Discover Athlone - Sunday 5th October

Discover Athlone - Sunday 5th October
















Discover what's on your doorstep. Come along and enjoy an afternoon of FREE activities with fun for all the family.

Where? Athlone Town

When? Sunday 5th October

Time: 12 noon - 6pm

What? Arts Display, Craft Trails, Theatre, Athlone Castle Visits, Water Activities, Music, Angling Displays, Walking Tours, Face Painting....

...and lots, lots more!


Download Discover Athlone Brochure
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Tours

Athlone Castle (Self Guided)
Time:12noon to 4pm
Learn the history of your town through audio visual presentation..

Walking Tour
Time: 4pm
Walking Tour of Athlone with local historian Donal O'Brien, Dept entrance of Athlone Castle, 4pm

Craft Trail (to Clommacnoise & Ballinahown)
Time: Bus departs 12noon & 3pm
Free Bus Dept Athlone Castle: Enjoy the magic & solitude of Clonmacnoise & visit the newly established craft village of Ballinahown. Includes Tea & Coffee (limited seating, first come first serve).

Theatre & Art

Art Display
Time: 12noon to 3pm
A street display & sale in Athlone Castle of Arts and Crafts by local artists

Passion Fruit Theatre
Time: 1.30pm to 2pm & 5pm 6pm
1.30 - 2pm - "Sea" by Joe Ducke, 1 act play.
5 - 6pm: Showcase of local singers, song writers & musicians performing for an exclusive hour long show

Dean Crowe Theatre
Time: 2pm to 2.30pm & 3pm to 3.30pm
2 - 2.30pm: Centre Stage theatrical performance by a group of 17 - 19 year olds (tbc).
3 - 3.30pm: Atitude Dance Company

Athlone Little Theatre
Time: 3pm to 4.30pm
Presentation of three one act comedies, Plaze Suite, A Marriage Proposal & The Bear

Water Activities

Time: 2.30pm to 3.30pm

Viking Tours
Free boat trip, dept the Strand.

River Run:
Free Boat Trip. Dept: The Quay (beside Athlone Castle)

Barracuda Boat Trips:
Free Boat Trip, Dept The Quay (beside Athlone Castle)

Water Activities Display

Irish Boat Rental Association
Time 3.30pm 5pm
Hop aboard an Inland Cabin Cruiser for a tour and a chance to win a holiday.

Hodson Bay Watersports & Training Centre
Time: 2.30pm to 3pm
Activities on day Kayaking & Sailing (1/2 hour duration)

Angling Display
Time: 3.30pm to 5pm
Shannon Regional Fisheries Board Angling display (Abbey Graveyard).

Music & Entertainment

Tonnta Street Theatre & Community Arts Group
Time All Day
Street Theatre throughout the day

Army Band (TBC)

Athlone Town Centre and Sheraton Combined
Time: 4pm to 4.30pm
Enter into Athlone Town Centre, where entertainment and special promotions on the day await the visitors. Following a show around of the centre, they make for Sirana Spa via Harvest Caf (where a flavour of Harvest will be on provided on route). Orla Gallagher, our Spa expert and Manager, will take the visitor through Irelands newest and Lakelands only Urban Spa, designed in conjunction with Irelands famous potter, Stephen Pearce. Sirana can be blocked off for the window in question, allowing visitors to take advantage of an exclusive offer on the day as well as the opportunity to ask for Orlas advise on any therapy or lifestyle questions as they walk the customer journey.

Radisson SAS Hotel Athlone
Time:2pm to 4pm
Expereince the spectular views of all the hussle bustle happening on the River Shannon with Panoramic views from the terrace at the Radisson SAS Hotel Athlone. Relax, unwind and view all the events happening in Athlone on the 5th of October with live music entertainment at the Quayside Bar

Shamrock Lodge Country House Hotel
Time 4pm to 4.30pm
Jazz Session with Frankie McDonald in the Iona Bar.

Childrens Art Competition
Time 12noon
Presentation of prizes in Golden Island Shopping Centre

Olann Tir Artisan Knit

Olann

Tir

Artisan Knit

Designed and made in Ireland

Product Handfinished

100 % Pure Irish Wool

Genuine Donegal Yarns

100% Pure Irish Wool

Olann Tir

Artisan Knit

Kilcar is a small village in Donegal on the rugged north west coastline of Ireland. Both the name of the village the name of its woollen spinning mill. “Cill Chartha”. Kilcara is a village of just 450 people.

