Uncategorized Archives - Page 20 of 54 - Jim Murty’s TravelTravelTravel

Because Cruiseday can’t always wait until Tuesday.

Princess Cruises www.princess.com has announced its Canada and USA packages for next summer and autumn.

Which gives holidaymakers a choice of 17 cruises, visiting 18 destinations on seven itineraries.

Princess will have three ships in the region with voyages from seven to 24 days.

The 3,660-guest Sky Princess and 3,140-guest Caribbean Princess will sail from August to October on a series of departures from New York, Quebec and Fort Lauderdale.

And September will see the 2,600-guest Grand Princess sail roundtrip from Southampton on a 24-night voyage, calling at Boston, Bar Harbour, Halifax, Sydney (Nova Scotia), Quebec (overnight call), Saguenay, Charlottetown and St. Johns (Newfoundland).

There will be a maiden call into Sept-Îles, Quebec.

Which will give guests more time to explore ashore with a series of late night departures in Boston and Charleston, as well as overnight calls in Quebec on select sailings.

*Old-style Quebec. Photo by O-seop Sim on Pexels.com*

And maybe best of all the chance to visit Greenland, the world’s largest island. Before it disappears.

Princess Cruises is offering 24-day Canada & New England voyage, departing September 18, 2021 on Grand Princess.

*And there’s tea. Boston: Photo by Kristin Vogt on Pexels.com*

Sailing roundtrip from Southampton, calling at Boston, Bar Harbour, Halifax, Sydney (Nova Scotia), Quebec (overnight call), Saguenay, Charlottetown and St. Johns (Newfoundland). Prices from €2,639 per person.

*Greenland… still there Photo by Harrison Haines on Pexels.com*

Special offer currently available with prices from €3,849 per person for a free upgrade from an oceanview stateroom to a balcony.

Visit www.princess.com. Or call (0344) 338 8663.

You Corker

It’s a famous old port with a certain stop-off of a ship called the Titanic.

And it’s where the big cruise companies will be tomorrow, Sunday, September 15.

The Cruise Lines International Association will be held in the Clayton Hotel Silver Springs.

*Let’s get on board: Photo Oleksandr Pidvalnyi on Pexels.com*

It will bring together seven of the world’s biggest lines including river cruises.

So take your pick from Fly/Cruises, Honeymoon Cruises, Over-50s Specialities, Adventure Cruises, River Cruises and Solo Cruises.

Cruise offers for the next two years will be on sale.

And admission and parking will be free.

Visit www.thecruisecentre.ie.

And you know what’s coming next… some cruise reviews.

The call of the fjords, I’m A Celebrity, Get Me Out To Here, A Royal Party.

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Holiday Snaps – Carnegie’s Pittsburgh

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The next time you visit your library you might bump into Andrew Carnegie.

Andrew Carnegie? Doesn’t he have something to do with music and the Carnegie Hall in New York.?

Yes, but the great industrialist and entrepreneur helped fund more than 2,500 libraries in his time too.

And his name may well be inscribed on the outside of your library.

Carnegie was though more associated with Pittsburgh than New York.

Carnegie centenary

If we’re quibbling (and I love an our’ quibble) then he’s really a son of Dunfermline in Fife, Scotland who emigrated to the US.

Carnegie died 100 years ago so it’s timely to flag up Pittsburgh…

After all his Carnegie Institute, or Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh, are one of the big reasons to visit Steel City.

*The Carnegie Museum of Art… you make up your* own mind

The Carnegie Museum of Art puts an emphasis on contemporary art. Carnegie instructing them to collect the ‘old masters of tomorrorow’. http://www.cmoa.org.

Admission is £16.50 for an adult and £10 for a child.

*Enraptured: At the Museum of Natural History*

The most famous inhabitant of Carnegie Museum of Natural History is one Dippy the Dinosaur. http://www.carnegiemnh.org

Dippy is the nearly complete fossil skeleton of the Diplodocus carnegii dinosaur.

He was discovered in 1899 by a team of scientists, an excavation funded by Carnegie.

