Ballyhaunis Blog

Here is what Ken Ring thinks the weather will be like in Ireland for summer 2011

June
Ken Ring says that the number of sunny days in June will be five or less - with the best days being the 14th-20th in most places.
Otherwise - quite a bit of rain in the first week and also after the 20th.

July
The forecast from Ken Ring for the first half of July is good - plenty of sun, hardly any rain days until the 24th , in fact only about 6 good rain days in the whole month and they should nearly all be in the last week. July should also be the warmest month.

August
The driest and sunniest part may be the last week, about 5 or 6 good rain days peppered through the month for each county.

September
Forecast from Ken is for lovely weather - dry and sunny, for the first two weeks, then rain about 18th-20th, pretty heavy in places and then dry but a bit cloudy for another 9 days, until more rain on the 29th, and this should be heavy .

The Summer holiday season will soon be here - and with the bad weather we are having it will be nice to get away to somewhere warm.
Knock Airport is so handy for people living in the West of Ireland - and there are plenty of package holiday deals departing from Knock.
You can book holidays with flights departing from Knock - going to Portugal , Canaries and Spain.

Sunworld do holidays in the Algarve, Portugal. You can stay at resorts such as Praia Da Rocha or Albufeira , Praia Da Oura , Praia Do Vau , Vilamoura , Lagos . Self Catering or B&B.
Flights with Sunworls normally departs Knock Airport on Thursdays at 16:30 returning from Faro Thursdays at 12:30

See all the availability at Sunworld

You can now fly from Knock Airport to Edinburgh in Scotland.
Check out the exact times and prices here at the FlyBe Website.

Flights from Ireland West Airport Knock to Edinburgh Airport will depart on Tuesdays and Thursdays with additional Friday and Monday flights during July and August.

Edinburgh is the second largest city in Scotland and the city attracts 1 million overseas visitors a year, making it the second most visited tourist destination in the United Kingdom, after London.

This SAturday and Sunday sees the annual Ballyhaunis Festival back again for 2011

Party In The Park
All new “Party in the Park” will take place at the Friary fields in Ballyhaunis, on Friday 3rd June. Come and see the amazing local bands who will showcase their talent on the night. You may already know of them but if not you will get to hear them for the first time, we will have Whiskey Dancers, Spitfyre, Nevernoodz, SevenEven and more.

The evening starts at 6pm, and there will be food so chill on the grass with a burger while you take in the great atmosphere of Ballyhaunis’ first Party in the Park. Everyone is welcome so bring friends, family or even make it a date.
For information call 094 9630311 or 086 3177123.

Family Fun Day
Saturday 4th June is the excellent free children’s day at the Friary Fields with the Family Fun Day. There will be free entertainment for the kids in the form of bouncy castles, bungee run, Velcro wall, street art, treasure hunt, face painting, giant Jenga and giant connect-4 and much more.

There will also be plenty of sports displays to watch and interact with including rugby, soccer, cricket and Camogie. There will be refreshments all day with a catering van and ice creams. The fun starts at around 1pm so bring the kids or just come for the craic because it’s promised to be a great day!

While you are at the Friary field why don’t you pop up to the Friary for the Ballyhaunis Artist Group Exhibition between 2pm and 5pm.
For information call 094 9630311 or 086 3177123.

Traditional Fair Day
On Sunday 5th June, Ballyhaunis will be alive with activity. The Summer festival peaks with the traditional craft fair day with stalls lining the streets, demonstrators, animals, face painting, vintage machinery and much more to see.

The kids can look forward to a puppet show in the grounds of the Courthouse at 1.30pm, 2.45pm, 3.20pm & 4pm. There will be a wonderful display from Mary Elwood’s School of Irish Dancing at 1pm, followed by music in the Square, and then the Tuam All-star Gymnastics Team will enthral the audience with their high-flying acrobatics at 2pm.

Then Ramblin Bob will play music in the Square at 3pm while the Vintage Cars drive through the town and park in the Church car park. There will also be the good old-fashioned duck race down by the river on Bridge Street at 3.30pm.

