Baltimore Heritage Festival (9th - 11th April)

The weekend after Easter Baltimore celebrates its cultural history and skills with the 3rd annual Heritage Festival. The Festival features based on Baltimore’s local talent, together with its wonderful blend of people, seascape, maritime activity and enterprise.

The weekend kicks off on Friday evening at 8 p.m. in the Glebe Café. Join our local shanakees, Mrs. Walsh and Mr. Neily Bohane, around the fireplace with tales from our past while enjoying a drink and fingerfood, followed by music, song and dance.
There will be leisure activities, history, drama, music and old trades, crafts, vintage vehicles and old-time kitchen and cooking utensils. The presentations & talks are as follows:

• Saturday 11 a.m. in the Glebe Café – Tim Rowe on “Bees & Beekeeping under Threat”

• Saturday 3 p.m. in Dún na Séad Castle (entrance fee €3 pp) – Gary McMahon on the “Restoration of the Ilen”

• Sunday 3 p.m. in Dún na Séad Castle (entrance fee €3 pp) – Bernadette McCarthy on “The History and Restoration of the Castle”

• Sunday 11 a.m. in The Glebe Café - Darina Allen on “Forgotten Skills of Cooking” and book-signing afterwards

For children there will be a chance to see some small animals including goats, donkeys, chickens, sheep, rabbits, turtles, fish and a horse & trap, near the Sailing Club on Saturday between 2 and 4 pm. Inside the Club there will be a book exchange, face painting and crafts for kids.

Activities by local enterprises include kayaking with Atlantic Sea Kayaking; scenic rib rides in the harbour and to nearby islands with Baltimore Sea Safari; River Ilen Cruise or Ten Island Tour with the Sherkin Island Ferry company; marine wildlife tours with Whale Watch West Cork; sailing on a 50’ yacht to the Skeams or Horse Island with Baltimore Yacht Charters. Due to popular demand, these all need to be prebooked and are of course weather dependant. You can also avail of the special swim concession in the Baltimore Community Leisure Centre or play lawn croquet at Inish Beg.

It might sound odd to be asked to pay to attend a wake, but the wake on Saturday evening is one with a difference. The Skibbereen Theatrical Society will perform “A Wake in the West”, a black comedy by Mayo man Michael Joe Ginnelly. Set in a small West of Ireland fishing village, it’s a wonderful play about a professor and a student who meet after 16 years, when the student discovers that his much loved tutor is suffering from a terminal illness. The performance commences at 8.30 p.m. on Saturday evening in the Fr. Cashman Community Centre (fee €10 pp and tickets for sale in Casey’s Hotel Baltimore and Thornhill Skibbereen).

On Sunday afternoon there’s the “Now and Then” traditional trade and craft exhibition in the Sailing Club. Displays include lobsterpot and basket weaving, bronze / copper craft (which in the Bronze Age brought traders from the Mediterranean hereabouts, who fetched local copper to be combined with Cornish tin for bronze), jewellery and stained glass-making, wool spinning, crochet and knitting, portrait art, butter, soda breads, local honey and jams, chutneys, wine and Irish carrigeen moss dessert (free entry). Outside the Sailing Club will be a display of vintage cars, bicycles and agricultural transport.
Those wanting to stretch their legs may join the Baltimore Tidy Town group for their walk and unveiling of the Heritage Trail together with the launch of an accompanying brochure. New plaques give details of historical buildings and structures. It will be viewed with a local guide during an easy stroll through the village, starting Sunday 2 p.m. at Casey’s.

Over the weekend, local bars and restaurants will have live music and include traditional Irish choices on their menu. All proceeds during the festival are for the Baltimore Community Playgroup.
Further details available on www.baltimore.ie

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Rianne Smith o.b.o. Explore Baltimore (Marketing Cooperative)
Aquaventures, The Stone House B&B, Baltimore, Co Cork 028-20511 / 087-79614546
Email: rianne@aquaventures.ie

ENDS