Great atmosphere as over 18,000 attend Lucan Festival
By Hayden Moore
NOW in its 11th year, Lucan Festival continues to go from strength to strength with more than 18,000 people attending the festivities across the weekend.
With a whole host of talks, interactive events, tours, entertainers and stalls set up across the weekend, thousands descended on the streets of Lucan Village.
Sarah, Paula, Aoife and Sophie making marshmallow skewers
As one of the event organisers, Joseph Reid, explained, the weekend was a massive success that brought about a great sense of community.
“It absolutely went amazingly, there was a great reception,” he told The Echo.
“There was a big crowd at it, it brought a lot of people back into the community and created a great atmosphere across the weekend.
“Once the festival finished, it was cleaned up in record time as well, our volunteers truly did a great job across the weekend.
“We had a meeting with some of the businesses that took part the other day and the feedback we’ve been getting has been very positive.
One of the many acts at Lucan fest
“One of the statements used actually was that the fireworks were better than the Bray fireworks show, which is just brilliant.”
An event that attracted way more attention than the organisers had anticipated was the fireworks show on the weir on the Friday night, with 6,000 people attending to see the arrival of a 40-foot-long Viking longship down the River Liffey.
Packed with 20 Vikings, the ship is one of five working boats that is used on the History Channel hit show ‘Vikings’.
James and Aisling from The Echo enjoying the atmosphere
“The Vikings got a great reception. As the fireworks were going off, 20 of us were sitting in the boat down the weir waiting for the drummers,” explained Joseph.
“Then a little girl by the name Rivan, blew a horn which signalled us to come down to where the crowds were, it was dead quiet.
“We smoked out the river and then lit our torches.
The Walkeleles
“It was a spectacle and people seemed to really like it.”
Keeping with the Viking theme, a historic walk and Viking village were also hosted at the Italian Ambassador’s residence.
Mr Reid also went on to explain how there was so much interest that they had to turn down a number of stalls because of a lack of space and how two performances on the main stage stole the weekend.
“The Walkelele’s were absolutely amazing, they closed out the festival on Sunday – them and the Lucan Gospel Choir stole the whole weekend with their performances,” he said.
“We will most definitely be back next year; we’ll come back together in January and talk about what we’re going to do.”
See pages 63 & 64 of this week’s Echo for more pictures
TAGS Lucan