There will be much to see and do and there will be plenty of food throughout the town for all tastes, so come along for a great day out. We have a few more stalls available for anyone who is interested so call us quick to book your spot in town.
For information call 094 9630311 or 086 3177123.

Mobile Cinema Coming

June bank holiday weekend is the weekend of the Ballyhaunis Summer festival and this year we have organised a mobile cinema for Saturday 4th and Sunday 5th June. The cinema will be behind the Enterprise Centre and will cost €5 for one showing. The times are as follows: Saturday; 12.30pm, 5.30pm & 7.30pm. Sunday; 1pm, 5.30pm & 7.30pm. We will be showing up to date films for tots to teens.
For information call 094 9630311 or 086 3177123.

Final Day

The Ballyhaunis Summer Festival will wind down with a relaxed day. There will be a 9-hole Beginners Scramble at the Ballyhaunis Golf Club. The Ballyhaunis Gun Club is arranging the Inter Provincial County Shoot from 12pm-5pm and there will be an Open Day Fishing Competition down at Derrykins Lake at Greenwood organised by the angling club.
For information call 094 9630311 or 086 3177123.

Ireland West Airport - Knock is telling travellers that restrictions are continuing to cause severe disruptions to flights today as a result of the volcanic ash cloud which is continuing to drift over Northern Europe. These restrictions will cause severe disruption to flights to and from all Irish and UK Airports today.

The Irish Aviation Authority has announced that it is lifting restrictions, with immediate effect, on flights to and from the State airports at Cork and Shannon and some of the regional airports. However, restrictions will remain in force at Dublin airport until, at least, 11:00 today, Friday 16th of April. Restrictions also remain in force in large parts of Northern Europe.

National Air Traffic Service (NATS) advises that restrictions will remain in place in UK controlled airspace until 01:00 Saturday 17th April.

At this stage, Irleand West Airport Knock has confirmation that the following flights have been cancelled today, Friday 16th April, 2010:

* RE220 from Ireland West Airport Knock to Dublin with Aer Arann
* FR805 from London Stansted to Ireland West Airport Knock with Ryanair
* FR806 from Ireland West Airport Knock to London Stansted with Ryanair
* FR6673 from Liverpool to Ireland West Airport Knock with Ryanair
* FR6674 from Ireland West Airport Knock to Liverpool with Ryanair
* FR8142 from London Luton to Ireland West Airport Knock with Ryanair
* FR8143 from Ireland West Airport Knock to London Luton with Ryanair
* FR9151 from Alicante to Ireland West Airport Knock with Ryanair
* FR9152 from Ireland West Airport Knock to Alicante with Ryanair
* EI916 from London Gatwick to Ireland West Airport Knock with Aer Lingus
* EI917 from Ireland West Airport Knock to London Gatwick with Aer Lingus
* WW1091 from Birmingham to Ireland West Airport Knock with Bmi Baby
* WW1092 from Ireland West Airport Knock to Birmingham with Bmi Baby
* FR8202 from Bristol to Ireland West Airport Knock with Ryanair
* FR8203 from Ireland West Airport Knock to Bristol with Ryanair
* FR1742 from East Midlands to Ireland West Airport Knock with Ryanair
* FR1743 from Ireland West Airport Knock to East Midlands with Ryanair

Flight RE227 Dublin to Ireland West Airport Knock with Aer Arann is still scheduled to operate as per normal.

Ryanair have cancelled all scheduled flights to and from Irish and UK airports up to 13:00 today and Aerlingus have cancelled all UK and European flights scheduled to depart Ireland up to 13:00 today.

All affected passengers are asked to contact their airline for further information. Updates will be issued on this webpage as they become available.

Airline contact details are as follows:

* Aer Arann: 0818 210 210 / www.aerarann.com
* Aer Lingus: 0818 365 000 / www.aerlingus.com
* bmibaby: 1890 340 122 / www.bmibaby.com
* Ryanair: 01 248 0856 / www.ryanair.com

Ballyhaunis lady Roisin Curley is tweeting about her trip to Australia - which currently seems to involve a lot of wine tasting! http://twitter.com/roisincurley

A new Ryanair service from Knock Ireland West Airport to Faro in the Algarve starts today.

