It’s one of those annoying Government buzzwords so let’s claim it back with a Rainy Days and Songdays Green Lighting megamix around the world. Our favourite songs with ‘green’ in the title and the countries where they transport us.
As a recruiting call for Ireland our pals at Tourism Ireland would have been proud as in true singer style Johnny namechecks everywhere on the Emerald Island.
Quite who the girl from Tipperary town with the lips like eiderdown is Johnny would never say, perhaps because June would have killed him.
The old rogue Burns was pure rock’n’roll and could pen a lyric and a tune which is probably why he is held in such high regard by the greatest singer-songwriters of the latter half of the 20th century.
With Bob Dylan, no less, crediting the Scot as his greatest inspiration.
The Milanese Verdi had the support of Gaetano Donizetti from nearby Bergamo whom he visited in Vienna which, of course, was the capital of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
And that included Bohemia, or the current-day Czech Republic where the thing to do when you’re in Prague is take in a production at the opera house.
Every nation sacrificed its most promising generation in No Man’s Land but for those from the furthest outposts of Empire… well, it just seems to be all the more pointless to modern sensibilities.
Eric Bogle, a Scots-born Australian, explores the pyschological cost to one survivor ‘young Willie McBride’. And it was all the more poignant after I’d seen the statue of the Scots soldier in northern France.
The story goes that the Stax house band were waiting around for the Sun artist and rockabilly singer Billy Lee Riley to turn up and developed the song.
And why Green Onions? Well Booker T. Jones self-deprecatingly said it was because green onions were the nastiest thing he could think of and something you could throw away. We never would.
Either way it’s flag-waving, Americana. And even if you don’t know the song you’ll recognise the tune.
Particularly if you’re a fan of Celtic FC who famously play in green and white hoops and who have adapted the song and lyrics into a favourite fans’ song With a Four-leaf Clover on My Breast.
The evergreen Cliff belts this one out from the Seventies.
The Peter Pan of Pop who was born in India, grew up in England, and has had homes in Portugal and Barbados, though he is selling up in Bim (and yes I’m interested).
Good enough for Princess Diana and kiddies Wills and Harry, Alton Towers is the rollercoaster rip-up by royal appointment.
A big kiddie at heart, and let’s remember she was barely out of her nappies herself when she had them, Diana’s memorable visit to Alton Towers put it on the global map.
Probably best though to forget the jolly japes of the It’s a Royal Knockout jolly japes Olde England tournament.
The Royal Carousel
Only to say that this corner of the unfashionable Potteries area of the English Midlands has the royal seal of approval.
Thrills and spills
It is too just a hop, skip and a jump over the water for theme park fans from Ireland.
Queasy tummy time
And this is where our friends at Irish Ferries come in with a two-day family getaway.
You and your 2.2 family (under-11s) will stay at the Best Western in Stoke-on-Trent just 15 miles out from the park.
While, of course, Wicklow more than fulfils the staple of every good Camino, stop-off waterholes!
Walk with me around Wickla
Launching the programme, Fred Verdier, of Wicklow Tourism, said: ‘As tourism finally starts to open up again in Ireland, we wanted to be ready for our guests coming to explore Wicklow – The Garden of Ireland.
‘The idea of the Passport was born a couple of years ago. It gives visitors new ideas of things to do and places to see and visit.’
King of Scotland and King of Ireland in Rathdrum
The idea is to collect 15 or more stamps and become a Wicklow ambassadors and you will receive a certificate and gift from Wicklow Tourism.
It is a right royal bunfight between two English counties which the Queen has now ruled on. So sorry Cornwall, it’s heaven for Devon… ONE decrees it’s jam on cream.
It’s actually timely that the Queen’s pastry chefs have revealed that Her Maj is Devonian in her scone tastes.
All of which is bad news for neighbouring West Country county Cornwall where it’s cream on jam.
Knowing look: Mary Berry’s giving nothing away
And why is this centuries-old row brewing again? Well, because supermarket chain Sainsbury’s is in the eye of the storm for putting out an advert where a Cornwall scone has the cream on first.
Creme de la creme
What we do know from living down near those parts is that Devon is the cream (we actually like Cornwall too but for the purposes of this article…)
And Ireland’s national airline carrier knows it too, or is coming around to it now.
Aer Lingus has announced that it is launching a direct flight to historic Exeter from August 30.
With my old friends Aer Lingus
And helpfully flags up for those who don’t know the county the city’s Gothic cathedral and its quayside as well as its national parks Exmoor and Dartmoor.
And for paleontologists its Jurassic Coast in East Devon, with its 185 million years of history.
While we were taken too among the attractions by Beer. And there’s little surprise there.
Mind you, Beer is better known for its chalk cliffs and quarry caves.
I dare say there are lovely craft beers down here but real Cornwallians and Devonians drink cider.
East Devon and the Jurassic Coast
Now don’t get us started on which is the better. Although we do know a wee old woman in Buckingham Palace who swears by one of them!