General admission is £16.50 for an adult and £10 for a child.

The Carnegie Science Centre is true to the Scot’s vision for future generations, dedicated to nurturing innovators and leaders like himself http://www.carnegiesciencecenter.org.

General admission is £16.50 for an adult and £10 for a child.

The Andy Warhol Museum will celebrate its official 25^th anniversary 19-20 October 2019, coinciding with the launch of the Andy Warhol: Revelation exhibition. http://www.warhol25.org.

And if you’re in the vicinity of Dunfermline, Fife in Scotland I’m sure he’ll look down on you kindly if you visit his birthplace http://www.carnegiebirthplace.com.

How to get there

I found a round trip Dublin-Pittsburgh through Boston from£301 (€340) with Delta Airlines http://www.delta.com.

And Pittsburgh is also served by British Airways through London http://www.britishairways.com.

BA has a sale on that ends on September 24. I found return flights from £348 for any month between October-March.

Also check out http://www.visitpittsburgh.com,

And Philly too

Whisper it but here’s an oul’ review from the city up the road Philadelphia https://jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/philadelphia-freedom/

And from now on your Holiday Snaps will get even snappier with regular snap dates through the weekend.

MEET YOU ON THE ROAD

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This Sporting Weekend – Solheim Cup

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Golfing widows were a staple of Ronnie Corbett and Tom O’Connor stories.

Female drivers too – in fact it was probably the same lame joke.

Of course women are just as able to hit a wee white ball into a wee hole, sometimes even more able.

Wednesday afternoons for my Dear Old Dad and Mum were spent on the golf course.

Where my Dad would try to hit the skin off the ball… and end up in the thistle and the gorse.

And my Mum would drive straight down the middle.

Though she did confirm to Ronnie Corbett’s stereotype on the road by swaying everywhere.

The eyes of the golfing world are on its finest women players this week.

As Europe and the USA battle it out for the Solheim Cup in Gleneagles, Scotland.

Captaining Europe is North Berwick’s Catriona Matthew.

And she is as strong a buttress as the Law, or rock, that stands proudly in the Firth of Forth.

And which I know only too well with the Outlaws living on its doorstep.

Scotland’s ‘Golf Coast’ covers 21 golf courses along 30 miles of coastline in the hinterland of Edinburgh.

While, of course Gleneagles in Perthshire further north is something of a lucky charm for Europe’s golfers.

With Paul McGinley’s men’s team winning there in 2014.

Where to find your golf

Catch these websites for more information www.golfeastlothian.com, www.gleneagles.com and www.scotlandgolf.com, http://www.northberwick.org.uk.

And www.visitscotland.com.

And if you want to see how it should be done, er, here’s me at the Paul McGinley school in Quinto da Lago in Portugal https://jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/2019/06/12/sportugal/.

I’ll be looking out for you and your cup Catriona when I’m over in North Berwick seeing the Outlaws.

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Happy Newer Year – from Ethiopia

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Happy Enkutatash. You’ll notice here that I look a year or two younger.

That’s Enkutatash for you, the Ethiopian New Year, when the years just roll off you.

In fact seven of them.

The thing is that the Ethiopians are on a different calendar from the rest of us.

Theirs is fixed to the Julian Calendar from the Roman Emperor Augustus in 25 BC with a start date of 29 August J.C.

Which I guess must be September 12 in our money.

And this establishes the New Year on this day.

It is also associated with the return of the Queen of Sheba (I’ve one of them at home) to Ethiopia.

Following her visit to King Solomon in Jerusalem in 980BC.

It is also a permanent fixture on our calendar in Dublin.

When Ethiopian Airlines, Meseret Tekalign, the Country Manager for Ethiopian Ireland and our friends from the Airlines http://www.ethiopianairlines.com invite us to share in their New Year feast.

So if you like your injera (flat bread) and wat (stew) which we do in Ireland and Britain. And wine (guilty again) then this is the New Year for you.

And you’ll also get to watch their traditional coffee-making ritual. Beats my spoonful of instant, hands down.

