Over the past years, Crawley has been deprived of so many events involving the community, so when the Celtic & Irish Cultural Society put on the St. Patrick’s Parade in the town centre, the community donned vibrant outfits, the dancers jigged, making it a wonderful day!

John Nolan and the committee members worked tirelessly to put this amazing parade together, which was no mean feat. But they made it look easy. It all went very smoothly and everyone who took part thoroughly enjoyed themselves.

The parade was lead by the Mayor of Crawley, Cllr Brenda Burgess with representative from the Irish embassy together with invited guests local dignitaries and personalities.

The parade was the last event in a string of well organised events. On the 6th March we had the launch of the Fleadh with a celebratory evening at The Emerald Club in Southgate. On Saturday 20th March we were entertained at The Hawth Theatre by an Irish Variety Concert. Compared by Gerry Molumby with Jimmy Cricket heading the bill and made up of music, song, dance, seanachi and a few special surprises. A Piece of Irish Theatre and some poetry is also included together with a special performance of the Emerald Pipe and Drum band which is made up of the Irish guys and girls serving in the Metropolitan Police as well as some excellent dancing by the Andromeda Edmunds School of Dance and O’Briens Irish School of Dance.

Before the weekend kicked off John Nolan told us “The CICS want to make the whole day a success and give the people of Crawley and the surrounding areas a parade to remember. It’s not just an Irish only St Patrick’s Parade, it’s a parade for the community. One for everyone to enjoy, for the residents and the business fraternity to come on board and work on together. There is also a special section called the ‘nations of the world’ where the participants can walk in the parade carrying the flag of their country or geographical region. The more banners the merrier. This always adds fantastic colour to the event. Check out http://www.celtic-irish.co.uk/stpats for more info” We think you will agree, they certainly managed to pull this off in style. If you want to be part of this next year, email us editor@crawleyhappytimes.co.uk and we will pass your details on.

A special thanks goes to Currys and especially Jay Nai, who without their help the bandstand would not have had a sound system. Another special thanks goes to Tracey Herald of Herald Photography for donating some amazing pictures of the parade to Crawley Happy Times xx

Thank you to Jay Nai from Currys for the sound system they supplied on Sunday

We took some pictures and video for you to experience the day! We would also like to thank the good people from The Cloth Store who made us a giant CHT finger puppet but we were unable to use this on the day. We will be speaking more about Victoria and the ladies from The Cloth Store in the near future.