HALLOWEEN HORROR ON ‘THE HILL’
IF you ever needed an indication of how seriously Halloween is taken here in Kerry, then you only need to look - if you dare - at the spooktacular night of horror that takes place in the village of Knocknagoshel each year.
This year was an extra special event for the biggest ‘All Hallows Eve’ event in the county as it celebrated a milestone 25 years full of spooky scares and terrifying thrills, drawing crowds of hundreds of willing victims - ahem, we mean visitors - and raising over €17,000 in the process.
Regular visitors to the North Kerry village knew all about the scares that awaited them on the night, but for newcomers the chilling sight of vampires, grinning clowns and hordes of the undead will have ensured a sleepless night.
The Knocknagoshel Festival has been running every year since 1994 and every year the money raised from the night is given to various charities around the county.
“The night was a roaring success. We had over 3,400 people there on the night and it was great that this year we helped to restore the fun factor to the event. It was a great community effort,” said Secretary for the festival, Anne Keane.
Anne said that she and the rest of the organisers were also very happy with the fact that there was no repeat this year of the anti-social behaviour that marred last year’s event.
“We were really pleased with how this year went. We had a zero tolerance to the behaviour this year. We had increased security, better supervised areas and much more. Posts on social media really helped us this year We had our finger on the pulse,” Anne added.
Of course, Knocknagoshel is the not the only place in Kerry that has been serving a healthy dose of scares this week with numerous Halloween themed events having taken place all over the county.
Kenmare is still in the middle of its brilliant ‘Halloween Howl’ event which is running until Saturday November 3. This event counts spooky night-time orienteering and a witches and wizards workshop among its highlights.