Four thousand people flocked to a medieval fair in St Ives country park, Bingley, yesterday.

Knights held a jousting tournament, archers aimed for the bullseye and a musician played on a hurdy gurdy.

The free fair was the first of its kind at the park in Harden Lane. But Andrew Wood, project and events officer at Bradford Council, said it was partly a victim of its own success.

"There were more people than we expected and there were traffic problems," he said. "The car park could have held twice as many cars as it did but people were getting stuck."

Cars were nose to tail on the narrow road to the entrance. Some overheated in the queues and had to call out recovery vehicles.The fair included a chain saw sculpture display, a children's tug-of-war and trips around the showfield in a cart pulled by Henry, a Shire horse from Bradford Industrial Museum in Eccleshill.

Jenny Windsor, a horse keeper at the museum who was dressed as Maid Marian, said: "It has been a brilliant day. Some of the children were a bit scared of the horses at first but most of them were excited to have a trip round."

John Smith, president of Bingley Airedale Rotary Club, played a friendly Sheriff of Nottingham by cooking burgers on a barbecue for hungry visitors. Money raised by the club will be donated to the Yorkshire Cancer Campaign.