Another light bulb moment sees Araglin landmark illuminated
Whether it’s altitude or attitude, the people of Araglin come into their own when it comes to ideas. Some are embraced and prove wonderfully successful, others flounder and are quickly discarded. Regardless, the Araglin think tank never goes into the reserve and more often than not, energy and enthusiasm gets projects over the line.
There’s nothing new in lighting a landmark, especially for a special occasion, and, in the normal course of events, this would be very doable. However, lighting one of country’s most inaccessible, yet majestic waterfalls, is another matter entirely.
Against considerable odds, the famous 3 Doons Waterfall has been illuminated in green to mark Lá Le Pádraig. Had they a larger budget, the commissioning of a helicopter to transport generators, fuel canisters, cables, lights, stands, tripods, cameras, planks and scaffolding would have been ideal, unfortunately, it fell to a few hardy souls to act as beasts of burden. What a sight they made - laden down bravehearts, struggling against the elements as they slowly traversed the most demanding of terrain.
Without sat nav or compass, but possessing ‘the show must go on’ mentality, not one, but two stages, were constructed on a portion of remote countryside, known to generations of Araglin people as ‘the Foill Dearg’. An elaborate lighting system was set up and professional grade cameras used to capture the raw power of the Araglin river, cascading over ancient rocks.
Having not seen the finished project at the time of going to press - set to air live at 8pm on St Patrick’s Day - we are unable to give too much away. According to joint project managers, Thomas Leddy and John J. O’Donovan, it consists of a 40 minute show, complete with the aforementioned images, spectacular drone footage, a selection of lockdown photographs and video clips of greetings from the Araglin diaspora.
Billed as ‘Lighting The Doons’, it can be accessed on Facebook or YouTube - https: //youtu.be/ulrCvsh7WEU