With Aer Lingus fares starting at from just €36.99 and four weekly flights on offer you’d have to be a dinosaur not to explore this magical corner of England.
It’s been one of the catchphrases of politicians over this Covid year but I prefer it when the UK’s Four Nations approach is a cruise.
And as we look into the horizon to the days (next year hopefully) when we can all cruise around foreign shores again, let’s celebrate our own British Isles.
And that’s what our old friends at Royal Caribbean are doing with their All roads lead to the British Isles pitch.
Whistlestop tour
Now Royal Caribbean helpfully give us a Four Nations approach.
That’s a whistlestop digital tour of the British Isles which geographically (and not politically) also includes the Republic of Ireland to make it five.
All of which we’ll leave to others to debate as cruiseheads leave the outside world behind when we’re on the waters around our shores.
Deal me in
Kings and the Castle: Edinburgh
Royal Caribbean is offering three 12-night options on Jewel of the Seas which leaves from Amsterdam… and, of course, Royal Caribbean will keep you abreast of the latest Travel guidelines.
But so that you can get saving here’s their offers:
RC has an interior room for €1369 for August 19, 2022, which checks in at Edinburgh with its Castle, its historic Royal Mile and Greyfriars Bobby statue.
Then up to seee Nessie at Loch Ness, Greenock from where James Watt, the father of steam power, originates.
Onto Liverpool, home of the Beatles and the Son and Heir, over to Cork, the last stop for Titanic before its transatlantic voyage although maybe best not mentioned in shipping circles here.
St Peter Port in the Channel Islands will be your last stop on this tour and obviously we’ve inserted a Jersey Cow heere.
Can I be trusted on a bike? In Amsterdam
Before checking out the White Cliffs of Dover, and we won’t spoil a classic song by mentioning that Bluebirds don’t fly over here and that they’re really found in the US of A.
I said we won’t.
Those white Cliffs of Dover
Before you’re back in Amsterdam, and seeing that this trip is for next year and we’ll all be back to normal spend some time in one of the world’s great cities.
And travel to the Promised Land Israel close before the end of the year.
Israel, as we all know, has been the real leading light in vaccine roll-outs.
With half its population now having had their second jags.
And boy have they been celebrating with this year’s Yom Ha’atzmaut, Israel’s Independence Day a real cause for celebration.
It has brought people out on the streets to sing, dance and watch the fireworks display.
Dublin is El Al City
Israel, of course, was the shiny new El Al route from Dublin for 2020, only for it to be interrupted by Covid.
The good news is that Sharon Bershadsky, Director at the Israel Tourism Office in London made real connections on her visit to Dublin last year.
And she is keen to get the Irish out to Israel as soon as we can.
A land of our childhood
From May 23 vaccinated groups of international travellers will be allowed out to Israel initially in a pilot scheme and then through a phased approach.
And don’t we all want to get out there but again our political leaders continue to drag their feet.
I’ve said it before that I’ve got real close to stepping on holy land.
I have seen Israel from Mt Nebo, Moses’s last resting place, and by the Jordan where John the Baptist baptised Jesus with G Adventures.
Israel is over there: Atop Mt Nebo
And I’m determined to step across into Israel. And yes, you can do countries with G Adventures.
This ancient land of Israel, and all its previous incarnations, is the one country we all know from childhood.
Even if we have never been there, through our religious classes.
So it’s a real challenge to present it anew but one which Sharon succeeded in consumately.
Best of both worlds
No place like dome
The appeal of the Promised Land is obvious, it’s not called that for nothing.
And its historical and religious sites will always draw us there.
But Israel is a diverse country of peoples, cultures, geography… and of course culinary.
There is more than milk and honey although both are to be recommended and used in many of their best dishes.
Tel Aviv and Jerusalem is a combined trip which will give the traveller the best of both worlds.
Modern hip beach Mediterannean Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, where three religions meet.
Hotting up
Good to go
Jews, Muslims and Christians all come together too in Haifa on the northern coast in a model of co-existence.
Israel really is a country of contrasts with the traveller able to lie back and think of…
Well, nothing on the Dead Sea, or take a boat out on the Dead Sea and snorkel or tuck into the barbecue and Israeli wine.
In fact the water may just be a blessed relief.
From the heat of an Israeli summer with temperatures hitting the high 40s… great for me, I must admit.
Because of the year that’s in it, it may be the Autumn or Winter when we all get out there which is real good by me.
Rihanna was there to meet me but where was my party?
Ri-Ri is the first face you’ll see as you walk into Grantley Adams Airport, Bridgetown, Barbados, through its open-air entrance.
Follow the signs
She’s there draped on the wall in the arrivals area along with the world’s greatest-ever cricket all-rounder Sir Gary Sobers.
And, yes, I’m talking about you Laura
And from this past week she has smiling excited visitors to greet again as Grantley Adams reopens.
Sign here
We’ll be filling up soon
In the balmy heat of an early Bajan summer evening I found myself spending more time with the superstar than the party I was there to meet.
