Bulmers, Horse Blankets, Paper Binoculars and more...

Well... I wish I might be able to do my best to explain this weekend to all of you! I am not sure I can, but will certainly try!

ATTENTION to my friends in Ireland... have a few minutes to come to Galway on Tuesday the 29th? I would love to see you. It will be my last night here. I will contact you via text with more info. Smiles!

First, I won the World Fleadh photography competition... kinda cool as it was judged by the photographer from Irish music magazine... definately fun and an extra €50 for me! yessss...

Friday was when it all started. They set up something called the Atlantic stage... man... all of you festival goers would have been seriously impressed. Friday the music started early as we were in the pubs at the session trail. There was a pub called Feale's that turned out to be one of our favorites for music. Apart from my brief interruption to go to the theater and check out the gig, we were in there until 3am or so and then made our way to the hotel again (The hotel opened the 5th floor to musicians, festival workers and anyone else who could sneak in... which we managed to always do!)... AND... Beoga was playing (this is Aemon's band... remember? I met him on Inisheer at the beginning of the summer?)... so, It was very cool to see him play and the session afterwards... uh... it was amazing. The session that night was one of the best. I will tell ya what I did for the following 2 days...


SATURDAY

7am session ends in the hotel
breakfast in the hotel
slept until 11 or so
1:30 Seamus Begley & Jim Murray
2:15 Frankie Gavin Band
3:15 Alison Brown Quartet
4:15 Michael McGouldrick Band
5:00 La Bottine Souriante (BY FAR THE BEST LIVE MUSIC I HAVE EVER SEEN!!!!!!!!!!)
by the way... please go here and check out their webiste... you can see some video footage right on the first page. The woman is a dancer, but is what they call a percussion dancer. Her feet make the music. It's wild. They would blow your minds. AND LISTEN... they are in Chicago on September 16th at the Celtic Festival... I am SERIOUSLY thinking of going... they are amazing!
La Bottine Souriante

6:30 Lúnasa
9:00 Solas
10:15 Sharon Shannon Band with Dessie O'Halloran and guests!
12:00 Kila
1am Flook in the hotel
followed by session all night... all the guys from La Bottine Souriante, Sharon Shannon and much much more!

SUNDAY

9:30 Session ends in the hotel
9:45 breakfast at the hotel (yes, you are noticing... Jess and I never went to bed)
10:30 Small band competition (we picked up a fun guy named Luke!!!)
12:30 fun on the slides, Jess, myself and Luke
1:30 John Spillane
4:00 The Waterboys
5:00 had fun getting my $ for the photo contest
5:45 Gipsy Kings
6:00 La Bottine Souriante (AGAIN!!!!)
8:00 we all met in the parking lot for SuperValue (grocery store) and watched Damien's band (they won the group contest) perform. When the rain was about to come, Elaine went and got the pop-up tent and popped it in the parking lot. It was hysterical. Everyone in the band loved it and laughed so hard. We fit 9 people in the tent!
10pm Cora and Breda Smyth & Carlos Nunez for the closing ceremonies and fireworks
Session in the hotel, but I actually went to bed around 3... too much!

Monday was good, but we were all pretty wrecked by then. We hung out on the beach (myself, Jess, Tommy, Siobhan, Pete, Paul, Rob) and just had a great time. Elaine and I made it back to Galway last night around 11pm and just crashed. So... I am trying to decide what to do. Elaine is headed up to the Fleadh in Letterkenny tomorrow morning, but I think I might want to get up to Donegal and explore a bit before making it to Letterkenny. This next weekend (Thursday on) will be the most amazing as all the people I have been hanging out with at Festivals will all be there in one place. What a way to exit the country, ya know?

So, enjoy the pictures. I wish you could have experienced this music people! It was just unbelieveable.

For those of you at home, I return the night of August 30th... I assume Verizon has messed up my phone (as they usually do), but I will try to have it on the next day.
I know you will all understand that I will need some hibernation time.
I miss you though!

Smiles!

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