THE two-week Bungay festival 2009 gets under way tomorrow - with a programme of 36 events to suit all ages and tastes.At 10.30am tomorrow at the castle the Bigod flag will be raised for the traditional opening by the town reeve, Professor Christopher Hand, and the mayor, John Warnes, and they and others will then walk in procession to visit the country market at the Butter Cross and then the Bungay Camera Club exhibition at St Mary's Church.

THE two-week Bungay festival 2009 gets under way tomorrow - with a programme of 36 events to suit all ages and tastes.

At 10.30am tomorrow at the castle the Bigod flag will be raised for the traditional opening by the town reeve, Professor Christopher Hand, and the mayor, John Warnes, and they and others will then walk in procession to visit the country market at the Butter Cross and then the Bungay Camera Club exhibition at St Mary's Church.

Also on tomorrow is a kids' fun day at the old grammar school field, organised by the Bungay Youth Association and Bungay Rotary Club, while the production of Steel Magnolias, by the Black Ram Theatre Company, continues its run at the Fisher Theatre at 2.30pm and 7.30pm.

On Sunday the Bungay group of the Suffolk Wildlife Trust is leading a tour of Bungay's street flora, starting at 2.15pm at St Mary's Church, the Harleston and Waveney Art Trail continues with the chance to visit artists' studios at Bungay, Ditchingham and Flixton, and the camera club exhibition and steel Magnolias also continue.

On Tuesday the first of three sessions of the real ale trail starts at the Castle Inn at 7.30pm, and other first-week highlights include a demonstration of dowsing and looking for Bungay's ley lines at the Castle Meadow on Wednesday, the Oscar-winning film Slumdog Millionaire showing at the Fisher Theatre on Thursday and 1960s folk singing icon Julie Felix at the theatre on Friday.

The festival also includes a medieval fair at the King's Head, a concert by the Norwich Mozart Orchestra at St Mary's Church, the annual antiques street fair, together with the first Bungay busking competition, and an evening with Peter Sallis (of Last of the Summer Wine fame), as well as sporting and other cultural events. The festival art exhibition will run through the two weeks at 19, Trinity Street, from 10am-6pm daily.