In Pictures: Barbie bog snorkels and flaming vikings – the quirkiness of 2023

From booting a “bottle” in the land’s oldest sport to bog snorkelling while dressed as Barbie – complete with box – and from swimming in mud dressed as the titular character from Where’s Wally? to setting fire to a viking boat for a flaming good Norse festival, it is safe to say 2023 has not just been a year of Rwanda rows and cost-of-living fears.

Whitby in Yorkshire hosted the Krampus Run, which celebrates the creepy Alpine creature said to scare naughty children, while women took part in the Lerwick squads at the Up Helly Aa fire festival in Shetland for the first time.

Two Leicestershire villages competed in the Hallaton Bottle Kick contest, thought to be Britain’s longest-running sporting event, while in Scotland, St Andrews University students kept it clean for the traditional Raisin Monday foam fight.

Here are some of the quirkiest and most upbeat scenes from up and down the UK in 2023, captured through the lenses of PA news agency photographers.

A woman dressed as Barbie, the doll from one of the year’s biggest films, takes part in the Rude Health World Bog Snorkelling Championships at Waen Rhydd peat bog in Llanwrtyd Wells, Wales, in August (PA)PA Wire/PA Images - Ben Birchall

Students take part in the traditional Raisin Monday foam fight on St Salvator’s Lower College Lawn at the University of St Andrews in Fife in October (PA)PA Wire/PA Images - Lesley Martin

A woman and man, dressed as Wally from the Where’s Wally? books, take part in the annual Maldon Mud Race, a charity event to race across the bed of the River Blackwater in Essex, in May (PA)PA Archive/PA Images - Joe Giddens

Two well-dressed individuals vying for the golden frying pan trophy at the yearly Leadenhall Market pancake race in London in February (PA)PA Archive/PA Images - David Parry

Players challenge for the ball during the annual traditional River Windrush football match, which has been taking place for more than 100 years, in the Cotswolds village of Bourton-in-the-Water, Gloucestershire, in August (PA)PA Wire/PA Images - Ben Birchall

A creepy costumed figure during the Whitby Krampus Run in Whitby, Yorkshire, which celebrates the Krampus, a horned creature which accompanies Saint Nicholas on his rounds in December (PA)PA Wire/PA Images - Danny Lawson

Krampus is said to terrify naughty children during the festive season (PA)PA Wire/PA Images - Danny Lawson

Young racers in flat caps compete in the Settrington Cup – dubbed the ‘world’s cutest race’ – at the Goodwood Motor Circuit in West Sussex in September (PA)PA Wire/PA Images - Kieran Cleeves

Men take part in the 823rd Atherstone Ball Game in Warwickshire in February. The game honours a match played between Leicestershire and Warwickshire in 1199, when teams used a bag of gold as a ball (PA)PA Archive/PA Images - Joe Giddens

The torch procession in Lerwick on the Shetland Isles during the Up Helly Aa fire festival in January (PA)PA Archive/PA Images - Jane Barlow

Women took part in the festival, which dates back to the 1880s and celebrates Shetland’s Norse heritage, for the first time in 2023. Here, youngsters take part in the Junior Up Helly Aa (PA)PA Archive/PA Images - Jane Barlow

Players from the villages of Hallaton and Medbourne battle for the ‘bottle’, an old field barrel holding about a gallon of beer, during the annual game of bottle-kicking in Leicestershire in April (PA)PA Archive/PA Images - Joe Giddens

The Pentacle Drummers perform in front of a burning wicker man during the Beltain Celtic Fire Festival at Butser Ancient Farm, in Waterlooville, Hampshire, in April (PA)PA Archive/PA Images - Andrew Matthews

Some 995 people take part in a world record bid – the most people throwing wellies – at the National Ploughing Championships in Co Laois in September (PA)PA Wire/PA Images - Niall Carson

Competitors take part in the annual Maldon Mud Race in May (PA)PA Archive/PA Images - Joe Giddens