And we are now on part two of our amazing tour of the whole country from the west to the east and the north to the south this time we are in the picturesque town of Clifden which is smack dab in the center of to Connemara. Clifden itself is a gorgeous spot with a magnificent sculpture of a giant cheese grater in the middle of the town. The plaque on this sculpture says something about it being a monument of light but we can see the truth a cheese grater by any other name would still be as grate. Terrible puns aside the town is a really nice looking and well kept town.
I will let you in on a little secret here and that is that we really like this festival and that is not only because of the location its a combination of factors really; the town,the people, the festival itself the organisers and the vibe generally even the cheese grater this is all despite having had some of the worst luck we have had in the past few years in terms of weather affected parades and outrageous self inflicted hangovers ever. In fact two years ago the weather was so bad that during the parade i fully expected to see Noah floating up the street in his ark making a special appearance at the parade such was the rainy rain that rained.
So anyway we arrived late at night having driven across the country from ranelagh (see previous entry) and landed in Clifden in the wee small hours. The hours though were not wee enough and small enough to stop us from getting a pint, indeed we had to go to a local pub in order to pick up the keys for the guesthouse in which we were staying Andrew Storng was playing some blues in the packed pub and we stayed for a while to hear him play the blues and also to witness one of the most bizzare displays of dancing that it has every been my dubious pleasure to see, Dont ask me what the guy was doing but man he was throwing some unusual shapes dodecahedrons and such like. We were staying in the guesthouse of the local fire officer and part time organiser of the festival who runs a b and b in the town. Also on duty during the weekend were Fidget Feet and the mighty Jim Webster but more of them anon.
We retired relatively early in order to be up early the next day for our show in the local secondary school. Before we get on to the show i have to give an honourable mention to the Off the Square resturant in central Clifden which served up an absoloutley superb breakfast as you know we are always on the lookout for the ultimate veggie breakfast which can be problematic in the land of the jumbo breakfast roll but this place served up an albsolute stormer. Some places kind of look at you funny when you ask for a veggie breakfast while others just smother the plate with beans in order to cover up the fact that their imagination cant stretch to thinking up a breakfast without a plate full of bacon and sausages but in the off the square they had it nailed good coffee too a real treat up there perhaps with the breakfast served in Ard Bia served in Galway city. I was so impressed that i even took a photo of the plate. The service was also good and the reasonable price meant that all in all you left with a smile on your face and a full belly.
We really enjoyed this show even though we had been adjudged a bit too risque for the younger students this year due to my turning up the raunchiness to 11 last year and indeed we were even asked to tone it down. This we did and pulled out a really nice show which went down a storm.




We also got to meet up with our good mate Jim Webster of the Belfast Circus Community who was at the school with the amazing Nick Mc@~££%@k ( who shall henceforth just be known as Nick) the lads were there to do a series of workshops and the lads were amazed cos a couple of the kids in the school had just gotten up on the unicycles and just ridden them straight away which does not happen very often.
We finished up the show and loaded the stuff in to the van and having the rest of the day at our mercy we proceeded to head off out into the countryside in order to explore and also perhaps to find a spot where we could kick a football around. The landscape around clifden is amazing so amazing that i could not do justice to it in words so you will just have to go there and see it for yourself. Its that typical wild Irish rugged coastline that we are so blessed with in this country looks great but has the potential to be torn apart by the wind and the rain during the winter. So we ended up kicking the football about on the beach at Roundstone which gave Ronaldo the chance to wax sceintific about how the sand at the beach in Roundstone is special cos it is made up of the skeletons of some kind of small crustacean or something like that. I ended up popping in for a swim off the beach in Roundstone anyway which did the trick for me.
So anyway back to Clifden itself where we were treated to dinner in the local hotel where all the performers were provided with complimentary meals in the Alcock and Brown hotel which is expertly run by a lovely lady whose name unfortunatley escapes me for now. The hotel is so named because of the long association between the town of Clifden and those noted aviators Alcock and Brown who in the early days of flight performed what would be described as an emergency landing on the bog just outside of Clifden. Seems like a smashing hotel where all the great and the good who are at the festival seem to hang out and a place that seems from the posters on display at least to have had a long association with the festival.
Before retiring for the evening we enquired from Jim as to when he would like to perform his show on the morrow and he infromed us that he and Nick would like to go on first so we agreed to his request and were not surprised when we awoke the next morning to find jim already stationed in the square a full three hours before anyone was due to pull a show. We had a leisurley breakfast and pulled the van up in order to unload the stuff and were able to check out Jim and nicks show which was enjoyed by all and sundry. We were really lucky with the weather as the sun shone unlike in other years. The fidget feet crew were stationed on the roof of the Alcock and Brown hotel setting up their stuff for later and they must have had the best view of the goings on in the town. We ourselves were really happy with the way that the show went with the giant cheese grater as a backdrop and an appreciative audience in the foreground. To say that we rocked it would be about right and we walked away from the venue satisfied with our performance.
That evening we had to have an early dinner in the Alcock and Brown hotel in order to get ready to perform in the parade that was due to start at about 8. I spent a bit of time switching from one unicycle to the other before eventually settling for the 3 foot uni due to the many potholes and uneven ground in the parade. The parade does a full circut of the town which has a kind of a strange almost triangular shape to it and ended up back where it started. This was followed by a display from the Fidget Feet crew which was nearly scuppered at an early stage by the non availability of a crane. Opinion was divided on the performance by the Fidget Feet between myself and Ronaldo with Roanldo being very impressed but with myself being slightly underwhelmed by the whole thing which involved a group of people swinging upside down while suspended from a crane which caused them to glide gently over the heads of teh audience with the whole thing set to music. In fairness my descriptiojn does not really do the spectacle justice and thinking back in hindsight i am more less underwhelmed if that make sense. In fairness it is not something that you are going to see every day and particularly so in a small town in the west of Ireland.
Following the parade it was off to the hotel once again for more merry making in the company of Jim Nick and Pippa from the Galway circus project. There was also some fantastic jazz on hand just in case you got bored.





When you take it all together an absolute gem of a festival more like a holiday for us with a little bit of work thrown in for good meausre and a great testament to the organisers and all who sail in her. Its the little touches really that make it special and unique the programme is really diverse and interesting they make sure that a lot of the events get out to the schools so all the kids get exposed to the art which can range from art exhibitions to our insane selves to fun filled poetry readings and recitals and concerts. When you add that to the fact that the information center for the whole festival is a small caravan which for the duration is parked up in the square and dispenses info and tickets and programmes and all you will ever need and which can be seen in the photos provided. This festival also sports the coolest posters that you will ever see for a festival which are apparently produced alternately year on year by two local artists. I dont know which one had a go this year but i was so impressed that i had to take a photos of it.
And so it was with sadness in our hearts and a pang in our bellies for the hearty tucker in "the off the square" that we set our sights north for the next leg of our journey which took us out the sky road and past Killary which is i am told irelands only fijord and onwards to Donegal for our next engagement. Just one other thing that stood out for me is the current prolifereation of people with laptops accessing the interweb across the nation all over the place and lo is the town that can not provide the precious nectar that is interweb speed and availibility they are everywhere. Just an observation.
Anyway part three soon.