Encompassing theatre, dance, music, visual arts, food, street performers and even circus, this 16 day festival in Ireland’s ‘real capital’ is nothing if not varied.
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Since 1978 Ireland’s biggest and longest established jazz event and has hundreds of musicians and many thousands of music fans to the city for an annual feast of jazz of all kinds.
As well as the core performance there are fringe events taking place throughout the city and it is a festival known for the friendly welcome given to visitors.
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This eclectic series of events, held in a marquee in Cork’s Docklands, started when the city was European Capital of Culture in 2005 and has gone from strength to strength since.
The 2011 line up is as varied as ever, and includes acts as diverse as Paul Simon, Elton John, Christy Moore, Brian Adam, Imelda May and Tom Jones.
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An annual feast for those who love choral music, this festival brings highly rated choirs from all over the world to Cork each year.
The central event is a competition for adult choirs, but there are many other competitions, gala concerts and social events on the programme also. Standards are extremely high – it’s well worth making a special effort to get to at least one event.
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A nice local museum, with a wide range of exhibits primarily related to Cork city, its history and in particular some of the famous Cork people who are important to Irish history and culture.
There is a pleasant garden outside and a good restaurant.
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Ireland’s largest and best collection of rare trees and shrubs is found on Fota Island near Cork city. For those who love trees it’s an essential place to visit and, as you might expect, the Autumn is a great time to go.
The house, which is open to the public, is also well worth visiting.
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Lakemount is a beautifully kept herbaceous garden which is evidently owned by someone with a huge love of plants.
The garden is the work of one man, Brian Cross, and is a domestic garden, albeit a particularly large one. So, if you have an anyway decent patch of ground, you could have a garden like this too. In theory.
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Owned by University College Cork, this relatively new gallery houses the college collection and has a year round programme of visiting exhibitions.
The building has won multiple awards for its architecture, and though very modern in design sits beautifully alongside the old college gates, almost floating over a river.
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Ireland’s second city is a compact place build largely on an island and easily explored on foot.
It may not have the wealth of places to visit of other cities, but the glorious English Market alone would make it worth a detour and as a university city it has a lively night life as well as good restaurants.
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