Town Centre
Saturday 17th September – the big heritage day
Wonderful big, noisy, exciting steam engines in the centre of the town on the final festival Saturday. The sights and sounds and smells of times past. Don’t forget to bring your camera!
Boat trips on the Bann, in The Council’s ‘Master McGrath’, leaving from Shillington’s Quay to give you a view of Portadown and its surroundings that many people will never have seen before.
A large exhibition of wonderful, locally-produced foods from specialist providers throughout the area. Meat, vegetables, fruit, jams and even locally-produced chocolate on sale.
The most significant impact on Portadown on Heritage Saturday will be the 250+ vintage vehicles which will have travelled from all over N Ireland and beyond. Cars, motor-cycles, lorries, tractors and vintage farm machinery – perhaps even a few old UTA buses. Anyone still remember them? With their cream and two-tone green livery and the passenger door at the back?
Let’s not forget the static steam engine enthusiasts. They’ll be along to demonstrate the skills of a bygone age. With their miniature steam engines, they illustrate the energy that was used at the turn of the century to make Portadown a powerhouse of industrial production.
A chance to meet the brave lads and lasses from the Lough Neagh Rescue Service and to see the sophisticated search facilities they have at their disposal. Keeping us all safe in and around Lough Neagh.
Don’t miss the small animals’ exhibits along the main street – these are another ‘must’ for your kids. Miniature horses and ponies, chickens, pygmy goats, llamas and even a giant rabbit! All the fun of the farm, right in the heart of the town.
There’s loads of country music too. You can bop to The Senators on St Mark’s Plaza. And on stage with the band throughout the day are guest stars such as Boxcar Brian, Ritchie Rhino and Seamus Delaney.
Six – yes, six! Six very elegant Edwardian pedallists – charming ladies, impeccably dressed in the costumes of the period, and with the baskets of their bicycles filled with flowers. Listen out for them ringing their bells – very definitely a wonderful show of ‘pedals and petals’!
They’re famous everywhere, the wonderful Armagh Rhymers – walking the streets of Portadown and doing all those things that only they can do so well. Check out their outrageous outfits – and don’t miss their music and their rhyming.
