Not since Caesarian Sunday has Jesus Green seen such boozy scenes.

The Cambridge Beer Festival is the relative calm after the storm, but excitement still reached tempestuous levels with a giant marquee full of hundreds of beers available to try.

“I just like to get in there first before anything runs out!”

Students taking a cheeky revision break were amongst the visitors on Monday for the first of six days of merriment, mixing with townies back from the office, and dedicated pint disciples from around the world.

Violet spoke to first-time attendee Harry Guest, who simply couldn’t deal ­– wouldn’t deal – with the variety of beers on offer. “The selection is huge, isn’t it! There’s hundreds!”

Organised by the Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA), the 44th annual event has grown from a gathering at the Cambridge Corn Exchange to a week-long park extravaganza, amassing more than 14,000 visitors last year.

Cambridge resident Dave Arrow Smith is a festival diehard. “I like real ale, so I come here every year, especially at 5pm on the first night,” he said. “I just like to get in there first before anything runs out!”

It’s not just attendees who enjoyed themselves, but people behind the bar were keen to praise the festival.

Leanne Road, working at the festival for her second time, told Violet: “It’s fantastic. Everyone here is ridiculously friendly. The customers are amazing! All the breweries we work alongside are amazing!”

“I’ve not had a bad day here ever.”

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A festival on this scale takes significant preparation and Will Smith, the fresh prince of branch chair, explained that the planning begins as soon as the previous edition has ended and includes multiple committees.

“Back in the ’70s there wasn’t such a thing as real ale or if there was, it was very rare to find,” Smith said. “Once we realised people quite liked drinking real ale, we decided to promote it even further.”