Mystics, ships and spacemen jostle for space at Liffey party

Someone has clearly forgotten to tell the weather gods it's summer time and as people trickle along the north quays in the direction of the Dublin Port River Fest, a biting cold wind blows up from the mouth of the Liffey and thick black clouds with thoughts of downpours start gathering overhead.

Richard Kane from Street Theatre Ireland is hula hooping close the entrance of the festival, just beyond the National Convention Centre. He looks up at the clouds anxiously as children look up at him excitedly.

He shimmies and sways with his hula hoop in time to an unheard beat playing in his head. Some of the children copy him or try to. None succeed. He has wise words for them. “When learning circus tricks we deal with failure constantly,” he tells them.”W e have to because we’re always learning something new and learning new things means getting them wrong over and over again. And then, once we have them mastered, we move on to other new things. And we fail at them too, for a while. So don’t be disappointed by failure,” he says.

Nearby a juggling man is teaching another group to keep three balls in the air while a woman dressed as a pirate is balancing plates on a stick. There is a lot of “failure” on display but a lot of laughs too.

In the water there are three tall ships, four if you count the lonely Jeannie Johnston moored and covered in scaffolding on the other side of the Samuel Beckett Bridge. People queue patiently to board all the ships but poor Jeanie.

Back on land there are dozens of food stalls and a handful of stalls flogging arts and crafts, costume jewellery and One Direction baseball hats. In the early part of the day business is slow. “It is still a bit early to tell how things will go. I think tomorrow will be the day,” 1D hatter Paul Preston says. “There is a big crowd expected. But Monday will be very bad,” he says forlornly. He is basing his dismal predictions on some dismal weather forecasts he has heard.

Beaufort and Shackleton won’t be worrying about the weather. The two tug boats, which are the workhorses of Dublin Port, are dancing in the centre of the river. They can drag enormous cruise ships into tight spaces but they are also incredibly nimble as they prove to the oohs and aahs of the watching crowd. They nudge each other, then back away suddenly and turn in incredibly tight circles to a soundtrack of Wagner’s Flight of the Valkyries.

“You’re not getting a cross-bow, not until you’re 12,” a cross woman hisses at a soon to be sobbing four-year old who has turned his back on the tug boats and has wandered over to a stall selling cute wood carvings and less cute weapons of mini destruction. “You can have the bow and arrow but the cross bow is too dangerous. Not until you’re 12,” she repeats.

A spaceman walks past. His face is hidden behind a large mirrored glass helmet but despite the camouflage he seems sad. He trudges down the quays handing out fliers for a popular, vaguely space-themed, 1950s style burger joint which has just opened on the quays.

Two kids are practically hanging off his suit, badgering him to explain what all the apparatus on it does. Instead of saying “Absolutely nothing, this is a costume made of flimsy material, you lackwits,” as he may well have done, he uses a clever diversionary tactic . “Oh look a dog,” he practically shrieks as a small Jack Russell called Toby walks past. The two little boys are momentarily distracted allowing the spaceman to make good his escape.

In the early afternoon all the hurdy gurdies are attracting long queues of children and long-faced parents who realise there’s no such thing as a free carousel or free face painter. “A fiver!” one parent exclaims before hauling her child out of the face painting queue. “That’s a ridiculous price to pay,” she says. She’s not wrong.

The “Ice Blast” slide meanwhile costs what appears to be a reasonable euro a pop. Kids bring a large tyre to the top of the slide and them go down in a frenzy of shrieking that lasts exactly three seconds. One euro. Three seconds of fun. An hour of constant sliding on this ride would cost €1,200.

Past the Ice Blast is a stage when musicians and magicians normally perform. But right now someone from Dublin Port is on the stage with two dogs. He points at one of the mutts and tells the 100 or so people who have gathered in front of him that “Buster was only trained on drugs”.

There is a ripple of laughter as a wag in the crowd says “Jaysus, it musta been hard to train a dog who’d taken loads of drugs, wha?”

Turns out Buster is a sniffer dog. And to prove he’s really, really good his trainer has some tests lined up. He’s going to sniff out some drugs planted about the place. The wag looks worried and moves off.

Not far away, Madame Matilda, the seventh daughter of a seventh daughter, stands alone. She is reading palms for a tenner. Or at least trying to but there are few takers. Business is very slow on the first day of the three day event but she is very upbeat. "We're expecting a lot of good things from this festival," she says. It is unclear if she is using the royal We or referring to herself and her friend in the spirit world. "Yes, there will a lot of bright things happening here this weekend."

Well, she should know.