Kansas Wesleyan choir
This choir will perform in St Peter’s Church, Bandon at 8pm on Saturday, 15th May. Admission euro 10, children euro 5. All proceeds to the restoration of the organ at St Peters Church.
The choir is comprised of 70 students from Kansas Wesleyan University and is directed by Ken Hakoda. There will be a guest soloist. This event is not to be missed!!!
The exceptional amount of rain has turned the Bandon river into a full scale torrent flooding parts of South Main Street causing businesses to close.
Flooding in South Main Street in Bandon
The Bandon River in full flow
Bridge Street, Bandon under water
Bandon Playground under water
Each year the Innishannon Steam and Vintage Rally raises substantial funds for the Irish Cancer Society, a really worthy cause (in 2008 euro 125,000 was raised). The rally is now in its 12th successful year and takes place over the bank holiday weekend on Sunday, 31st May, 2009 and Monday, 1st June. If you are anywhere nearby, be sure to visit as it is a great day out.
Steam Engine
One of the steam engines which will feature in the rally is kept close to Kilbrogan House. Its owners had it out on the streets last weekend and its in tip top working order so well done to the Lordans!!
This post is by Catherine FitzMaurice of Kilbrogan House Guest Accommodation
Check out the photo of this salmon which was caught yesterday (13th May, 2009) near the footbridge across the river in Bandon. The opening of the fishing season on the Bandon River was delayed but is now up and running.
A hefty Bandon salmon
This post was made by Catherine FitzMaurice of Kilbrogan House Guest Accommodation
We were unlucky to choose two very wet days for our annual Bandon spring clean which ties in with the National Spring Clean, namely Friday, 25th April, 2009 and Saturday, 26th April. Nevertheless, a big thank you to the Lauragh National School children who braved the bad weather to clean up the town park. We wish them well in their pursuit of a green flag for the school. We would also like to thank Sinn Fein who cleaned along the river bank, the brownies and guides who cleaned the shambles, the playground and around the park and to local residents and Bandon Tidy Towns who cleaned up around their areas, Gaggin, Thornfields and Castle Road out to the golf club etc.
Pay by weight is a system that doesn’t work. Fly tipping all over the place is rampant and there aren’t enough CCTV cameras to catch people. Black bags carefully tied are dumped everywhere. Rats nibble through the plastic and the contents fly all over the countryside. Have we no pride? Do we seriously think that these black bags will just magically disappear? Bring back compulsory bin charges for everyone! I hate paying taxes like everybody else but I hate it even more when I end up paying whilst plenty duck them.
We had a miserable job getting the secondary schools to participate in the spring clean. Any suggestions??? Dropping litter, gum etc isn’t cool – It’s dumb. How do we convey this message to kids? We need the secondary schools help with this!!!!
If the town could have convinced business and construction employees who work in the centre of Bandon to park on the outskirts of the town, the introduction of pay parking might have been avoided. I am not a fan of pay parking and certainly many tourists who visit Kilbrogan House tell me that they are put off by the pay parking in Kinsale. At times it is very difficult to get a parking spot in Bandon. Even entering the bank car parks is a challenge as the endless 4x4s seem to take up more than one space. I turn into the bank car parks and then have to try to turn around in a confined space to find parking on the street.
The businesses on the main street may suffer but time will tell. Pedestrianisation of the main street is urgently needed. Look at the places where this has been introduced and how successful it has become. Pedestrianisation attracts shoppers. Just think of Galway, Grafton Street in Dublin and McCurtain Street in Cork. Somehow the shop keepers have to be convinced that this is the way forward.
Guests tell me that they love shopping in Bandon. We have a wide variety of useful shops rather than endless craft shops which populate the tourist towns in the country. Visitors from England are pleasantly surprised at how so many individual enterprises have continued to exist on the Bandon high street as their towns are full of chain stores – Starbucks, WH Smith, endless mobile phone enterprises, Boots etc etc. Sometimes the only difference between towns in the UK is the architecture. Lets not kill off the town centre. Lets seriously consider pedestrianisation!!
An interesting article appeared in the papers this week about Starbucks. The share price has halved in the past year and the brand which has suffered from soaring commodity prices and the American downturn has been stumbling.
One young chap in New York commented that it’s too pricey, the coffee isn’t as good as it used to be and lastly it has become New York’s public rest rooms. Another chap pointed out that the only difference between a grande (medium) and a venti (large) coffee is the extra milk but no extra coffee.
I am a staunch advocate of the local cafe outlets so would not be overjoyed to see a Starbucks in Bandon. In this country we have come a long way from the watery instant coffee that used to be on offer to cafes that offer top class produce. Try The Early Bird, Urru and Seats in Bandon. You will certainly not be disappointed. Each of these cafes has a unique atmosphere and layout and each one offers great coffee. We don’t realize how lucky we are. We could have a high street full of chains all offering the same standard ‘school uniform like’ fair.
Many of our English guests here at Kilbrogan House have commented on how great it is to shop in a town like Bandon where there are so many independent stores. Lets keep it that way! Who wants to sample the same thing everywhere we go.
There are three members of the West Cork Calling network that offer craft courses within a short drive of Bandon, namely Crackpots and Kinsale Pottery in Kinsale and Rossmore pottery in Clonakilty. Some of these courses might interested guests at Kilbrogan House Bed and Breakfast or Self Catering.
Kinsale Pottery runs a host of different classes for all ages including pottery, drawing and painting, glass fusing, bronze casting, jewellery making, sculpture, silk painting and mosaic making. The facility accommodates up to 20 people in one class or 40 as part of a group.
Crackpots is located in the heart of Kinsale and the pottery workshops are held on the premises. Their workshops concentrate on various pottery techniques and have recently included working with red terracotta clay using sawdust firing.
Jim Turner and Etain Hickey at Rossmore Pottery have been working away at their pottery for over 20 years and have a shop in the centre of Clonakilty. Their pottery courses take place in a farmhouse just 15 minutes from Clonakilty. They offer everything from Raku to Kiln building as well as master courses for more experienced potters.
Full marks go to the organizers of the Bandon St Patricks Day parade as it gets better and better every year. We did miss a pipe band and some Irish dancers so perhaps we could aim to include those next year. All the groups and individuals that paraded from the scouts to the farmers on their classic tractors and the classic cars were great as was the performance by the Fanzini Brothers before and after the parade itself.
Our American guests from Chicago loved the old tractors. They were expecting our river to be green like in Chicago but aside from that, they loved the small intimate feel of our parade compared with their massive parade. They had a great lunch afterwards at The Poachers Inn
Last week two of us visited Daniele Quatrana’s new Italian restaurant in Bandon called Italistro. Daniele is the owner and is from Italy though has lived here for over 30 years. He told us that nearly all the fixtures and fittings have come from Italy and it certainly has that feeling.
The surroundings really work. Daniele has chosen clean pastel colours and a very modern decor. The restaurant is also cleverly laid out so that there is ample room between the tables and there is a feeling of privacy yet a buzz around the place.
I chose a spicy hot pizza and had the choice of three different sizes with a thick or thin base all at different prices. What I really like about this menu is that you can have just a pasta or pizza or if you feel a bit more peckish, you can choose a steak or other meats, ie he has catered for everybody at all price brackets. Our bill was less than euro 30 per head for a pizza and a couple of glasses of white wine which I thought was very reasonable. Incidentally, the pizza was the best that I have eaten in a long time and so far all my guests from Kilbrogan House who have visited the restaurant have been favourably impressed. Daniele, we have been waiting for such a restaurant in Bandon for a long time so well done!!
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