
Dee Kelleghan workshop
Artist and Astronomer Dee Kelleghan paid a visit to Newport National School during Space Week for an art workshop. The pupils learned all about the Apollo 11 moon landing and then they all produced pastel drawings of the iconic event The drawings will be exhibited in Hotel Newport during the Mayo Dark Sky Festival. #news

Tourism Ireland in Germany
Thanks to Tourism Ireland's German ezine features Mayo Dark Skies and the Dark Sky Festival ... https://media.ireland.com/de-de/news-releases/local/german/2018/e-zine-october-2018/astro-tourismus-viel-licht-in-irischer-nacht #news

Ktec Telescopes
Thanks to Stephen and the gang at Ktec Telescopes for the lovely mention on their website. Ktec will be on hand over the festival weekend displaying a huge range of telescopes, accessories and a wonderful display of meteorites. They're the best in the business, both knowledgeable and helpful, so do drop in if you have any questions about the right telescope or lens for your needs! #news

Opening Night
The 2018 festival opening will be a little different... The wonderful CODA will perform in St. Patricks Church Newport at 7pm on Friday 2nd November Coda are a Mayo based group of seven singers and musicians who have developed their own unique and richly-harmonised approach to vocal performance from diverse vocal and instrumental backgrounds, including folk, trad, blues, rock and pop music, uniquely complemented by their multi-part vocal harmony experience gained from classic

French Embassy
We are so pleased to be partnered with the French Embassy in bringing 'Chasseurs de Nuits' to the Mayo Dark Sky Festival. This exhibition will run throughout the festival weekend in Ballycroy National Park Visitor Centre and will be one of the highlights of our third festival. This 'sensory solar system (which premiered at the Nighscapades event in Lourdes France in April 2018), invites you to discover our solar system with your fingertips. From the Sun, through the lunar cr

Astronomy Ireland September 2018
Thanks to 'Astronomy Ireland' who have featured our festival in their September issue! #news #press #2018

Exhibition in Ballycroy
What a treat! Franck Seguin of Chasseurs de Nuits brings his exhibition (which premiered at the Nightscapades Festival in France in early 2018) to Wild Nephin Ballycroy National Park Vistor Centre. The advent of new technology in printing has made photography accessible to all. Photographic printers, by superimposing thin layers of ink successively, give a relief and texture to photographs, making them ‘visible’. This means that visually impaired and blind people, as well a

Meet our latest speaker
We are delighted to welcome Dr. Niall Smith to the line-up for this year's festival. Niall has been Head of Research at Cork Institute of Technology since 2005. He is also founder member and Principal Scientist at Blackrock Castle Observatory (BCO) in Cork. The Observatory houses a robotic observatory alongside Ireland’s first interactive science centre based on the theme of Life in the Universe. Dr. Smith’s research interests include optical searches for extrasolar planets u

Tickets now on sale!
You can now buy ONE DAY or WEEKEND passes for the Mayo Dark Sky Festival via our ticketing partners at Eventbrite With just over two months to go, we are regularly adding details about talks and other events, so keep checking back as talk titles are finalised - and we may even add a new event or two! We hope you agree that €20 for a one day pass and €30 for a weekend pass offers great value for money. Anyone wishing to attend just one or two events can pay the entry fee at t

Fun at the cinema
We had a great turnout for our 'sneak preview' event in the W Cinema. We had so many responses with requests for seats that we had to move to a bigger screen! Special thanks to Derek Dempsey of Newport Astronomy Club for an excellent ‘Introduction to Astronomy’, and to Penny and all the wonderful staff at the cinema. #news #2018