Rain stays away as 20,000 converge on Moynalty

From early on Sunday morning, they started arriving. A convoy of vintage cars, horse-drawn machinery, veteran tractors, steam engines, stationery engines, trade stands and spectators poured into the village of Moynalty for one of the biggest one-day festival in the country - the enduring Moynalty Steam Threshing Festival. Despite floods elsewhere, the rain stayed away from the pretty north Meath village until 5pm, ensuring that the 33rd annual steam threshing festival was another major success with up to 20,000 people attending. They came from all over the country to the festival and one group even flew in by helicopter. The festival is a celebration of all the traditional methods of farming. Six acres of oats were specially grown on site and were harvested by reaper and binder, sickle and scythe. The sheaves were tied and brought to the mills for threshing and horse-drawn ploughs turned the stubble. The central drama of the afternoon had several steam engines and mills in action, reviving memories of olden times with their sounds and smells. Oats were threshed using steam, flail, horse and tractor. There were vintage combine harvesters in operation and unusual tractors and binders could be seen at work all over the field. Every aspect of farm life was represented as there was butter-churning, cooking over open fires, making boxty and brown bread, while a large crowd visited the threshing museum. All the usual attractions were there, including the animal farm, bric-a-brac and crafts stalls, funfair, pig roasting, trade stands, traditional displays and vintage displays in addition to a dancing deck with music by Dessie Hynes, Pat Duffy, Johnny Shankey and Matt Leavy. The water-wheel on the Borora river was the only missing attraction as the organisers feared that the water levels were too high. The craft displays were particularly impressive this year and there was a massive turn-out of Massey Fergusons to mark the famous tractor"s 50th anniversary. On Monday, the local community were out in force cleaning up the site, with young members of the Junior Tidy Towns Commuittee out with paper-pickers to ensure the village was back to its usual pristine condition by evening, It is not for nothing that Moynalty has consistently won the title of Meath"s tidiest town for the past decade as well as scoring major successes in the national tidy towns competition. Sean Sheridan, PRO of the local committee, thanked the Gardai, Order of Malta, Civil Defence and all their neighbours who helped out on the day. He said the committee would shortly be sitting down to plan the 34th festival!