28/05/08 - WEBSITE REVIEW

The website of Bo'ness Children's Fair Festival is reaching its fourth Fair and over 75,000 have visited almost 600,000 pages and we expect this to increase by another six figure in the coming weeks. We intend to change the site slightly but this won't be done until after this years Fair due to the workload involved and other material being added.

Our aim is to take Bo'ness Children's Fair Festival to the world and we believe we are doing that. The fairytale "Brigadoon" that we believe Bo'ness holds is spectacular and Bo'ness knows that. How many other towns can say they have a huge returning towns people from across the world to view the Fair? Also visitors who visit for the first time have a desire to return to view the spectacular event we have. Two years ago we had friends in town when I performed with the pipe band and they couldn't believe what they had walked into and even the picturesque views across the Firth of Forth they witnessed were breath taking. Most of them now take the time to come on the Fair E'en to view the arches as dusk falls.

Primary school pupils throughout the town and Blackness send in e-mails to let us know where the arches are so we can draw up a map which can be printed off on the Fair E'en to hopefully direct the traffic through the streets of the arch locations. This in itself is a puzzle to try and work out the maze of streets in each corner of the town with all the new streets appearing on the new housing estates. You can also let us know where the arches are if you know where one is and it isn't on the map, please let us know at webmaster@thefairday.com

This year I won't be here to take many pictures of arches and house frontages on the Fair night and early Saturday morning as I did last year due to heading away shortly after the crowning ceremony and missing the Procession for the first time. But I have managed to hold things off to catch the crowning. I would hope you can take a picture of the arches and house frontages and send them to the website for the world to view. Even pictures in the lead up to the Fair of the construction of the arches and frontages will be loaded daily for people to view how our week is going if they are maybe in the house and can't get out or those who can't return for the Fair. We hope the website will make them all feel at home as we constantly change the pictures as soon as possible.

Our efforts to try and make it more wonderful than last year will be time consuming, but we are willing to give it ago to try and add to the viewing of last year. Our plans are on target as the few days remaining draw in.

I hope you enjoyed my wee spiel on the website and look forward to your stories and pictures in the coming weeks. Also if you are returning for the Fair, Douglas would like to hear from you and where you are coming from so he can let everyone know who our visitors are at the Crowning Ceremony. You can e-mail him at the website through webmaster@thefairday.com

It is a privilege to work on the website, my family have worked on fair committees for years and now I work behind the scenes with the website and it wouldn't be possible without the amazing support I have in the community and it wouldn't be possible to mention anyone individually just in case we missed someone out. I hope you all have a Happy Fair Day and look forward to hearing from you in the lead up to the Fair.

Charlie

Herald to Queen Nicola 2001