“Birds go flying at the speed of sound to show you how it all began” – Chris Martin. Nope, I was NOT on the defunct Concorde nor one of Richard Branson’s sky rockets!! I flew from North America to Europe in 4 hours 17 minutes!!! This was the fastest I have EVER done that. I…
Read More
“Nobody knows the way it’s gonna be” – Noel Gallagher. Getting Oasis ticketsin 1997 for the Be Here Now tour was nuts and the proper way to see your favourite rock’n’roll band. Nothing was done online, nobody had the internet, nobody had any type of mobile phone at all, never mind a “smartphone”. Oasis massive…
Read More
“Illusion never changed into something real” – NI *. There are obviously loads of roads and border crossings between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland and I’ve crossed that border about 100 times I’d say, given my list of visits to each country. I’ve crossed by bus, train, foot and car. This includes the…
Read More
“Why do anything, when you can’t forget everything?” – Manic Street Preachers. There are obviously loads of roads and border crossings between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland and I’ve crossed that border about 100 times I’d say, given my list of visits to each country. It was commonplace as a kid on holidays…
Read More
“By a lonely prison wall, I heard a young girl calling” – Pete Saint John. It was a sunshiney day in June 2023, as we toured Athenry Castle, Athenry Town Centre, Athenry Square, Athenry Monastery and the fields that inspired a song back in 1979, called “The Fields Of Athenry“. With all that in mind,…
Read More
“Some might say, we will find a brighter day” – (Some Might Say)* all quotes on this post are from Oasis and this post is dedicated to Colin Walker and Keith Freel. August 1996. Rock’n’roll. I was only 16 years old. I was still officially a student at Bangor Grammar School, having just finished “fifth…
Read More
“In Dublin’s fair city where the girls are so pretty, I first set my eyes on sweet Molly Malone” – Irish Folk Song. As you might have read, I come from and grew up in Northern Ireland. We were the demon in your angel. Back in the 1980s, backpacking in Dublin and Cork was only…
Read More
“You know that feeling you get? You feel you’re older than time. You ain’t exactly sure if you’ve been away a while.” – Noel Gallagher. It felt like I had warped myself back to the 90s when I did this excellent day tour with Irish Day Tours and Extreme Ireland. Despite growing up in Northern…
Read More
It was a weird and emotional return to Cork City for me this month, it had been a twenty year wait to get back here and things just sorted themselves out. I arranged to do a tour with IrishDayTours.ie out to Blarney Castle and to kiss the famous Blarney Stone, which you may have read…
Read More
“Work is the curse of the drinking classes” – Oscar Wilde. On my adventure back to Cork in the Republic of Ireland, I stopped off in Dublin and got booked on a brilliant tour with Day Tours. ie. This was pretty inspiring as I wasn’t just returning to the place I watched Oasis rock in…
Read More