HERE are the major Halloween festivals across Ireland:
- Derry Halloween Festival: Europe’s largest Halloween celebration in Derry, featuring spectacular parades, live music, fireworks, and family-friendly activities over four nights, blending ancient Samhain rituals with modern festivities.
- Púca Festival: A folklore-rich event in Trim and Athboy, County Meath, honouring the shape-shifting Púca spirit with fire performances, music, comedy, processions, and harvest markets, celebrating Ireland’s Celtic Halloween origins.
- Bram Stoker Festival: A gothic-themed festival in Dublin dedicated to the author of Dracula, offering horror screenings, theatre, walking tours, and shadowy installations exploring Ireland’s dark literary and historical past.
- Gaillimh Ah-Boo! (Galway Halloween Festival): A vibrant month-long Samhain celebration in Galway, highlighted by the Macnas Parade with towering puppets, comedy shows, dark history tours, and family events in the city’s medieval streets.
- Samhain: Limerick’s Hallowe’en Festival: A dazzling four-day event in Limerick with fire and shadows processions, light parades, harvest feasts, scavenger hunts, and séances, marking the Celtic New Year with spooky spectacle.
- Dragon of Shandon Parade: Cork’s iconic Halloween parade where a massive dragon leads a procession of ghouls, beasts, and demons through the streets, evoking ancient Samhain traditions with music and theatrical displays.
- Dead of Night Festival: A thrilling week-long Halloween extravaganza in Longford Town, culminating in a Fire & Shadows procession, with storytelling, live performances, and eerie night-time adventures.
- Samhain on Uisneach: An ancient ritual gathering at the Hill of Uisneach in County Westmeath, Ireland’s spiritual heart, featuring fire ceremonies, music, and Celtic New Year observances to connect with ancestral spirits.
- Halloween at Bunratty Castle: A medieval-themed fright night at Bunratty Folk Park in County Clare, with haunted castle tours, ghostly banquets, costume balls, and interactive storytelling for an immersive Samhain experience.
- Festival of Fire & Light: A mesmerising series of light and music spectacles across North County Dublin sites like Malahide and Bremore Castles, illuminating autumn nights with projections, aerial shows, and fiery displays.
- Halloween at Glenarm Castle: Family-oriented spooky fun at Glenarm Castle in County Antrim, including ghostly characters, wand-making workshops, haunted rides, and a monster mash dance party amid historic gardens.
- Carrickfergus Haunted History Tour: A theatrical guided walk through Carrickfergus, County Antrim, led by a caped guide recounting dark tales of hauntings, plagues, and folklore in the town’s ancient streets.
- Lú Festival of Light: A magical Halloween illumination in Drogheda, County Louth, transforming the town with light installations, projections, and interactive art that weave Celtic myths into glowing nocturnal displays.
- Samhain Chiarraí: A four-week Halloween odyssey in County Kerry, exploring the Kingdom’s folklore through parades, ghost walks, music sessions, and harvest rituals in scenic Wild Atlantic Way locations.
- Ulster Folk Museum Halloween: An educational reenactment of traditional Samhain at the Ulster Folk Museum in Holywood, County Down, with bonfires, storytelling, old customs, and demonstrations of Celtic harvest practices.
