Inverness Hogmanay Party Attracts 10,000

An estimated 10,000 people attended the Inverness Hogmanay celebration, which ended the six-week Inverness Winter Festival run by The Highland Council’s Inverness City Committee.
 
The festivities began at 7.30 pm when a 500-strong torchlight procession led by Provost Jimmy Gray, Chairman of the Inverness City Committee, left Inverness Castle to enjoy the first of two firework displays over Inverness Cathedral at 8pm and ended in the early hours of 2009 at the Northern Meeting Park Arena, when a piece of sporting history was made with the staging of the world's first ever Global Highland Games event - The Highland Fling.
 
Following the first fireworks display, the crowd at the Northern Meeting Park steadily swelled over the night, as Inverness Has Talent Winner 9 Year old Lyndsay Sutherland and the Northern Constabulary Pipes and Drums Band and Shutter, Lowtide Revelry and Single Malt Sound System got revellers singing along and dancing.
 
Headline Band The Magic Numbers played until shortly before midnight, when fireworks were let off and the bells at Inverness Cathedral rang out to herald the start of 2009 as live pictures from Waipu in New Zealand and Greensboro in the USA appeared on the four giant screens which had been erected during a rousing singing of Auld Lang Syne. The concert ended with a pounding performance by Scottish Pipes and Drums Band Albannach.

Councillor Roy Pedersen, Inverness Winter Festival Working Group Chairman, said: “We are absolutely delighted with the atmosphere that was created on the night by the well behaved and enthusiastic crowd of all ages that we set out to attract and their reaction to the show has been fantastic. It has been a long time since we staged a Hogmanay party in Inverness and it provided a perfect end to the Festival, which has been extremely well received by all sections of our community." 
 
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