Square will come alive, beginning with a competitive wood chopping display by the Canterbury Axeman Centre. Might and muscle abound in this highly technical, highly physical, and potentially risky sport. These competitors are experts, and their skills will be on display later in the festival at the A & P Show.

Also courtesy of The Show, The City Farmyard will bring country sights, sounds and smells to town. Animals in the delightful petting zoo this year include Delia the Showtime Canterbury brochure-cover cow, Arabian horses, donkeys, Llamas, coloured lambs and Shetland ponies. Children and adults alike will enjoy getting close to these farm animals, many of which are tame enough to touch.

Crowd workers will provide roving entertainment, with stilt walking and acrobatics.

The majestic Showtime Canterbury Painted Horses will begin their transformation into works of art on Friday 1st. An event unique in New Zealand, these life sized, life-like thoroughbreds will each be painted in a individual design, conceptualised by four talented local artists, to the theme ‘What Canterbury Means to You’. Maria Park, Ngaire McNeill, Celia Ballantyne and Sharon Earl begin creating their public art works onsite, and will continue for the following week.

The popular Celebrity Sulky Race will commence at around 12.15pm. At least 6 teams have registered this year, and the pressure is on for these brave and muscle-bound souls to haul their sulky around the course, in the hope of winning our trophy. Plenty of fun and laughs are guaranteed!

Those local princes of polyester-pop, The Vague As Brothers, will bring their unique style, wit, and shocking outfits to the festival launch, proving yet again, that good taste and good entertainment are not necessarily incompatible! Les and Dick. E promise another stunning performance of pop classics to sing along to.