The new flights will be launched at the Airport today by OLYWN MURRAY, A NATIVE OF BALLYHAUNIS.

With summer Ryanair flights to Alicante and now Faro - there is no need to travel to Dublin to get flights to the sun.
You could previously fly on package tours from Knock - but the new Ryanair flights mean hopefully cheaper holidays for people in the West of Ireland.

Back in the summer of 2009 Ken Ring - the long term weather forecaster was doing the rounds on radio stations. His predictions for Winter 2009 / 2010 were pretty specific - but did he predict this long long cold spell?
This is some of what Ken Ring said back in September 2009 on local station Mid West Radio …

From 23rd nov - 26th nov it will be cold with frost and possibly snow.
There wil be a dry period from 9th to 23rd December with a cold spell around December 11th .
January 2010 will bring heavy rain from 14th-18th and a dry cold spell between January 20th and 31st 2010 .
Ken Ring said that he expected early February 2010 to be also be very cold . He predicted snow on March 2nd 2010 and even as late as April 14th.
He said warm weather will be back from late May early June 2010

On his web site he says ” The country is looking at an average-to-slightly-warmer winter” - so it looks like whatever Ken is using to predict the temperatures isn’t working too well. (but maybe Nov was warm and February may be warmer and that will bring the average temperatures up?)

Snow - on his website Ken Ring made this general snow forecast for Ireland in the Winter of 2009/2010 …

“Chances of snow in Tipperary are in the last few days of November, fourth weeks in January and February, the first week in March, and the second week in April. However, there is about a 4degC minimum difference between Tipperary and Northern Ireland, so the north will be affected more. Some northern parts may get some significant falls about the second and last weeks in Nov, and in December, snow in the north in the last few days. Then first and fourth weeks in both Feb and March, and the north may even get snow as late as the first week in May in some places.”

Again - pretty useless really . OK he did mention snow in late December for some parts .

His forecast for Winter 2010/2011 given in June 2010 was no better

Would you believe this man? This is Keith Henderson one of the two men who claim to have had visions of the Virgin Mary in Knock . Keith Henderson is a sidekick of Joe Coleman who is also pictured below. I know what I’d think if this man told me he was seeing things…..he probably needs medical help.

Pictures taken from http://www.irishtimes.com/indepth/slideshows/knock-apparition-virgin-mary/

where you can see more of the crazy activity at knock on 31st October 2009.
Nothing really happened apart from a few thousand crazy people running around and looking at the sun.
I looked at the sun for no more than 2 seconds that day near Ballyhaunis - and I could see circles ringed in blue/green for minutes afterwards. It was no miracle - just my eyes being nearly blinded by looking at the bloody sun.

Read an eye witness report from Knock here http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2009/1102/1224257902496.html

Great quote in there from some young girl when they thought something was happening outside “She’s outside. F*** ya! We shudda stayed outside- ”

It’s all great for the tourist industry in Knock though. Or is it ?
The Church are probably getting worried - maybe all this rubbish about visions and apparitions will make people think that maybe the original apparitions might have been just as silly as these new ones.

This is the other half of the comedy duo - Joe Coleman shedding a tear in Knock on Saturday.

If you heard Joe Coleman talking on the Joe Duffy show on RTE - you wouldn’t think there was much in the way of holiness about him. He is an arrogant , lying, welfare fiddling, offensive, rude, ignorant man - and Joe Duffy hardly even challenged him.

The bookmaker Paddy Power is taking bets on where Our Lady will appear next in Ireland. Because of the forecast by Joe Coleman last week - Knock Shrine is the clear favourite. Hopefully Joe has a good big bet on - he seems pretty sure it will happen.
You Can Bet Here Odds below were at 7pm Friday 9th Oct
(It’s under the Novelty Bets Menu - )