I hadn’t picked out Barbados tourism’s board or that the blonde Afro traveller a few groups ahead of me in the queue was heading that way.
Incoming flights from the UK and Ireland
And so I found myself on my own in the airport long after everyone else had left.
The friendly Bajan airport staff allowed me back through customs to double check if my party were there before connecting me with a taxi firm and my hotel.
That’s far
And a bottle of rum to go please
In said taxi I asked the handsome Twentysomething driver about his family and if he had a partner.
To which he said that the Bajan girls were all after the same thing.
I had heard from my West Indian pal that there were three women to every one man on the island.
Can we get off yet?
I asked him to turn the taxi around to remove me from such temptation.
But I then thought better of it, and besides what would the poor staff at the Grantley Adams Airport make of me showing up again so soon.
Barbados Aer
And, of course, my Rihanna
And for our Irish friends, Aer Lingus are now on board too with new flights through Manchester from October 20. With fares from £199.
And you can attach on the connecting flights from Dublin and Cork from €249 and from Belfast from £239.
There’s an advert on Irish television where the winner of the EuroMillions lottery buys a tropical island for his friends and family… oh Ireland in the sun!
Didn’t he know there was a Caribbean island there already which is more Irish than Ireland?
Montserrat is the tiny 39 and a half sqm Emerald Island of the Caribbean because of its Irish links which run deep.
The Irish have been around the Leeward Island since 1632, sent there from neighbouring St Kitts and later Virginia.
Fly the flag
Sounds of Ireland: The oul’ harp
Montserrat was to build a thriving economy around tobacco and indigo (that’s blue dye) and later tobacco and sugar.
Fast forward to today by way of Cromwell’s transportations, and if it wasn’t for the sun, palm trees, volcano and rain forest you’d swear you were in Ireland.
It’s there in the island flag with its figure of a cailín standing by a cross and holding a harp. We’ll gloss over the Union flag in the corner.
While a shamrock adorns Government House.
The oul’ Shamrock and the oul’ Jock
So why then is Montserrat not a throng of Irish visitors from the Old Country?
Possibly because they prefer the Canaries and there is a lot to like about them but say that it’s Tenerife you love then you’ll love Montserrat too.
Hot-Hot-Hot
The volcano and Arrow’s hot-hot-hot too
There’s the volcano which gives you the distinctive black beaches shared by both islands, though there is one white beach that we all love too on Montserrat.
While there’s evidence of the volcano’s activity in the form of a buried city, and now St Vincent’s has awoken and is erupting the focus switches south to the ghost town of Plymouth.
The best place to view it is from the Garibaldi Hill viewpoint or the viewpoint from Jack Boy Hill on the east of the island following a short hike.
Combined, of course, with a trip to the Montserrat Volcano Observatory.
Your own beach?
While Montserrat’s Irishness is all around you in its symbols (the shamrock stamp in your passport), names of villages and they say too in an Irish brogue it goes into overdrive around St Patrick’s Day.
When the Montserratians tie in their own commemoration of their slavery past with the saint’s day.
For the craic, yes, but also because it is steeped in their history.
St Paddy’s Day, mon
Irish pubs everywhere: Martin Healy and his band in Montserrat
On St. Patrick’s Day in 1768, the African slaves on the island rose up and it is alleged nine slaves were hanged.
And they have never been forgotten with St. Patrick’s Day now heradling a ten-day festival to honour their Afro-Irish heritage.
Again there are too few of the Irish who go out to Montserrat, and we mean to do something about it.
And trawling through the records we’ve seen that Martin is a regular visitor out to the Emerald Island
Caribbean craic
Stay there… the Caribbean
Where he was a special guest at Governor’s wife Sujue Davis’s popular latest Coffee Morning on Tuesday, March 11 before that same evening performing at the Uncle’s bar/restaurant a popular night spot in Flemings.
And the Montserrat Reporter (are you employing?) chronicled that ‘the three-man Irish band performed throughout the week at probably every ‘rum shop and bar’ and is a major performer in the popular “Pub Crawl’.
So Montserrat, all 4,900 of them, celebrates their Irish roots with good trad music then, and also its Caribbean heritage with our favourite Soca Music.
Arrow hits the mark
Golden Arrow
Hot-hot-hot? Yeah, you now it, mon. It’s this classic from one of Montserrat’s favourite sons, the legendary late Soca star Arrow
So to get there… you’ll fly out of the UK to Antigua where it’s only a 15-minute flight out to your Ireland in the Sun.
And here’s where you’ll stay with a wide range of hotel rooms, guest houses, villas and apartments all flagged up on the Montserrat site.
Tropical Mansion Suites on Montserrat
And with less than 5,000 people on the island, everyone practically knows each other, and if you say you’re Irish you’ll get a warm welcome from Warren and Cherise!
Slainte!
And no, you don’t get away that easily… here’s why we love the Caribbean so, from Trinidad and Tobago to Barbados.
And next up is Jamaica where we’ll bring you all the news of how they’re jammin’.
Israel is over there: Atop Mt Nebo