Every New Year’s Eve, or Hogmanay as us Scottishy type people like to call it, is a time of reflection.

And Ethiopian rightly reflected on this year’s plane tragedy while emphasising their commitment to passenger safety.

It is also a time for Enkutatash resolutions I’m imagining, and I’m resolving to get out to this intriguing and glorious ancient country.

Where they have nine UNESCO World Heritage sites.

I love Lucy

And a certain little lady, Lucy, the first human, thus called because the excavators were singing Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds at the time.

Like your Beatles? Here’s a treat https://jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/2019/09/09/the-beatles-in-hamburg-with-stefanie-hempel/.

Like your Africa? Then here’s another https://jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/home/whats-new-pussycat/

And, of course, because Lucy is on the Coptic calendar she’s probably only about 40… and looking just as good too!

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Kilkenny – give it a hurl

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The hurls are out and Kilkenny here in Ireland are already planning to get Liam back.

So for those not in the know you soon will be.

When you hear more about this, the fastest field team sport in the world.

Who’s Liam you ask?

Well, that’ll be Liam MacCarthy who was involved in the establishment of the GAA (Gaelic Athletic Association) County Board in London in the 1890s.

And he was honoured by having a trophy named after him in 1922.

The Liam MacCarthy Cup’s design is based on a medieval drinking vessel called a mether.

Hurl power: 360 Degrees of Kilkenny, with Fred Malzard, Julie Calder Potts, Naoise Nunn Chairman Kilkenny Tourism and Siobhan Donohoe. Picture Jason Clarke.

It was first presented in 1923 – to Limerick who defeated Dublin in the 1921 final.

And that’s where we need to start talking about Kilkenny again.

Because they treat Liam as their adopted son, and his cup as their property.

Favourite son, the Kilkenny All-Ireland hurler Richie Hogan was sharing his expertise with those who attended.

Alongside Fred Malzard from Malzard Hurling Experience http://www.malzards.com.

Whether they gave the guests a belt across the backside if they mentioned the ‘T’ word, Tipperary having defeated Kilkenny in this year’s final, I don’t know.

*Stick it to ’em: Louise Jordan and Kilkenny hurler, Richie Hogan. Picture Jason Clarke*

Because I wasn’t able to attend but by the wonders of modern communications they told me all about it.

A bit like home

I’ve been entranced by Kilkenny since I first passed through and did a double take when I saw and heard Scottish bagpipers belting out a tune in front of the castle.

The comparisons don’t stop there.

And while my old stomping ground Edinburgh has its Royal Mile, my home city Glasgow has its Style Mile, Kilkenny has its Medieval Mile.

And its culinary delights…

The guests were treated to a tasting menu with Mooncoin Beetroot; Goatsbridge Trout; Kilkenny Rose Veal and Cakeface Patisserie among others.

*Star man: Kilkenny hurler Richie Hogan. Picture Jason Clarke*

And the drinks makers too: Highbank Orchard; Ballykeefe Distillers and Costello’s provided samples of their products too.

Whatever it is I was doing, and whatever I’m up to next year I’ll put on hold and join my friends in Kilkenny.

When they’ll definitely have Liam along for company http://www.visitkilkenny.ie.

You want to find out how the Irish country is and how it differs from the town… here’s https://jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/monaghans-country-roads/.

Yes, I know it’s Kilkenny but that’s because I’m saving the best…

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Flyday Friday – Virgin vs plastic

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Are you a hoarder? It sounds like one of those American TV ads… call this number for a money back guarantee if you’re not truly satisfied.

I have more toothbrushes, combs, earplugs, eye masks and pens than I know what to do with.

And bags in which to hold them.

And it’s rightly getting up The Scary One’s nose.

Which is handy because I reckon I’ve got some kind of stick for that too.

What’s not handy though is the amount of plastic I’ve accumulated.

So I’m delighted to see that Virgin Atlantic are leading the way in new biodegradable airplane sundries.

What do we get then?

