Laois

... - Brussels - Ypre - Lille - Nice - Paris - Le Quesnoy - Strasbourg - Stuttgart - Berlin - Munich (& Dachau) - Venice - Rome - Napoli - Pompeii - Rome - Dublin - Galway - Electric Picnic (Music festival, Co. Laois) - Dublin - London - Hong Kong - NZ

We hired a car and set out for Laois (pronounced "Leash") on Wednesday. There's now a ring road in the south of Dublin which makes it very easy to get out of Dublin. In under an hour we made it to my Great Aunt Ada's house in Abbeyleix. Abbeyleix is a ...

... for a spot of tourism? Australia is lucky to have Uuluru, otherwise there'd be no tourist buses there either. The guide books call Laois "flat and boring". But I like it. There's nothing fancy about Laois, but it is a great way to ease into Irish ...

... spent my first year in a drawer with a hot water bottle for company. This was during the winter of 1973 in Coolbanagher, Laois. My grandfather has spent most his life in the "Old Rectory" next to Coolbanagher church and my father also called Coolbanagher ...

Got this far on my trip and I had a car accident, had to go to hospital and head home, no serious ...

... way. Michelle managed to get a head cold, yes that is possible south of the equator. So Liam, Jonny, James, Donal (from Laois) and Monica his Spanish girlfriend took to the grade 2 rapids for a spot of kayaking. The instructor was useless and for ...

... of the highlights during my stay in Ireland was writing a number of articles for the Leinster Express about the personalities of County Laois. Following is a chat with two publicans from the village of Abbeyleix I had published at the end of 1999: ...

... the place completely destroyed (btw kudos to the person who commented on my Facebook status, wondering why I noticed that everyone had discovered Laois? your day will come Laois, it really will.....) And so that was it. Possibly one of the most ...

... and I even had a heat rash .   Then we had our music festival Electric picnic with 'water bed' camping in a yurt fri-sun in Laois so that was weird leaving the baby but we both survived ok. She was good as gold for Mum. I breast fed ...

... Asians. Luxury flats and town houses dot the city, there's a new train system and summer happened two months ago. We're off to Laois and the Deverell ancestory home tomorrow, were we'll catch up with the cricket team and the Rock of Dunamese, where I'm ...

... off. People who i will never forget are as follows, in NZ there was Shane Bopper the mad cork man went let loose, Eilish from Laois who was my hair dresser, Seba the French dude who took me and benny rock climbing, Jill the wee dub who was fond of the ...

... to go anyway. We got to the airport and flew to Heathrow. When we landed in Heathrow we met a puppet theatre group from Laois who posed for a picture with Calluna who was delighted to meet so many other soft folk. (Picture to follow when we find the ...

... sad to see the back of it! And just my luck, they are only now working on extending the motorway the rest of the way from Laois to Limerick! Oh well, when I drive that road again some day it will be a whole new experience. There is a gap of three weeks ...