Boorowa’s Irish Woolfest is one of the biggest events for the entire state each year, bringing many to Boorowa for a spectacular time. From Friday, October 3, until Sunday, October 5, there will be festivities around Boorowa, including the ‘Running of the Sheep’.
Boorowa, world-renowned for its fine Merino wool, created a festival centred around it, Wool Week, which ran through the late 1990s. This showcased the beautiful wool from the region. A whole week was dedicated to this event with wool shows, wool workshops, shearing displays and much more all around the town. Even then, the sheep led the street parade to the Showground with a colourful street parade meandering along behind.
The Running of the Sheep, similar to the Running of the Bulls in Pamplona, has become an attraction every year. Everyone should at least once see the visually exciting scenes of four-wheeled motor bikes and the sheep dogs leaping on and off the sheep’s back as they run down the street.
After a couple of years, it was decided that to make it a truly spectacular event, the community would condense it to a one-day festival, when the street would be closed to traffic. This gave it more impact with all festivities located up and down the main street and packed each day as much as possible.
This was the beginning of Woolfest as we know it.
The event just had a three-month lead-in and 1000 visitors. The first star performer was Armondo of Sweet Charity fame, followed by a wool fashion parade by Simona. They linked the event to Floriade in Canberra to give visitors an alternative activity.
In the year 2000, Boorowa introduced the Irish component based on the fact that the town has strong Irish connections and is twinned with Clonoulty in Tipperary, Ireland. The Irish Woolfest took its first bow.
Boorowa’s Irish connection dates back to the 1820s when cousins Roger Corcoran and Ned Ryan arrived in the area on‘Ticket of Leave’. They had been sentenced to transportation to New South Wales from Clonoulty in Tipperary. Their crime was participation in the destruction of a hospital that a garrison of English troops planned to occupy. They were later granted a ‘Ticket of Freedom’ and played prominent roles in the settlement and growth of the area.
Numbers of visitors to the Irish Woolfest, which is well known for its outstanding and professional performers, including The Australian Youth Choir, John MacNally, Cat and Fiddle, The Tullys, Saoirse, The Irish Drovers and Enchanted Ireland with Annalisa Kerrigan and Tim Manning, an outstanding Irish Dancer.
President of the committee gave the Boorowa Times an update on how it’s all going, ahead of the massive weekend. “Everything looks to be tracking pretty well for Woolfest. We had a meeting last Monday, and it all looks as though it has come together well. We are all pretty comfortable with where we are at the moment, and if the weather treats us well, we should have a great day,” he said.“It is one of the biggest things going on in the region. We have got a lot of stalls coming and it looks as though the parade will be good, so it looks to be a good weekend.
“We’ve got a bit going on Saturday that we haven’t traditionally had before with some support. Things for the quick shear with some food stalls over there and some jumping castles and things, and then jumping castles and food stalls over there on the Saturday afternoon when the movie’s on, which will be good and then the fireworks on Saturday night are always popular with everybody. That’s around 8:00 pm Saturday, so that’ll be good, and there’s a bit on at some of the pubs with music on on Saturday night, and that’ll attract a few people to most of those venues. It will be a good spread of entertainment for people.
“What we’ve tried to do this time is try to keep it tracking with the main Woolfest and then just look at building on it over time. I think if you had a plan for the Woolfest moving forward, instead of just focussing on the Sunday, you’d try and build Saturday as a strong day as well, so that people can come in Friday or come in on Saturday and there’s something for them, Saturday and Sunday, and then they can head home after the Woolfest on the Sunday, which gives them a fuller weekend and it gives the accommodation and the facilities in Boorowa, a chance to make a better dollar in the process and then gives you a fuller weekend which would be good too.
“That’s what we will try to do as we move forward, and we are just looking at a couple of options that people have raised to fill in Saturday a little bit more. And I think that’s the challenge, to get Saturday to work properly and then just flow nicely into Sunday, which I think on Sunday we will pretty much leave as it is. I think the Woolfest and the Parade actually work very well. So you wouldn’t be playing around with something that’s worked particularly well over time.
“It’s excellent. I’ve done business and been supportive generally, so it’s good. Everybody understands the benefits it brings to the town, so I think it’s a great thing. “Just generally, everybody is being supportive, and I think it has been great. We’ve got some good sponsorship in from some of the bigger sponsors. I don’t want to single anybody out in particular, but it’s just been a good effort. “We’ve raised some good funds, and the committee has been good; everybody’s pitched in and helped, which is kind of what you want out of this, and I think the town’s just been generally supportive in letting us do things and new things, and it’s been good.
“It is cranking along well. We’re pretty happy where we are planning-wise, and we’ve made sure we went through last week and ticked off everything that needed to be ticked off, so we are pretty comfortable.
“The Hilltops Council guys have been great. They’ve been really supportive and helpful. I think we are in reasonably good shape.
“We have got a backup to the quick shear if there are any problems with rain on the Saturday, they’ve got an option to use a horse facility up at the Showground free of charge, which is a good undercover venue that would probably work for them. So the council has given it free of charge if it’s needed.
“We just hope we get great weather for Saturday and Sunday.”
Coinciding with the Boorowa Woolfest is the Boorowa Art Show, which will have its official opening on Friday, 3 October from 6:00–8:00 pm at the Old Court House in Boorowa for the Boorowa Art Show Opening Night, your first chance to view and purchase artworks before they go live online the next morning.
Enjoy live music by local crowd favourites Tori and Jason, delicious catering by Wallenbeen Catering, and a relaxed atmosphere filled with art, community, and conversation. Drinks will be available, bubbles, beer, and good wine, with the official opening at 7:00 pm.
Susan Corcoran of the Art Show said, “We are raising funds for the two local schools. We have so many amazing pieces of art coming from local artists and some from far and wide. Opening night is Friday the 3rd for $15, and everyone is welcome.”
You’d be mad to miss an event like this.
– Jack Murray
