Hundreds of festivalgoers turned up for the return of the Weymouth Food and Family Festival.

The popular festival which is in its fourth year returned to Lodmoor Country Park today for an afternoon of all things food, drink, live music and entertainment.

Upon entry, guests are greeted by incredibly friendly and helpful door staff, and then they can follow a trail of stalls, some of which were giving out free samples of tasty treats like cheese and jam.

This included The Cherry Tree, founded by Anya and Andy Godden from Bridport.

Anya said: “We came here last year, and it was really good. And this year, so far it has been good. We are ticking along nicely, and people keep coming over.”

After a short wonder, you reach the main festival area with a live music stage which many groups of families and friends decided to pitch themselves around to enjoy the day complete with beautiful sunshine.

This included Clare and Kelly who were visiting Weymouth from Reading.

The pair said: “We are on holiday in Weymouth and we saw that the event was on so we decided to buy some tickets. It’s been really good and we have enjoyed it.”

Further along by the hot food court, Janette Alexander was enjoying the festival with her daughter Courtney, granddaughter Poppy and dog Bertie.

Janette said: “I live here and I have got my daughter and granddaughter down visiting. We love it here because we can bring the dog so it’s a whole family thing.”

Courtney added: “I have been to food festivals in London and in my opinion, this is better. The diversity of food is great. It’s a good combination of people selling things and food and drink tents.”

The mother and daughter duo also noted that they were pleased to see so many security staff, paramedics, and plenty of bins.

Everyone seemed to be having a lovely time and all the stalls appeared to be busy, including one for Slouvaki and another for axe throwing.

Mike from Mad Mike's Chilli Jam said: “We work with Simon and Venetia (the festival organisers) and we do all their cheese and chilli festivals so we thought we would give this one a try and so far its doing very well.”

There was also a great funfair area for kids to enjoy with plenty of carnival themed games.

Tucked away in the bottom-right corner of the festival ground was the cooking theatre and throughout the day Olly Reynalds and David Perrett were hosting live cooking demonstrations and competitions.

Olly said: “We have seen a lot of people here that we recognise from the last four years that we have been attending the festival. We are not too serious. We really enjoy working with the team and it’s great to be by the seaside. There’s a good selection of locals and people from all over the country.”

One particularly popular competition was the Verses Food Challenge which saw competitors battle it out to see who could eat a burrito covered in mega hot chilli sauce the fastest.

One contestant dropped out within the first bite, glugging down his glass of milk. There was even a medic on standby.

In the end it was down to just two contestants and librarian James Winter came out on top.

James was actually visiting the festival as part of his honeymoon trip to Weymouth from Derby alongside his wife Geneveve Winter.

It was actually Geneveve that encouraged him to take part. She joked: “I said go on and that was it, he did it.”

James was adamant that he would not attempt the challenge again. He has previously attempted chilli eating challenges before but they were ‘roulette styled.’

At the end James added: “I really wish I had some more milk.”

At 12pm, band The Rock Apes took to the stage, performing a selection of covers.

Rachel and Mark Best were amongst the crowd of people gathered around the stage.

They said: “We are just down visiting for the weekend, and this is the first time that we have been to the Food and Family Festival the music is good and so has everything else. The weather is also great.”

The festival continues tomorrow from 10am-5pm.

Check out our interactive gallery of pictures at the top of the page.