Olann Tir (wooland) is a Naturally and Artisan product made with Pure and genuine Kilcar Wool.

Olann Tir
Artisan Knit

Designed and made in Ireland

Product Handfinished

100 % Pure Irish Wool
Genuine Donegal Yarns

The Aran (or Arran) jumper/sweater takes its name from the Aran Islands, was popular in the fishing villages on and islands off the West Coast of Ireland, or from the Isle of Arran off the west coast of Scotland. They are distinguished by their use of complex textured stitch patterns, several of which are combined in the creation of a single garment. The word choice of 'jumper' or 'sweater' (or indeed other options such as 'pullover' and 'jersey')is largely determined by the regional version of English being spoken. In the case of Ireland and Britain 'jumper' is the standard word with 'sweater' mainly found in tourist shops. To be even more respectful/aware of the local culture the word used in Irish Gaelic is 'geansaí' and in Scottish Gaelic 'geansaidh' (both pronounced "gahnzee").

Originally the jumpers were knitted using unscoured wool that retained its natural oils or lanolin which made the garments water-resistant and meant they remained wearable even when wet. It was primarily the wives of Island fishermen who knitted the jumpers.

"Aran jumper". Also many megaliths around Europe depict similar patterns as those used in the knitting, which are carved into the stone, and date back several thousand years. However it is more likely that the knitting stitches were modeled on these than that they evolved contemporaneously.

Most historians agree that far from being an ancient craft, aran knitting was invented as recently as the early 1900's by a small group of enterprising island women, with the intention of creating garments not just for their families to wear but which could be sold as a source of income.

The first Aran knitting patterns were published in the 1940s by Patons of England after being supplied by Ó Máille's shop in Galway. Ó Máille's was also responsible for most of the costuming used the filming of The Quiet Man in 1951. Vogue magazine carried articles on the garment in the 1950s, and jumper exports from the west of Ireland to the United States began in the early 1950s.

The development of the export trade during the 1950's and 1960's took place after P.A. Ó Síocháin organised an instructor, with the help of an IDA Ireland grant, to go to the islands and teach the knitters how to make garments to standard international sizings. Knitting became an important part of the island's economy and during the 1960's, even with all available knitters recruited from the three islands he had difficulty in fulfilling orders from around the world.

Aran jumpers are sometimes sold as a "fisherman sweater", indicating that the jumper was traditionally used by the islands' famous fishermen. It is said that each fisherman (or their family) had a jumper with a unique design, so that if he drowned and was found maybe weeks later on the beach, his body could be identified. There is no record of any such event ever taking place.

This misconception may have originated with J.M. Synge's 1904 play 'Riders to the Sea', in which the body of a dead fisherman is identified by the hand-knitted stitches on one of his garments. However, even in the play there is no reference to any decorative or Aran type pattern. The garment referred to is a plain stocking and it is identified by the number of stitches, the quote being "it's the second one of the third pair I knitted, and I put up three score stitches, and I dropped four of them".

There is also some doubt about whether Aran jumpers were ever widely used by fishermen and many argue that the original jumpers with their untreated yarn would not have been suitable for this use. They were quite thick and stiff, which would probably restrict the movements of a fisherman. On the other hand these garments were the only form of hardy clothing they had to weather the Atlantic Ocean storms in. Islanders can be seen wearing them in photographs taken early in the last century.

Arising from the myth above is a widely believed misconception that Aran patterns have clan associations, somewhat like Scottish tartan. Although sometimes used as a marketing device, there is no evidence for any such association even among families who lived on the Islands. Only a relatively small number of family names are or were ever found on the Aran Islands and the majority of Irish families have no history of either wearing or knitting jumpers of any particular pattern.

While in the past the majority of jumpers and other Aran garments were knit by hand, today the majority of items on sale in Ireland and elsewhere are either machine knit or produced on a hand loom. There are very few people still knitting jumpers by hand on a commercial basis.

Machine knit jumpers tend to use finer wool and have less complex patterns, since many of the traditional stitches cannot be reproduced this way. They are the least expensive option. Hand looming allows more complicated stitches to be used, will have more stitches to the inch and be thicker. The best quality hand loomed sweaters are almost indistinguishable from hand knit. Hand knit jumpers tend to be more tightly knit, to have more complex stitch patterns and to be longer lasting and they attract a significant price premium. By holding them up to light the difference between the machine knit and hand kits is self-evident.

Wikipedia contributors (2006). Aran Jumper. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved August 23, 2006 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aran_sweater