We are still days away from St. Patrick’s Day, but the festivities are already starting around Central Florida. Whether you are celebrating your heritage or just enjoy the music and food, most people will be wearing green and looking for the nearest Irish pub to enjoy the holiday.
Downtown Orlando
If you’re celebrating St. Patrick’s Day in Downtown Orlando, Wall Street Plaza is where most revelers wrap up their night out. Since the holiday falls on a Sunday, Orlando Pub Crawl is calling this year’s event St. “Practice Day.” The pub crawl starts Saturday, March 16, with the expectation of continuing into Sunday. St. Practice Day kicks off at 8 p.m. at Lizzy McCormack’s with scheduled stops at Celine, Irish Shannon’s and finally at Wall Street Plaza just before midnight. Tickets are $10 before March 6 and $20 on the day of the event. If you have had too much to drink, ride-sharing options will be plentiful throughout the downtown area.
Raglan Road Irish Pub & Restaurant
Raglan Road at Disney Springs is celebrating its biggest day of the year with the Mighty St. Patrick’s Festival. The all-ages event features three days of live Irish music from March 15-17. Nine bands will perform with headliner Young Dubliners as well as the Raglan Road Irish dancers. The venue will offer gourmet versions of traditional Irish cuisine with it brunch, lunch, dinner and bar menus available all three days.
Baldwin Park St. Patrick's Festival
A portion of New Broad Street will be shut down for a free festival in Baldwin Park. The Orlando neighborhood is encouraging guests to stroll through the festival with drinks in hand on March 16 from noon until 6 p.m. There will also be music, art and food trucks.
Shamrockin’ Festival
Meg O’Malley’s in Downtown Melbourne is celebrating St. Patrick’s Day with its 20th annual Shamrockin’ Festival. A free street party and parade will be held on Saturday, March 16 at 11 a.m. Then on St. Patrick’s Day, the restaurant and bar will kick off a street party at 8 a.m. with Irish breakfast and two stages for live music.
If you want to be safe and charitable on St. Patrick's Day the ride-sharing app Lyft will donate $1 to the The Keri Anne DeMott Foundation for every Lyft ride taken on March 17. The foundation was named after University of Central Florida student Kerri Anne DeMott, who was killed by a drunk driver in 2015. The foundation works with the Florida Highway Patrol, local law enforcement to raise awareness of drunk, distracted and impaired driving.
