Irish Fair

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To Do in the Twin Cities

Festivals

Irish Fair

August 14, 2021

836 Prior Ave N

St Paul, MN

Phone: (651) 645-0221

www.irishfair.com

Irish Fair

We had a long discussion about Irish Fair before E&I went to it. The problem is/was other years Irish Fair was FREE. No now that is not quite correct, it is free to enter. But before you enter you needed to pay for parking. We normally pay $20 to park & walk the closest, basically across the street plus a block or so.

You could park for $10 4-5 blocks further but at 5 minutes a block to walk, BOTH WAYS, that adds an hour to your trip. Saving $10 for walking an extra hour especially in the August heat, we'll take pass on.

Anyway add forty a day for a couple,more for a family this year (BECAUSE of COVID)! Will that go away next year… who knows, just know the cost is up.

We normally eat at Irish Fair. We eat fried food we shouldn't yet we do. This time with the increased cost we did a touch&go at McDonalds and got some McNuggets. And its a good thing we did the normal 5 deep food lines were closer to 15 deep. I am NOT a big fan of food trucks for that exact reason.

Other years we put down a blanket, one of us got the food, the other our drinks and we met back at the blanket. Had we done that this year wee would have had a warm drink and cold food.

Far from the nice night we usually had at the Irish Fair. As it was we spent the $40 on entrance not vendor food.

We went at about 4 PM on Saturday. The $20 entrance did not seem to deter the crowds that were about the same as other years.

Back to food… we get the food truck thing, wanting to help new small businesses. BUT when your food lines get 15 deep that helps no one. Perhaps a mix of trucks & booths. Because we always look forward to food at the festivals we go to most weekends in the summer, but we wont do lines as with most people.

OK we are done discussing food…

This year the Marketplace was in multiple areas that other years were one long line next to the river. By breaking up the vendors there was musical and poetry type of apps between them and it simply became and audio mess.

Then this year the organizers moved the bands to the west side where the dancers and the bagpipes were other years… again an audio mess. Part of the fun of the Irish Fair is all the sounds… not so much this year.

We bought nothing for merchandise for the first time in over ten years. Just nothing bisque that caught our eyes like other years.

All and all the one festival we look forward to every year was VERY disappointing.

If anyone wants our two cents worth they can ask or read it here but fir the first time in over a decade we may not go to Irish Fair next year.