Launch of Portaferry Heritage Fest

2nd September 2024

Photo caption: Launch of Portaferry Heritage Fest on Sat 31 August 2024 at Portaferry Market House.

Health Minister and Ulster Unionist Party Leader Mike Nesbitt and councillors Pete Wray and Joe Boyle joined local community leaders in Portaferry on Saturday to launch a new festival celebrating Portaferry’s abundance of heritage - built, cultural and natural. 

The Portaferry Heritage Fest takes place 13-15 September with over 30 events and activities across three days, all in, or close to, Portaferry.

Access to the stunning natural heritage of Strangford Lough is available through guided boat tours or get even closer to the lough (and maybe see the dolphins!) by having a go at coastal rowing. Or find out how it all began with the talk on Windmill Hill about How Strangford Lough Was Formed. Or literally taste our natural heritage with the Wild About Foraging event at Kearney where you can forage, cook and eat nature with Wildlife Expert David Thompson and Wild Chef Celia Spouncer.

Portaferry Men’s Shed will be demonstrating how to build bird boxes and True Harvest Seeds and Strangford Lough and Lecale Partnership will have stalls to explore urban biodiversity.

The built heritage offer includes Drones, Stones and Ancient Bones, an investigation into the Neolithic cairn at Millin Bay, as well as tours of Templecranny ruins and graveyard plus living history interpretation at Portaferry Castle. Tour guide Seamus Dorrian is running tours entitled ‘Think You Know Portaferry?’ which finish with a ‘pour your own pint’ stop at Fiddlers Green. Several of Portaferry’s heritage buildings will be open as part of European Open Heritage Day too.

Cultural heritage abounds with art exhibitions and heritage displays at Portico, the Recreation Hub and the Ropewalk Maritime Heritage Centre. Artisan craft demonstrations feature at a special heritage themed Market On The Square on both Saturday and Sunday, and the RNLI is open to the public too.

Find out about the history of Echlinville Distillery with the ‘Tour & Tipple’ or enjoy getting creative with Seaweed and Cyantope at Queen’s Marine Lab.

Lough Legends at Portaferry Library will entertain the little ones, and Joseph Tomelty’s The McCooeys will engage the older folk. For those somewhere in between, there’s tours and tipples aplenty, not to mention folk music with Seán Donnelly, traditional music with The Kilkennys and  a celebration of 1980s pop heritage with Spring Break, all at Portico.

Speaking on behalf of Portaferry Community Collective’s Heritage Committee, Dr Verity Peet said, “The quantity and the diversity of the organisations involved in this festival shows us just how important heritage is for our wellbeing, our sense of identity and our ability to draw visitors and their business to Portaferry.”

“This festival is just the start. We want to work with local government and public bodies to find the balance between preserving our heritage for generations to come and encouraging access and sustainable tourism; the sweet spot between caring for and sharing our heritage. We want to make Portaferry known for being a heritage destination and a thriving Heritage Town.” 

The Portaferry Heritage Fest runs from Friday 13 to Sunday 15 September. Find out more about the festival from the online programme.