Skip to main content

Durham Fringe Festival.

In-between this mad social whirl we were suddenly experiencing, Dr Fred had two attempts at going on a balloon ride which I had bought him as a birthday present and in spite of some amazing weather each attempt was cancelled at the last minute due to adverse weather conditions - its set up to try again in September!! So we had some outings planned but they didn't come off so the next excitement happening was volunteering for the Durham Fringe Festival.  I had seen this on line and offered my services as I was beginning to feel a bit cabin fevered and I really felt I needed to get out into the real world and explore a bit of local life and culture - and the idea of helping out at something which was slightly alternative and a new venture appealed to me.   I was asked to help with some setting up early in the week and then to work in the comedy club for three nights over the weekend. 

Richard Pulsford - A Bit Rich - crazy clever quick fire one liners - heading for Edinburgh Fringe

I had a great time and while I did feel very strange being out n the wide world with other people it was an interesting and fun way to meet some new people and see some great performances.  The comedy was very good - all of it that I saw was very clever and well appreciated by the audience which grew as word about this brand new festival spread.  My favourite was 'Wishes on the Wind' a small musical playlet performed by two people with fabulous voices and beautiful harmonies.  It was well written with a balance of humour and emotion and I saw it three times and loved it each time.  


Wishes an the Wind - lovely harmonies...

I also made a quick dash to one of the other three venues showing fringe performances and enjoyed a brilliant play which was basically a skit on Jane Austen called 'Emma' performed by the Menstrual Rage Theatre Company who all originated at the Northern School of Art.  Hilarious take on female friendships and very fun and well produced - even in the rain!!!!   

The Festival was thought up and actualised by a small group of like minded Durham residents- no mean feat 30 different shows more than 100 performances and they sold over 2000 tickets-  it was a massive success and I look forward to being involved next year,  I met some interesting people and it was so very good to do something different and so worthwhile.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Vigo

We left the ship to explore Vigo. Its a much larger place then we expected... although tbh I hadn't given ut a lot of thought. Its a real mish mash of old and new and having got a map from tourist info we decided to follow the walking trail to the Monte Castro... the highest point of the town.  Most of the town was pretty much as everywhere else... lots of traffic... lots of people... one or two interesting buildings and a lot of shopping. We headed to the art gallery - this has been a year of gallery visits so we we seen o reason to change now.  The Museo de Marco is housed in the towns ex prison building and its very grand. In fact, I think that on this occaision the building might have been more interesting than the art....  Although the visiting exhibition by Susanne S D Themlitz was strangely compelling. It was a huge varied collection of eclectic items... found, salavaged, manipulated and arranged in lots of ways - weirdly inspiring - and mostly enjoyable to look at...

verdant lushness

Its a never ending island hop... today we hopped of the boat at Kingstown, on the island St. Vincents and Grenadine. Once through the usual port duty free - cheap booze and diamonds to go milarkey we were straight into the town... crazy noisy smelly chaos... refreshingly no tat shops for tourists, just local markets and street traders all vying for local sales.  Music blasting from everywhere, cars (very battered and often very pimped) all over the roads - parked in the middle of the street, loading, unloading, chatting seemingly oblivious to the total traffic jam caused behind them...  We walked through this mayhem - the temperatures were rising probably about 30 degrees - tourists evident by trying to walk on the shady side of the street - even when we turned off the main drag and there were less people it was still like carnival time with music blasting everywhere. Its very atmospheric and mostly promotes a good vibe although I have heard '3 little birds' everywhich way a...

Almost last chapter... In which our Go Stargazing team watch Astonishing Aurora Borealis seen from the deck of the Astonishing Borealis!!!

The weather brightened considerably and the snowy peaks lining our sail down the fjiords  looked glorious and sparkly in the sunshine against a (mainly) blue sky back drop.   More awesome scenary.... the Go Stargazing team wrapt up their lectures ... only searching for the illusive Northern Lights remained.  The tension from the night before dissolved in the sunshine the forecast for Aurora borealis was looking fairly positive - it was the captains farewell cocktsil party so everyone had their gladrags on.. We ate dinner and sky remained clear so we headed back to our room and donned as many layers as we could move in and proceeded to deck 10 in anticipation of stars and northern lights..... it did not dissappiont - just we got there as the bridge announced that the lights could be seen on the starboard side of the ship. It was stunning. Slowly the intensity built. The auroral green became brighter and bigger areas appe...