Toothbrushes made out of bamboo which sounds gentle in my toothies which are particularly brittle.

And even the pen is made of recycled kraft paper.

Virgin is hoping to save 945 tonnes of plastic waste each year, the equivalent of six airbus 350 wide body jets.

I’m lucky enough to be a member of the Virgin Atlantic Flying Club who will keep you up to date with all the great deals and more www.virginatlantic.com.

Try out their Caribbean routes and my reviews Let’s rumba in Barbados and My kiss with Rihanna.

The airline are also branching out into Virgin territory as it were with a first foray into South America.

And Sao Paulo in Brazil from Heathrow.

They will begin the route from March 29.

Virgin has also agreed a codeshare with GOL that will serve 37 destinations across Brazil and expand reach across South America.

Berlin y’all

*Fly the flag. Photo by Ingo Joseph on Pexels.com*

Berlin is high up on The Scary One’s wish list… she has a great affinity with the land of her birth.

Any year is good to visit the German capital but this year is best with the 30th anniversary of the Fall of the Wall upon us.

Aer Lingus is offering Berlin from Dublin among its range of destinations in its September sale from €34.99.

Which has a touch of October about it. See www.aerlingus.com for terms and conditions.

And also try the jewel of east Germany which you can reach from Berlin https://jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/dresdens-renaissance-martin-luther/

Agadir, do, do

*A touch of Morocco. Photo Nicolas Postiglioni on Pexels.com*

I’ll admit it. I have my demons.

Morocco is one.

I might just have got unlucky in Marrakech and the Sahara, almost being mugged, getting ripped off in the souk and getting food poisoning in the Sahara after a tajine.

Or maybe I was in the wrong city.

Air Arabia www.airarabia.com has a special promotional fare of from €135 return Dublin to Agadir.

And they’re pitching (sorry) golf, beach, sun, culture, food and more.

And they’ll give you a 15kg free golf kit allowance.

G’Day Melbourne

*Melbourne. Photo by Tiff Ng on Pexels.com*

I’ve been spending the summer as I do every fourth summer watching the Ashes and the dulcet, or ear-piercing, tones of Shane ‘Warney’ Warne.

Now I heard the former spin king and England legend Ian ‘Beefy’ Botham eulogise about Melbourne (and London).

I know about London https://jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/the-london-life/ and https://jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/2019/06/23/carole-king-youre-beautiful/.

But I could if I jumped on Etihad’s http://www.etihad.com Melbourne’s Global sale which is headlining with Business Melbourne from €3,3367.

Now while the old refrain from his team-mates when he was playing was ‘Well bowled, Warnie’, may I offer ‘Well sold, Etihad.’

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Hungry and Thursday – playing with your food

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We’re all told from an early age not to play with our food… but heck, that’s half the fun.

Doesn’t it make your flesh crawl when you see some foodie snob at work?

Pursing their lips, noses upturned, inspecting their food like Hamlet does Yoric.

It’s food, there to be eaten and, if you’re lucky, enjoyed.

And that’s exactly what you get with Le Petit Chef. Sounds fun already, eh?

I met the Wee Cook and his pals at Le Grand Bistro on the inaugural Celebrity Edge on the high seas to the Bahamas last year.

Now we’ve all been around open kitchens but this takes you from farm to fork.

TableMation at Le Grand Bistro on the $1bn ship sees the food prep played out on your table top by a cast of mini-animated characters.

They are beamed onto your plate with our little friends rounding up their animals from in this case the Italian countryside.

The detail, the chatter and the humour will have your captivated.

And then magically the real human waiter, the one you can pinch, takes the food they have prepared to your plate.

I have never had so much fun with ravioli.

Equally they have Chinese and French tableaux to enjoy too. See http://www.lepetitchef.com, http://www.celebritycruises.ie,

And my review of Edge, https://jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/im-a-celebrity-get-me-out-to-here/

Cruise ships have food at their heart and they’re fun when you’re not in a bun fight at the breakfast buffet.

Filipino chef Eric had us all playing along on Independence of the Seas with the Teppanyaki.

