Art is not something I particularly dig to be honest. I hardly ever visit art galleries and do find quite a lot of paintings over-rated, and some forms of art totally irrelevant and actually stupid, rather than clever. Which is why Sheffield came as a particular surprise. Growing up in Northern Ireland you really Read more about A Town Of Murals: Touring Sheffield, Tasmania, Australia[…]
Once you’ve worked in “weeding” in your life, I would have to say that most other jobs seem easy. I didn’t plan to do weeding, but while employed by Work Direct (A harvest and labouring work agency in Devonport, Tasmania) I told them I would do any job, and this often meant getting phone calls Read more about Weeding in Wesley Vale and Bishopsbourne[…]
I had never heard of the Carlyle Hotel, or even the district of Moonah, some kind of northern suburb of Hobart, I believe. It was time to hold the closest ever meeting to the South Pole for any Northern Ireland Supporters Club in history. And thanks to Hobart based, Andy Power, the venue was sorted, Read more about Closest Ever NISC Meeting To The South Pole[…]
So from our peak at Rinadeena, it was time to head downhill from the mines and into an area, barely a village named Dubbil Barril, note the strange spelling as opposed to Double Barrel. The rainforest route on the way down was totally amazing, we past gorges. We must have gone Read more about West Coast Wilderness Railway Part Five – Cow Dairy at Dubbil Barril[…]
WEST COAST WILDERNESS RAILWAY PART FOUR – LUNCH AT RINADEENA (RAINDROP) So I left behind the remote mining village of Lynchford, for this lifetime at least. This is where the train tracks got steeper and became a railway incline, as part of the famous “rack and pinion” system. I had already been on the Read more about West Coast Wilderness Railway Part Four – Lunch At Rinadeena (Raindrop)[…]
It’s truly kicking in – World Cup Fever. The passion that I first had back in June 1986 is back. I was too young to remember the 1982 World Cup sadly. Which is a shame because Northern Ireland won the group, and beat host nation Spain. However by 1986, I was a big Norman Whiteside Read more about World Cup Fever in the Land Down Under: Australia, June 2010[…]
It’s sounds a bit silly if I say “I’ve always been interested in railways”, because I say that about so many things. But there is something inspiring about being onboard a train. There’s history, character, atmosphere, geography, music involved in train journeys. And Michael Palin has a series called “The World’s Great Train Journeys.” I Read more about Don River Railway[…]
Ask me 12 years ago if I thought I’d be working as a broccoli harvester when I’m 30, and I would simply have laughed at you! But there I was, aged 30, working on farms in Northern Tasmania as a broccoli harvester. Loving it. I got into it totally by chance, but through my insistence Read more about Broccoli Fields Forever[…]
My second time in Hobart was three months after my first time. And I’ll be back again next week to watch the World Cup with a Northern Irish mate. It’s a city that has grown on me, or what I mean is I didn’t like it much at the start and now I do. I Read more about Brunswick Hotel, Victoria Tavern, Glentoran v Dundee United, Bushmills and The Charlatans[…]
It’s another of those small little close knit community towns in Tasmania. This one, I’ve passed through about 6 times, and lived just 44 kilometres away from it while camping up in Poatina. It’s simply called Campbelltown. Campbell is a popular surname in my home country of Northern Ireland, and one of my best mates Read more about No Sign of Paddy In Campbelltown[…]