MyTours Ireland

14/05/2024

https://www.facebook.com/share/r/jEqSXM4hAEUQFvH6/

12/07/2023

Travel in style and comfort in your private tours with MytoursIreland

25/04/2023

The lovely Mount Juliet Estate

27/03/2023

One of the several legends surrounding the Blarney Stone

27/03/2023

27/03/2023

St Patrick's week 2023 parade tour of ireland with the Florida Gators...wonderful week

20/03/2023

Go Gators

20/11/2022

Enjoying a well deserved deoch amhain

11/11/2022

Walking Back to Happiness ... in Style !
"A good walking stick is great company," is the best introduction I could have been given for this story. It's how Jerry Leahy, Brosna, who has been fashioning beautiful walking sticks for over 20 years, starts our conversation.
'Stick Dressing' is the correct terminology to describe the careful choosing, seasoning, preparing and finishing of a walk stick. Jerry's introduction to this ancient art was through an article he saw in a specialist hunting and shooting magazine.
'I remember I took out a membership in the Stick Makers Club and they'd send you two information booklets each year,' Jerry explains. 'That's where I got started but it all came down to trial and error in the early days.'
The choice of wood, how it responds to the processes that will refine it into a distinctive walking stick, the grain and so much more will go into determining the quality and finish of the end-product.
'I might have harvested twenty sticks when I started out but that might only yield two decent specimens for a stick. Over time, you get a better at identifying what will work best.'
The sticks are collected in Wintertime, mainly from Hazel and Blackthorn trees. You need a good eye to choose the best form, I'm told. The raw sticks are then left to season for at least 12 months. It's only after this time that you get to roll up your sleeves and start the time-consuming work of drawing forth the natural beauty of the stick.
'You'll rarely find a stick growing that's perfectly straight,' Jerry explains. 'But using a combination of steam and heat and physical manipulation, the seasoned stick can be straightened slowly or turned according to your design.'
In the early years, Jerry conducted most of this straightening work over the kitchen Range but soon found that it was conducive to a happier home life to take his hobby out to the shed. Inventing a homemade device using a wallpaper remover steamer and a pipe, Jerry was able to get a more effective result with the sticks.
His eventual membership of the Irish Stick Walkers Club gave Jerry access to workshops in Ireland that honed his skills as a craftsman further. Meeting up to three times a year, these tutorials run by gifted stick makers, would educate and demonstrate new techniques.
'It was great to see first-hand the work of other stick makers. It would certainly give you ideas about what could be achieved.'
The beautiful sticks that Jerry creates are the result of patience, creativity and an inherent understanding of the natural wood he works with.
Each stick is unique and distinctive, sanded to a smooth finish and protected against the elements with a coating of yacht varnish. Jerry leaves the finished sticks long so they can be trimmed down to the ergonomic height required by a customer.
If you're looking for a handcrafted, unique piece of Brosna that will become the best companion on walks, contact Jerry on 0874134929.
As a side note: Jerry gifted a beautiful hazel waking stick to my father about 30 years ago. My father, who passed away in 2000, had absolutely no intention of ever being seen shuffling around with a stick. I am delighted to say the stick came into my possession 20 years ago and is a strong, beautiful and faithful companion on my many hikes around the hills of Carrigeen. The stick is as attractive now as it ever was. Beating down nettles, holding down an electric fence so I can hop over it, using the curved handle to pull long briars out of my path and giving a dog a nudge to keep them on track - just some of the wonderful uses for this fine stick. Priceless!

07/11/2022

Enjoying The dark stuff

02/11/2022

My Italian Guests saying goodbye from outside my door in the sleepy little village of Brosna

21/08/2022

Brilliant tour with the lovely honeymooners Emily and Jacob...God bless them on their future life together

19/04/2022

16/04/2022

https://fb.watch/cqOlKcM1bY/

10/04/2022

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=357567206308507&id=103295878402309

17/03/2022

Happy Patrick's Day to all my friends and Family

21/02/2022

Welcome to HH Design Detail who are famous for designing Award Winning Handcrafted Irish Wooden Gifts at great prices

24/01/2022

https://fb.watch/aKI8qbCJYL/

09/11/2021

Really interesting course this national tour guiding

03/09/2021

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10166155058230144&id=703340143

SAM Maguire was a Protestant farmer from West Cork who became a close ally of Michael Collins in London in the struggle for Irish independence. In 1928, the year after he died, the Sam Maguire Cup was created and presented to the GAA to commemorate his contributions to that quest for freedom and to the GAA.
These days, everyone knows about the Sam Maguire Cup, presented to the winner of the GAA All-Ireland football final.
But few people remember who Sam Maguire was and his birthplace, 6km north of Dunmanway in West Cork, is now a mere shell.
He is buried in St Mary’s Protestant cemetery in Dunmanway, his grave marked by a Celtic cross. The local GAA grounds was named the Sam Maguire Memorial Park after him, in 1974, but otherwise, he has been completely forgotten about, as have the details of his life.
The Maguires, who were Church of Ireland, had a large farm in the townland of Mallabraca, where Sam was born in 1879.
The family was relatively well-to-do and were noted locally for always going out of their way to help neighbours whether Protestant or Catholic.
When Sam was 20, he passed the. British civil service exam and got a job in the post office in London.
In London, he joined the London Hibernians, even though he had never played GAA at home.
However, he played in the All-Ireland finals on at least-three occasions at the beginning of the 20th century. Sam was also the only Protestant to have captained a team in the All-Ireland final.
In London, he became a close friend of Michael Collins, another West Cork man, and Sam became the head of intelligence in Britain for the Irish Republican Brotherhood.
He was also the main agent for Collins in Britain for smuggling weapons to Ireland for the War Of Independence.
Sam’s work in the Post Office also meant he was able to access much vital intelligence from the mail. When the new Irish State came into being Sam supported the pro-treaty side and returned home to Ireland. He got a job with the new Irish civil service, but soon clashed with the pro-British staff who had stayed on after the treaty.
In 1924, he was dismissed from the Irish civil service, with no pension but with a gratuity of £100 from the new Free State government.
Sam returned to the family farm in West Cork, but soon developed TB. He died in 1927 at the age of 48, penniless.
On his last visit to Dunmanway, he gave away his last £5, saying that he wouldn’t need it anymore.
Soon after he died a group of his friends in Dublin got together to create a permanent memorial to him. They paid £300 (just over €26,000 in today’s money) to get the Sam Maguire Cup made in Dublin.
The GAA were proud to accept it as recognition of Sam’s twin contributions, to the War Of Independence and his role as a Protestant player and captain in the GAA.
These days, Sam Maguire’s work with Michael Collins has been almost completely airbrushed out of history, but even though his achievements have been long forgotten, his name lives on, revered by anyone with even the slightest interest in Gaelic football.
Pat O’Donnell, Douglas, Cork......mf

17/06/2021

Maria taking her bro on a spin.....not much grass cut