He makes egg fried rice and all sorts, using his chef’s hat as a prop to bring chicks out of the hat.

And rattling those pots and pans and leading us all in a sing-song.

And the food tastes all the better for it. See my review https://jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/a-royal-party/.

And follow http://www.royalcaribbean.ie and http://www.royalcaribbean.co.uk.

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Whiskey – it’s Irish for whisky

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It’s a Scottish thing… to say ‘without the e’. Why? Because the Scots are too tight to give you the extra ‘e’.

No, that’s just my little joke, to get my retaliation in first.

We are of course nothing like this stereotype and are in fact very charitable.

And liable to go off on a tangent. So back to whiskey… and the launch of IrishWhiskey360°.

*Me as a younger man.. I wish. Photo by Mehrad Vosoughi*

It’s the new brand and home of Irish whiskey tourism although of course Irish whiskey has been around for ever.

It’s the water of life, uisce beatha, after all while Bushmills Distilleryhttp://www.bushmills.com in Antrim is the oldest in the world.

*Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Michael Creed TD (centre), with PaulKelly (left), CEO of Fáilte Ireland, and David Stapleton, Chairman of Drinks Ireland | Irish Whiskey*

There are 17 Irish whiskey distillery visitors centres or brand homes operated by Drinks Ireland/Irish Whiskey Association.

Ireland is aiming to become the number one destination in the world for whiskey tourism.

You can have that… and Scotland will be the top whisky destination.

A milllion welcomes

Last year there were 923,000 visitors to this island of Ireland.

And with the figures for this year set to go through the million mark that seems a very good reason to have a festival.

If any is needed.

*Some take it with ice. Photo by Brett Sayles on Pexels.com*

The Festival of Irish Whiskey, supported by Failte Ireland as part of Taste the Island, will take place between Thursday, October 10 and Sunday, 13.

There will be 30 events and promotions in distilleries, brand homes and visitor centres across thew country.

The events will range across free and discounted tours, open days, whiskey tastings and food pairings to meet the distillers and more.

Now I’ve been on more distillery tours than I’ve had orange malted drinks (well, not really, but I’ve been to a lot).

And the best bit of them is not how it’s mashed but how we get smashed.

Of course I don’t mean that (drink responsibly everyone) but it’s the sample we get at the end of the tour that makes all the learning more palatable.

Visit http://www.IrishWhiskey360.ie. http://www.failteireland.ie,

Now all the distilleries are worthy of a mention and I’m ticking them off as I go.

But for here I’ll just flag up my local distillery, Powerscourt, and Slane. http://www.powerscourtdistillery.com http://www.slaneirishwhiskey.com.

No, I don’t miss much about my old work but one guy who was a diamond is Stephen.

Now Stephen is a whizz on IT and I was his best customer.

But he is even better on whiskey. And I was delighted to be able to invite him down to Slane as my Plus One.

Now that I think about it, Stephen, my screen is doing funny things here…

Drams are made of this

Here’s some whisk(e)y adventures… at least the ones I remember. https://jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/brexit-aberdeen-a-light-in-the-north/

And https://jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/swhisskey/

And look out every Thursday for my food and drinks column. https://jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/2019/09/05/hungry-and-thursday-wrinkly-potatoes/.

Also my cocktail column https://jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/2019/09/05/jocktails-tenerife-coffee-liqueurs/

Slainté

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Tobago… ready, steady, goat.

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My Dear Old Mum would sometimes chide me for being a bit of a giddy goat.

Nothing much changes, she’s still my Dear Old Mum, although a year older, and dearer, on Saturday, while I’m even giddier and even goatier…

With white hair hanging from my chinny-chin-chin.

We’ve had some travels, me and Mum, and I often think how much fun we’d have had together in some others.

Like Tobago.

Tobago ‘our little dot on the map’ as one local called it lies just off Trinidad and just off Venezuala.

But it’s in a world of its own with a tropical rainforest, its own national dish ‘crab and dumpling’.

And TV chef Ainsley Harriott was there to try some for himself.

