TALES and legends of the Wee County will be shared with live audiences this month as part of a storytelling festival.

Wild Hillfoots Storytelling Festival is set to go ahead with a programme of events between October 21 and 28.

It will see lively afternoons and cosy evenings with a host of storytellers, as part of the wider Scottish International Storytelling Festival.

The special week of events, co-ordinated by Hillfoots Tales in the Wee County, will celebrate the tales and legends of Clacks people and the landscape.

Hillfoots Tales is adding to the external offering of the wider Scottish festival for the fourth year with both experienced storytellers as well as those who recently took up the craft.

It comes after virtual events last year, due to restrictions, with organisers looking forward to the return to live settings.

Joanne Dowd, of Hillfoots Tales which became a community interest company during the pandemic, told the Advertiser: “This year we are really quite excited that we are actually going to be able to do some live events.”

The week will kick off with Legends at Legends, an evening of storytelling with Pariag MacNeil and Joanne Dowd at Legends Coffee House, at the foot of the National Wallace Monument.

Audiences heading along on Thursday, October 21, at 7pm can expect Clacks myths and legends of the Hillfoots as well as of William Wallace himself.

An informal afternoon in Story Fest Folklore will go ahead at Tillicoultry's Woolpack Inn on Saturday, October 23, from 2pm.

The event will see Laura Fyall, Eleanor Bell and Joanne Dowd share Clacks folklore with those heading along set to hear tales about the Fairy Minister, Maggie Duncan's Stone and more.

Both Laura and Eleanor are recent apprentices of the storytelling craft.

Joanne said: “Eleanor is telling for the first time, she's doing the Fairy Minister and she's quite excited about that.”

Laura will be telling the story of Maggie Duncan, who is actually one of her distant relatives, in what will be her first time in front of a live audience.

The programme will continue with Three Rivers Rising on Tuesday, October 26, from 7pm at the Bridge Inn in Tillicoultry.

It will be an evening of story and song celebrating the history, folklore and sounds inspired by the rivers Leith, Tay and Forth.

From the industrial past of the Forth, to the birds, beasts and fish on the Tay and the thronging city banks of the Leith, storytellers Svend-Erik Engh, Claire Hewitt and Neil Sutcliffe will celebrate the strong social identities of these waterways.

Finishing off the programme around Clacks will be the Wild Hillfoots Storytelling Workshop from 7pm on Thursday, October 28, at Legends Coffee House.

It will be an opportunity for anyone interested in storytelling to learn and hear some tips.

To book a space for any of the events, visit bit.ly/3uSIiCD or follow Hillfoots Tales on social media.