The streets of Sydney turned green as thousands of revellers celebrated St Patrick's Day. Source: AAP
IRISH rocker and charity king Sir Bob Geldof joined tens of thousands of Australians who turned patches of the country bright green on St Patrick's Day.
The Live Aid supremo was in Perth to promote the upcoming reunion tour with his band The Boomtown Rats, but took some time out from promotion for celebration along with thousands of his countrymen and women on the streets of Perth.
A parade of dozens of floats was launched by Sir Bob, as he stood beaming atop a double decker open-top bus.
And the hell raiser turned fundraiser then stopped off at the Irish Club in Subiaco to sink a pint of Guinness, and soak in the traditional Irish hospitality.
"There were thousands of people; it was an absolutely brilliant atmosphere," Sir Bob said.
"In Dublin the same parade is a tiny thing. This was fun and very cool."
The Boomtown Rats are set to play in Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth in May - and St Patrick's Day celebrations also spread across the country.
Australia has celebrated St Patrick's Day on March 17 since 1810, when Governor Lachlan Macquarie declared the date an official day of celebration.
The streets of Sydney turned green as thousands of revellers celebrated across the CBD.
Crowds around Town Hall and Elizabeth Street were 10-deep on Sunday to watch the annual parade roll past, with youngsters dressed in traditional costume getting the biggest cheers as they waved to the crowd.
Sydney's St Patrick's Day is the largest Irish event in the southern hemisphere with an estimated 60,000 Irish and Australian families participating on Sunday, according to Australia's Irish newspaper the Irish Echo.
In Brisbane, 30,000 people packed into the city for the annual St Patrick's Day parade which was held on Saturday.
Brisbane Irish Festival event manager Sorcha Holmes said many continued celebrating on Sunday at a family sports day, complete with Gaelic football, hurling and Irish dancing.
Plenty more could be seen dressed head-to-toe in green enjoying a Guinness at one of several Irish pubs in the CBD.
The scene was repeated in Melbourne where revellers were enjoying the "craic" at the city's many Irish pubs.
Live music, Irish dancing and lots of Guinness were the order of the day at PJ O'Brien's in Southbank.
Celebrations began early at The Quiet Man in Flemington where a 14-hour party kicked off at 8am.
The Dublin-based brewer expects 13 million glasses of its stout, affectionately known as "the black stuff", to be drunk across the world on Sunday alone.
No comments:
Post a Comment