Sunday School, which is anything but… it’s actually a street party held in Buccoo every Sunday night.

When our friends from Tobago visit every year it is always a highlight of the Travel circuit.

Last year they brought us up to speed with the many unique cultural aspects of the island.

This year they wanted to stress the nature, animal and birdlife and sustainability of the island.

The best animals, of course, are the goats.

The Tobago Goat Race was started by Bajan Samuel Callender in 1925 as an more everyman’s alternative to horse racing.

It runs every Easter Tuesday… and I’m looking to get out there next year to run too.

*And some cooking… here’s Y*zanne Williams Chance

Am I kidding? You’ll need to keep following to find out.

See http://www.tobagobeyond.com, http://www.visittobago.gov.tt and here’s a neat site I found too http://www.buccoo.net.

How to get there

Virgin Atlantic flies from Manchester and Gatwick http://www.virginatlantic.com

And British Airways flies from Gatwick http://www.britishairways.com.

Now you want to read about my adventures in the Caribbean? Thought you would https://jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/rihanna-in-barbados/

And https://jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/my-kiss-with-rihanna/

And you want to see how I got on when I tried to learn how to cook Caribbean-style…

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Savannah.. Meanwhile back in Perry Lane

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Perry Lane is in my ears and in my eyes

There beneath the blue Savannah skies

With apologies to Lennon and McCartney, but I’ll always pitch an idea when I’ve got an audience and a cool destination.

And I had just that with Pritpal and the Perry Lane Hotel http://www.perrylanehotel.com and http://www.westinsavannah.com.

And to be fair the Westin Savannah Harbor Golf Resort & Spa although the Beatles didn’t almost write a song about them.

Still Paul McCartney may yet do so!

A delegation from Savannah wined and dined us at the Alex Hotel http://www.thealexhotel.ie on their way back from Wexford.

It was welcome refuge from the traffic around Boris Johnson’s visit…

And we were looking behind us to see whether he’d snuck in.

Our Savannah friends had linked up with the Slanyesiders.

To spread the word about the links between Wexford and Savannah and the Dunbrody Famine Ship initiative http://www.dunbrody.com.

In the 1840s Wexford decamped pretty much on mass from The Famine to Georgia.

And once they’d got settled they built up its prosperity into the charming town it is today.

Voted in the top ten world cities by Conde Nast Traveler.

Now Savannah you’ll know from the movies.

I’m chocolate

And particularly Forrest Gump and his bench…. and this city really does have a soft centre with the sweetest people.

Flicking through their festival of events for this year I’m noticing that this month has (or had), I’m not sure which Bacon Fest.

While next month there is Oktoberfest (and I’m banned from much of Munich’s) and Tybee Island Pirate Festival.

And why? Because they aaaaaar.

Going into next year there are two other things particularly close to my heart .

St Patrick’s Day which is said to be the second oldest in the States. As a prequel there’s a Savannah Irish Festival in February.

The other big draw for me is the Scottish Games Festival in May.

Check out http://www.visitsavannah.com. And remember I like a cherry fondant choccie.

If you want to dip your toe into the Deep South, try my series https://jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/the-promised-land-martin-luther-king/ https://jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/the-story-of-the-blues/

And https://jimmurtytraveltraveltravel.com/elvispresley-the-king-of-kings/

Category: Uncategorized

Holiday Snaps – Cruise extra

You Corker

Holiday Snaps – Carnegie’s Pittsburgh

Carnegie centenary

How to get there

And Philly too

This Sporting Weekend – Solheim Cup

Where to find your golf

Happy Newer Year – from Ethiopia

I love Lucy

Kilkenny – give it a hurl

A bit like home

Flyday Friday – Virgin vs plastic

Berlin y’all

Agadir, do, do

G’Day Melbourne

Hungry and Thursday – playing with your food

Whiskey – it’s Irish for whisky

A milllion welcomes

Drams are made of this

Tobago… ready, steady, goat.

How to get there

Savannah.. Meanwhile back in Perry Lane

I’m chocolate