This week, people all over the world celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, the saint patron of Ireland. We, as Amsterdammers, had the opportunity to bike at the first “St. Patrick Bike Parade”, an event organized by Tourism Ireland and with the help of some beautiful professional bike event squad Cycle Fun Productions, led by Paulien Willems. The parade aimed to bring together two cultures: the bike (iconic for Amsterdam) and St. Patrick’s Day (known for parades and turning the world green).

More than 50 people, Irish, Dutch, English or other expats joined this beautiful green light ride on 13^th of March, 2019. The weather was with us so, we could enjoy this bike ride fully. The event started with a welcoming word from Karen van der Horst, Marketing Manager for Tourism Ireland in the Netherlands and also His Excellency, Ireland Ambassador in the Netherlands, Kevin Kelly.

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

With the bike wheels illuminated with green LED lights, St. Patrick hats, green accessories on the bikes, ring bells and music we had a ride of almost 6 km in the city center of Amsterdam. You could hear all the way the sounds of laughs, bike ring bells and joy. The green lights mirrored on the water of the city channels made the ride more beautiful. People took pictures and video of us, the St. Patrick green riders.

For one evening this bike parade made the “red” city of Amsterdam a “green” one.

The most beautiful part of the evening was one ad hoc live singing of Roberto’s IJsbike. He wrote a special song for this event called “We color Amsterdam in green”, on the music of an Irish classic, “Dirty Old Town”. Roberto made us sing and chant in Museumplein and the night could not end better with this nice song made special to celebrate this St. Patrick ride.

Here is you can hear the full song.

At this beautiful green light parade, I met again #flowerbikeman and #thefairybike with their colorful magic bikes.

• 

• 

• 

Here it’s a live video made by The JoSi Show , J and Silvia, two Expats currently living and working here in Amsterdam. Enjoy the video!

All was good, all was green, and for me and Cherry Cruiser was a nice way to celebrate the Irish culture in Amsterdam, to talk about who we are and how we appreciate each one nationality, to exchange thoughts and to appreciate an beautiful gathering of a community.

About Global Greening

Tourism Ireland’s annual Global Greening initiative has gone from strength to strength – from its beginning back in 2010, when just the Sydney Opera House and the Sky Tower in Auckland went green, to this year, which will be the biggest Global Greening to date. Around 420 sites in 53 different countries are signed up to take part for 2019. From Rome to Rio and from London to Las Vegas, a host of famous buildings and sites around the world will be turning a shade of green over the coming days, according to the Tourism Ireland website.

Loveee your Bike! Cherry Cruiser