BOAT TRIP TO THE LAKE ISLE AND THE SQUARE MOON

Join the annual boat trip – at dusk this year – to visit the Lake Isle and see the Square Moon.

Tickets € 35 (Incl. wine & Canapés)

Booking essential. [email protected] / Tel: 087-2598869

Meet at Doorly Park Pier

Monday, 8.30pm

In association with IT Sligo

Dusk boat trip to the Lake Isle of Innisfree

This is the fifth annual celebration of Yeats Day – June 13th – the poet’s birthday. Many people will remember last year’s great event as part of the national and international celebration of the poet’s 150th birthday.
Now that Yeats is 151, we have no plans to forget him any time soon. When we launched the dawn to dusk event on June 13 2012, our first event was the boat trip across Lough Gill to the Lake Isle to mark the mythical poem of his dreams The Lake Isle of Innisfree.

Our host – then as now – was George McGoldrick and his wife Tina who own and run the tour boat, Rose of Innisfree. There is not a rock or blade of grass or wave that George does not know and their collective knowledge of Lough Gill, the various islands, the 17th century Parkes Castle and Yeats is unsurpassed.

To sit close to the water and hear the birds and see Ben Bulben and Hazelwood from the water is one of the delights of Sligo – and of Yeats Day. We were honoured last year when Welsh poet laureate Gillian Clarke read The Lake Isle of Innisfree to a full boat of visitors from all round the world, just as the island appeared before us.

This year, we have moved the boat trip to dusk on Yeats’ birthday. The light across the lake should be wonderful and guests on board the Rose will be treated to the IT Sligo’s Yeats2015 architectural winner’s Square Moon installation which should be lighting as the boat arrives at the island. A glass of wine and some poetry from guests aboard the boat, including Yeats Society president Martin Enright should make it a perfect early midsummer evening. (The Ireland Sweden match at 5pm will have ended before the boat leaves!) Tickets are €35 and are available from George on 087 2598869 or you can email [email protected]. Boarding the Rose of Innisfree will commence at 8.30pm at Doorly Park, Sligo.