Sorry to drag this up, I was looking for posts on barleylands.
I went for a few years in a row as a young child when I was around 6-9 years old but parents stopped taking us there, then in 2014 and 15 I was planning to go but stuff came up, thankfully I was able to go last year but never once thought it would be the last one so I'm thoroughly glad I went with hindsight.
Considering how busy the place was, as with most of these events I think there's more to it than the reasons given, increased costs can be overcome with increased entry prices but as mentioned there was no shortage of visitors it was busy and carpark full.
But as it's not on this year after going last year I miss it already, having gone last year it brought back many memories of the enjoyment I got as a child, I loved seeing the ploughing engines, the traction engines powering the threshing machine, the wood saws etc, seeing horses ploughing the fields, the miniature pumping engines, the steam fair, the miniature and full size traction engines as well as the events they did like the slow race etc. Lol
But as above as a child I remember there being more steam but even with the smaller numbers it was still nice.
This year I went to orsett show again and noticed the reduced numbers of steam traction engines there as well, suspect some went to orsett show before barleylands as some was at both events but now no barleylands maybe some think it's no longer worth going to orsett show being its smaller 1 day event.
Even more a shame was that the ploughing pair owned by the family, it was the first year both had been in operation together after 1 fell off a lorry and had to undergo extensive repair.
Even if they will be doing steam events in the future, and I hope they will it may not include the same things the show did like the ploughing demonstrations thresher and saw mill etc or the fair or miniature pumping engines
I think that they have a direction with their business they want to go; maybe they want the land for other purposes, seems to coincide with them getting rid of their miniature steam trains also, which went to Barnard's miniature railway in the same year.
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