Liam Gaynor's love and knowledge of Dundalk make him the perfect walking tour guide

"It's great, I love Dundalk, I love the history of Dundalk, I've always had an interest in Dundalk. I'm collecting books on its history since I was 12, I'm big into the local history.”

Listening to Liam Gaynor explaining how he became involved as a guide in the SEEK Festival Walking Tours of Dundalk, it is clear to see that his involvement is a labour of love.

The SEEK Festival Walking Tours bring those who take part on a 90 minute tour of the town, beginning at Dundalk Tourist Office at Market Square, visiting the murals, and learning about the artists and the stories behind the pieces they have created, as well as pieces on Dundalk’s rich history and heritage.

Liam has been taking visitor on the walking tours for the past three years. “The festival is operating five years, I'm doing the tours three years”, he explains.

“It just started off by accident. I didn't intend to get into this sort of thing. I went on one of the tours, Martin McElligott was running the tour and he asked me, 'would you be interested in doing them yourself?' So it just started off by accident.”

During the tours Liam interweaves the stories behind the contemporary urban art of the murals, with interesting pieces of information about the history of Dundalk.

“There would be no tour without the murals. We build the tour around the murals. In between the murals I could be talking about architects, buildings, things that happened in Dundalk, historical things on the way [to the next mural].”

The walking tours are becoming very popular and are becoming a real attraction for tourists visiting the area. “Last year I did over 80”, he reveals. “I do them the first Friday of every month, from the tourist office at 11.30”.

He adds that if someone rings in and says they have eight people or ten people, and they'd like to do a tour, “if I'm around I'll do it.”

It's not just tourists that take the tours however. “We had one yesterday”, he explains, “that was the first tour of the SEEK festival, and we had two Americans, two people from Galway - there was 22 people on it.

“I do retired teacher groups, I did one for the DkIT lecturers. “I'll do the Transition Year in St Vincent's, I'll do six tours for them. It's going all the time”.

Liam has also noticed the impact on tourism, the visit earlier this year of US president Joe Biden to Dundalk has had. “I had a tour, it's a good couple of weeks ago now, and there were two people from Ohio, they came to Dundalk specially because of Joe Biden. So let's hope there's more of that.”

Looking at this year's SEEK Festival, Liam marvels at the international involvement. “There's five new murals coming in this year. The two guys from Holland working on the Imperial Hotel mural. “A guy from South Africa doing the Setanta mural. We have a Polish artist and a French artist. “It's wonderful for Dundalk.”

Liam talks about many of the interesting thing that have happened and are happening in Dundalk on the tours. “The facade project, where all the buildings are being painted on, its another great thing. We talk about all of that [on the tour] and the restoration work.”

One fascinating piece of information Liam shares, is about the unique style of architecture that can be seen on some of the old buildings on Clanbrassil Street. “It's called Dundalk Style architecture – the heads above the buildings, that's called Dundalk Style”, Liam reveals.

Liam also curates some of the tours for the benefit of some taking part. “I have a tour tomorrow, that's for the wheelchair association, I do that every so often, it's a specialist tour that takes an hour or less.”

One new feature of he tours that is happening this year is the strEAT tour. SEEK has teamed up with Mo Chara and The Tipsy Cow in Dundalk to create a strEAT Tour experience.

Explaining the strEAT tour that he was taking on Monday (yesterday), “it's coming out of Mo Chara. “So you come out of Mo Chara, we do the tour and you end back in Mo Chara for food and its all in the price.”

For anyone wishing to take part in any of the walking tours, booking is essential but very straightforward. Find out more at www.seekdundalk.ie/post/seek-walking-tours.

You can also get in touch with Dundalk Tourist Office on 042 9352111 or info@dundalktouristoffice.ie for more information.