04/17/2024
Hello all from the Northern Arizona Celtic Heritage Society! Thanks to Flagstaff Highland Games for letting us take over your page for a minute.
First to clarify…the Flagstaff Highland Games is an entity of athletes. The Arizona Highland Celtic Festival is an event celebrating all things Celtic. I hope that clears up most of the confusion. If you want to be kept in the loop on the Celtic Festival offerings, please follow the Northern Arizona Celtic Heritage Society’s page.
With regard to athletic competition and the festival in general, our 2023 year was brutal with extreme heat and loss of revenue. For those who are not in the know, it takes a lot of up-front money to host an event and if attendance is nil, you end up starting from scratch. We have done the best we can with what we have to provide for athletic competition. When you do not own the land, you have little say as to what you can do with it. Athletes did not like the carnival lot as it was too compacted and damaged the cabers, etc. Unfortunately, we are not allowed to modify that in any way. So, we went to great expense to rent the arena/grandstand area as our athletic director thought it would be a good fit. We are now hearing that people aren’t a fan of putting athletics far away and in horse dung (can’t blame ya there!). This year, with finances the way they are we have not other option and are unable to include athletics in this year’s schedule. This was not an easy decision.
We are looking into possibilities for the future and welcome constructive ideas if any of you are interested in helping (rather than making nasty comments), we would love to have your help. We value athletic competition but cannot know what to provide without constructive input. You can message us at the Northern Arizona Celtic Heritage Society’s page if you want to offer some ideas or be included in the planning discussions.
Meanwhile, we will be hosting our 26th Arizona Highland Celtic Festival at Fort Tuthill in Flagstaff, with all the wonderful entertainment (the Wicked Tinkers), educational workshops, fabulous vendors and more! Dates for the festival will be July 20 and 21!
