Hot Air Ballooning Festival draws near
Well done to the hardworking Boyle Balloon Festival committee who have put together an exciting few days of events to coincide with the upcoming Hot Air Ballooning Championship this September. Of great interest will be the Fireworks Display in Boyle town centre on Saturday September 19th and it is good to see that this will be held at 9pm, making it a family friendly display. There are numerous other events planned around the town that will be attended by the Balloon crews so you can get a chance to mix and mingle and give them a warm Boyle welcome
Anyone who attended the Championships last year would have witnessed the traffic problems that occurred each morning and evening as people headed out to and back from Lough Key Forest Park for the launches. With over 10,000 people attending last year and an even larger crowd expected this year, some form of traffic management needed to be put in place – hence why there will be a advance parking reservation system for those traveling by car to the Park each day. Of course the Balloon launches are weather dependent and those booking parking do so with the knowledge that a launch could be cancelled at short notice. You can pre book your parking from Tuesday next here and get more details of the events on social media and this website next week.
World record for Boyle native
Boyle native octagenerian athlete John McDermott is on the record setting trail once again – this time in Daegu, South Korea. 81 year old John recently took gold in the M80 Decathalon and in the process set a new World Record at the 2026 World Masters Track and Field Championship. Abbeytown native John previously won 800m gold and 200m silver at the European Masters Indoor Championships in Toruń earlier this year.
More than 7,000 athletes from 106 countries are competing across the championships, with competitors ranging from 35 years of age right through to 106-year-old Sawang Janpram of Thailand, who is entered in the shot put, discus and javelin.
Supporting the Lough Key Triathlon
One of the great late season events on the local sporting calendar takes place in Boyle’s Lough Key Forest Park on Sunday when the annual Lough Key Triathlon takes to the road and water. The Triathlon is always a great spectacle and brings a large number of competitors and their families to the area. The Triathlon gets underway at 10.30am with prize giving scheduled for 1.15pm. It would be great to see a big local support for the athletes on Sunday as there will be many from Boyle taking part.
Energy Masterplan for Boyle will be of great benefit
The Boyle Energy Masteplan that is currently been worked on by Boyle Town Team will be of great benefit to the town when completed. An Energy Masterplan will assist Boyle in a number of ways: It will establish a baseline of the community’s current energy use across electricity, heat and transport, identify any existing renewable energy sources in the area, create a Register of Opportunities outlining potential energy efficiency and renewable energy projects, select suitable projects for the first three years and set energy reduction targets, enable regular updates to track progress against targets and act as a living document, recording the community’s energy journey and supporting future funding applications and projects. The Town Team are currently asking businesses who are interested in being involved to contact them on [email protected] before August 31st for further information.
Hopefully Boyle will get a visit from ‘Vesper’
It was announced during the week that ‘Vesper’ a trained 20 month old black Labrador dog has been assigned to the North West Garda Region that covers this area. Vesper is trained in sniffing out drugs, cash and firearms and will be a great addition, especially in relation to drug searches. Hopefully he will be introduced to the Dublin Sligo rail line where drugs are transported on a regular basis. A visit to Boyle, especially on a Friday evening may also be no harm. Drugs – including cannabis and cocaine are getting a major grip all over rural Ireland, including Boyle and are causing untold damage to individuals, families and society.
‘The Lights above the Lake’
There are still a number of people around who will remember the late Betty Meyler. Betty came to Boyle many years ago along with her partner Jack and initially settled at Rock House in Ballindoon. Betty later moved into Boyle and to some, she could have been deemed eccentric. But to others who studied how she operated, Betty was a shrew and smart lady. She took an interest in UFO’s (Unidentified Flying Objects) and was the subject of many radio and television documentaries on the subject, even organising a UFO conference in the town! The shrewd Betty saw the economic benefit an association with UFO’s could bring to Boyle – one wonders was that her real motivation or did she really believe there was something ‘out there’?
Move on a number of years and there are still a few who believe that we are being visited by extra terrestrial beings with many others coming up with logical reasons why people see lights in the night sky.
This autumn, RTE will broadcast a documentary titled “The Lights Above the Lake”, investigating “The mysterious lights appearing over Boyle town, as locals set out to uncover why this quiet corner of Ireland has become one of the country’s most intriguing UFO hotspots” according to the RTE Press Release.
Betty would be a happy woman if she was alive today to see a documentary being made on the subject in her adopted town.
But will Boyle benefit from this documentary or will people see Boyle as a town willing to accept extraordinary claims without real, factual evidence?
News snippets from around Boyle
Family Fun Day this Saturday 29th in Abbey Haven Care Home from 2.30pm – 4.30pm. All families welcome to have fun and make memories……….Weekly Walking Tours of Boyle every Friday for August and September. The next tour takes place today (Friday) from the Craft Shop in the grounds of King house at 2pm……….Join Lisa Cannon in Boyle Family Resource Centre today Friday 2.30pm – 4.30pm for a free fun Community Creative Afternoon! Drop in, get creative and help make a spectacular hot-air balloon art installation for the Irish Hot Air Balloon Championships. All ages welcome. No booking needed…………..Six early morning Knock bound aircraft diverted to Shannon, Cork and Dublin today Friday due to fog. The flights all went in to the ‘hold’ over Boyle for a period of time before diverting…………Starting roadworks on Bridge Street the night before school commences may not have been the best idea. The result was traffic backed up around the town at the busy 9am slot yesterday morning………Tickets (priced €10) now on sale for “An evening with Charlie McGettigan” in King House on Friday September 4th at 6pm. Bookings at www.boylecraftshop.com……….Boyle based school principal Mike Solan has been appointed Offaly senior football team manager.
And finally…..!
Pat and Mick decide to apply for jobs at a mine that had opened nearby.
After sitting in the waiting room for a while, Pat gets called in for his interview.
The boss asks Pat if he had worked underground mines before, and Pat replies, “Yes, of course I have.”
The boss asks him how deep under ground he worked, and Pat says, “Oh, about 8 to 10 feet.”
The boss says, “Mines are a lot deeper than that; get out of here – you’re no miner!”
On his way out, Pat tells Mick to tell the boss that he worked real deep underground so he could get the job.
Mick gets called in.
The boss asks Mick if he had worked underground mines before, to which Mick says, “Oh sure.”
The boss asks how deep underground he worked, and Mick says, “I used to work in a mine 20,000 feet underground.”
The boss says, “20,000 feet, wow! That is incredible! What kind of lights did you use in a mine so deep underground?”
Mick says, “Oh, I didn’t need lights, I worked on the day shift!
