A new festival will be celebrating north Norfolk's fascinating history, through talks, walks, hands-on fun, music, exhibitions, wildlife, performances and much more this month.

The first ever North Norfolk Stories Festival is happening at 18 venues across the district from Wednesday May 16-Saturday May 16.

It is for all ages and includes 20 free events in Cromer, Holt, Mundesley, North Walsham, Stalham, Sheringham, Neatishead, Wells and Langham.

The festival has been co-ordinated by Museums Norfolk and is part of the North Norfolk Stories project which is supported for two years with £75,800 from the Heritage Lottery Fund.

It is hoped the festival will become an annual event.

Stephanie Potts, Development Manager at Museums Norfolk, said: 'There is a brilliant range of free events for everyone to enjoy. It's a great chance for people to get out and about and experience some of our fantastic local museums, libraries and cultural sites in a different way and to see, do and learn something new.'

The events include:

?May 13

North Walsham Library - an illustrated talk about the life and music of musician Sam Larner by folk expert Brian Gaudet. 2-4pm. 01692402482.

?May 14

RAF Air Defence Radar Museum in Neatishead - A talk by the Bat Conservation Trust on how bats navigate with their version of radar. 7-9pm. 01692 631485.

?May 15

North Norfolk Railway Holt station- An exhibition entitled Holidays of the Past which features a 1930s holiday cottage and the William Marriott Railway Museum at Holt. 7-9.30pm. 01263 820800.

Sheringham Little Theatre - A youth production called The Screaming Cockler which dramatises the story of Nancy - one of the Stiffkey cockle pickers. It is a chilling story with a strong relevance to today. 7-7.45pm. 01263 822347.

?May 16

Cromer Museum - A Mammoth Night Out includes live music from The Time Fiddlers, hands-on activities and an appearance from the mechanical model of the West Runton elephant. 6-9pm. 01263 513543.

Henry Blogg Museum - The Wailing Winds, Wild Waves and Wreaking Wrecks event is an evening of lantern-lit tale-telling. Lantern making stars from 6pm and tale-telling starts at 7.30pm. 6-9pm. 01263 511294.

?Festival leaflets are available across north Norfolk libraries, other participating venues and tourist information centres.

?For more information please visit www.northnorfolkstories.org, follow @museumsnorfolk on Twitter or email northnorfolkstories@gmail.com