On your bike for Clon's chain gang fest

GET your favourite bicycle shorts ready, and make sure your chain is oiled as all roads lead to Clonakilty once more for the ever-popular ClonBikeFest 2017. 

The festival, which celebrates the bicycle in all its shapes and forms is now in its sixth year and promises a bumper four days of fantastic events from June 8th.

‘Clonakilty is fast becoming a bicycle-town with its pioneering Clon Bikes being the first rural bike scheme in the country, and the Bicycle Festival is a celebration of all the joy, adventure and style that owning a bike can bring,’ organiser Allison Roberts told The Southern Star.

The festival kicks off with the opening night on Thursday June 8th, with a celebratory lap of the town on all 60 of the Clon Bikes, followed by a soiree of drinks and nibbles in O’Donovan’s Hotel, with tips and stories from some seasoned bike adventurers – the festival organisers Justin Grounds and Allison Roberts will have just returned from a cycling adventure in France on fold-up bikes and will add their story to the mix. 

‘As the weekend continues, including favourite events such as the bike clinic, the family bicycle hullaballoo, the annual cycle-in cinema and the now-legendary ‘meals on wheels’, its all about spend more time enjoying life on two wheels,’ Allison said.

Justin added:‘Other events include a literary ‘Bike-ku Haiku’ picnic cycle with poets James Waller and Tess Leak, a ‘foodie cycle’ to Courtmacsherry with a well earned supper at the Food Depot, and a project building a geodesic dome out of recycled bike wheels.’

Everything culminates in a Swing Jazz Soiree at Molly’s Cafe with the Clonakilty Jazz Collective ringing out the weekend.

See the Clonakilty Bicycle Festival Facebook page for more information.