Frightfully spooktacular fun around the county

KERRY TURNS INTO A KINGDOM OF THE DEAD FOR THIS YEAR’S GHOULISH HALLOWEEN CELEBRATIONS

HALLOWEEN seems to grow more popular every year and across the county communities were out in force to celebrate the spookiest and most ghoulish night of the year.

The biggest event in the county – and indeed one of the biggest in the entire country – was the annual Halloween Festival in Knocknagoshel which took place on Sunday and once again drew huge crowds to the north Kerry village.

Now firmly established as Ireland’s premier outdoor Halloween festival, visitors to the Well Road trail experienced another chilling production, with hundreds of volunteers and performers doing their bit to ensure the visitors enjoyed a genuinely ghastly experience.

This year’s Knocknagoshel horror show involved a lorry-load of deadly spiders that had escaped and turned the children of the village into a horde of rampaging, bloodthirsty zombies.

As ever no effort was spared and The Kerryman – which is a regular visitor to the Knocknagoshel event – can report that it was one of the very best Halloween shows the local committee has ever staged.

The Knocknagoshel festival has been running since 1994 and every year money raised at the event goes to support local charities and causes.

The main beneficiary of this year’s horrific spooktacular is the Tralee Soup Kitchen, a voluntary group which feeds hundreds of people for free every week.

Of course Knocknagoshel wasn’t the only place to celebrate Halloween with large and small events held all over the county to mark the annual festival of fear.

One of the biggest events was held in Kenmare where the local Halloween Howl committee organised a Halloween parade on Tuesday night as well as an evening of traditional Halloween party games in the town park.

Near Glenbeigh the Red Fox Inn hosted a Halloween disco for children while its Bog Village tourist attraction next door was transformed into a haunted hamlet filled with all manner of ghosts, goblins and ghouls.

In Killarney and Tralee hundreds of people lined out to take part in fancy dress fun runs while pubs and night clubs across the county hosted Halloween parties.

Schools also got in on the act with most primary schools around the county – and a few Secondary schools – holding fancy dress days on Friday to celebrate Halloween and the start of the, no doubt, eagerly anticipated mid-term break.

Photo by Michelle Cooper Galvin Robbie, Pat and J J O’Sullivan in character at the Halloween Run Walk/Run own Killarney on Saturday.

Fionn and Donnacha Quigg with Clodagh Hoare enjoying the Halloween Fancy Dress at the Red Fox on Saturday.

Photo by Michelle Cooper Galvin Emma and Dylan O’Grady enjoying the Halloween Fancy Dress at the Red Fox on Saturday.