Man smashes melon record

Darryl O’Leary, president of the Chinchilla Water Melon Festival, said: “We came up with this idea to have a melon festival back in about 1994, and it is growing and just keeps on getting better and better every year.

 

He said: “This year there is probably six to seven thousand people here, we are eating probably fifteen to twenty tonnes of the watermelon we used here today.”

 

John Allwood on his way to a new world record [Reuters]

Every two years, the town pays tribute to the melon harvest with the Chinchilla Melon Festival where people not only eat the melons but use them for a number of other activities.

 

Festival-goers were also given the chance to take part in events such as “melon bungy” and “melon bullseye” as well as melon-skiing, where participants strap melons to their feet and are pulled along with a rope.

 

Growers also take part in the traditional Big Melon Weigh-In – trying to beat the current record of 83 kilograms for the heaviest melon.