‘WELCOME TO Europe’s biggest singles event” is what the sign proclaims as you roll into Lisdoonvarna in Co Clare. September sees the usually quaint and quiet hamlet stewed in a month of deranged debauchery. That’s right, this festival lasts for a whole month. That’s hardcore.
“We’re here for the craic, the women and the beer,” the sign continues. You have now entered a parallel universe that is somewhere between the Ploughing Championships and Aya Napa. Bienvenido to Ibiza for boggers.
Sitting serenely in the middle of all the lunacy, you’ll find the bearded baron of bedlam, Willie Daly, matchmaker and horse-whisperer. I’m tempted to say that, given the standard of some of the singles on show this year, the horse-whispering probably comes in as a handy as the matchmaking, but that would be neither fair nor accurate (though this has never bothered me before).
“What would you think of that fine girl there” Willie says to me. “You could do a lot worse than her. There’s a lot of her in it, but she’s a ban garda”. I told Willie that I didn’t think a member of the Gardaí would make a suitable partner for me. “Wouldn’t you be the stupid fella to refuse a laying hen”. Hard to argue with a man who has made a living from this caper for longer than many conventional marriages last.
EVERYONE’S GANDERING
This year, there were two German camera crews in Lisdoon to document the carry-on of the clientele. I think it’s fair to say that when these programs air in Deutschland, Angela Merkel will no longer think we’re working. Just before I hit the road for Lisdoon last weekend, I got a text from Willie’s daughter Gráinne, also heavily involved in the family business – “German TV crew over and they have a lovely single girl with them. She loves music, travelling and The Alps. Will I set up a date?” It would have been both rude and inhospitable to say no.
The majority of the crowd will tell you that they’re only in Lisdoon for the buzz and not really looking for love, but if something happened, they’d be open to it. Don’t believe a word if it – they’re looking. When you walk into any juke joint there’s more scanning going on than Terminator sifting through an LA streetscape for Sarah Connor. Clients are gawping around the place like geese sticking their heads into a barrel. There is plenty of courting going on too. A young lad from Shanagolden told me he’d been entertaining an Israeli and an Egyptian girl the previous week. The Kofi Annan of giggity-giggity. One 60-year-old dude I met told me that he’d be to town three weekends on the trot and he hadn’t paid for a BB yet (wink wink).
SWINGING SINGLES
You couldn’t call the stamina of the auld boy into question because when it comes to jiving, it’s the well-seasoned swingers that have all the best moves. The dancing is as big a part of this shindig as the dating and you have much more chance of pulling if you can rip up the dance floor. Better chance still if you can do it in a cowboy hat. The tunes are more country’n’Irish than Charlie Pride in a Donegal jersey. Unfortunately, all I pulled was a calf muscle stepping out to Lovely Leitrim.
It’s difficult to capture the essence of the place, but try to imagine what your debs would have been like had Charlie Sheen, Jackie Healy Ray, Hugh Hefner, Big Tom and Paddy Doherty been on the organising committee and decided to hold it in Killinascully. You’re nearly there. It’s not for everyone. Someone asked during the week was it any good or was it ”just a bit hick and messy”? Yeah, it was a bit hick and messy, that’s possibly why I loved it.
Safe travels, don’t die.
