ROCHESTER High Street was transformed this May Bank Holiday Weekend for the annual Sweeps Festival.

Men and women with blacked-up faces, tall feathered hats and jingling bells on their legs clashed sticks and leaped in time to the rhythm of drumbeats and squeeze box melodies in the high street.

In a time when it’s no longer legal to send boys up chimneys, the festival has been taken over by Morris dancers.

Dozens of troupes, with names like Cockleshell Clog, Pork Scratchins and Rampant Rooster, came from as far away as Cheshire and Nottinghamshire to strut their stuff.

One troupe, Rant and Raven, came all the way from Alaska. Leader Chris Berg says they are the most northerly Morris dancers the world has seen.

On Saturday and Sunday evenings ceilidhs were held for the Morris dancers. There was also a beer festival, a guitar workshop, a traditional musical instrument fair and a host of other events.