fionaistravelling

"We knew he was good, but we didn't know he was THAT good".  That's what my sister said, all last week, when we were reading the newspaper headlines and amazing tributes from all sides of the political spectrum for my fantastic brother in law, Peter Rankin, former leader of Preston City Council. Here's a l ink to the article that the Lancashire Post did on his funeral ...  and here's a pic of the double page spread of the funeral coverage. Here's what I wrote on Facebook on Tuesday, the day after the funeral (so some of you will have read this already) The photo is of my wonderful nieces who both wrote beautiful tributes that they read to honour their father Peter Rankin at his funeral yesterday at Preston Minster.  As 20 year leader of Preston City Council Pete was given a civic funeral. This meant a packed service wth city councillors in their robes: but before that, when the funeral cortège drove through the city, staff from the town ha...

In my last blog two weeks ago I said I'd changed my travel plans to come up north to spend some time with my sister and nieces, while my brother in law was ill.  Definitely the best decision I've ever made. I have been privileged to be here, spending time with my sister's family, seeing their devotion to Peter, and hearing what a great dad he was as well as such a prominent public figure. He was eventually able to come home from hospital a week last Friday, and died last Sunday night,  peacefully, at home, in the arms of his loving family, my sister Lynn and his daughters, my nieces Jen and Gilly.  He had twice been the leader of Preston city council, for around twenty years in total.  He'd done so much for the city - the headline in the Lancashire Evening Post last Tuesday was: "We have lost a great man". With the whole front page, an editorial, and two inside pages, dedicated to him, I don't think I've ever seen anything like this.   The fami...

Fiona's travelling adventure week five ... has taken on another rhythm. I had a week between arriving back from Ireland and my planned trip to Spain, to see my friend Kate then go sailing. So I decided to spend the time with my sister and nieces, at a difficult time in their lives while my brother in law is seriously ill. It was good that I came at this time - the day after I got here Pete  took a turn for the worse.  I hired a car and have been a full time taxi driver , plant waterer and cat feeder for the family  as well as doing some shifts in the hospital between nieces. And I've seen my mum too, who lives 40 or so minutes away. It's wonderful not to have work commitments so I can be here for the family . As well as this I'm  doing a bit of podcast editing, the latest is putting a medley together of four music events  in five days that I took in  at the end of May - in the club at Cape Clear, in Hughes Bar in Dublin, at the Horseshoe at...

Yesterday (Friday 25th)  was Referendum Day in Ireland and it looks like the constitutional amendment which restricted the right to abortion has been repealed.We'll find out for sure later today. (Sat 26th).  In the meantime I have produced my second podcast.  This is a moving interview with Vanessa O'Sullivan, who's a political activist and who I met here at Cape Clear Island on the goat farm, where she has been helping Ed run the goat farm for the past few years. She talks about the deep connection that she has with the goats - and with Ed - and how the connection with the goats was just what she needed to help her at a difficult time in her life - and about her life in campaigning politics, and the importance that the result of today's referendum has for her. You can find the podcast, "I'm looking forward to the day I don't have to tell my story", here on my podcast page: and there's a   direct link here . Here's Vanessa a few years...

 Week Three - and  my first Podcast  So I've been "travelling" for three weeks now - but actually i got here, Cape Clear Island, a week ago.  I had my first goat milking lesson on Thursday  and did a bit more milking on Friday and over the weekend Also on the weekend I made some Goat Milk Cottage Cheese - which is amazingly straightforward to make... (just boil, add vinegar, stir, separate, and hang it overnight!) and the next day turned it into four CHEESECAKES which i'm very proud of (and which have been very popular here).  So that's me. A Beginner Milker.  On Monday we had a crisis - Ed - my friend, the goat farmer - had to go to hospital with severe stomach pains.  Which is rather complicated on an island... he called the nurse round, she arranged for the island bus to come to the house, for the lifeboat to come to the harbour, and for the ambulance to...

I arrived in Ireland 2 weeks ago on Tuesday 1 May.  I set off from home to the station the day before having managed to get all the stuff for my trip on a bike - with 2 35 litre drysacks sticking out of the ortlieb panniers, PLUS a laptop and a shoulder bag...  the bike got delivered home later that day and I carried on with the panniers on a trolley (which is now rather bent out of shape as the panniers were too heavy!)  I've already ditched quite a bit out of my packs - posted one lot home and Dawn took another bag home for me after our sailing course.   So things have got easier on the Carrying stakes and I can now just about manage my packs and fit everything in the bags... Last week was the SAILING COURSE in Kilmore Quay with Dermot from Sailing Ireland  and, from left to right, Ralph, Oran, Daire, me and Dawn....  we had a BALL.  Food, weather, and craic wonderful.  Wind and weather perfect for sailing....

I absolutely said I wasn't going to write a travel blog on my six months Travelling Adventure!  So i've bought a zappy Zoom tape recorder and am doing some recordings which I'm going to edit into a few little podcasts as I go.  I haven't had a chance to do that yet though, so I'm just posting my first and second week's thoughts on this blog.... which will be much more readable than an email, if I want to add pix and clips, it turns out.  So here we go. Here's my first week which I wrote and emailed out to some friends ten days ago, on Saturday 5th May, more or less the end of my first week. .... "Thanks for saying you'd like to hear how my Travelling Adventure is coming along. The idea is that I'll be publishing some podcasts at some stage. I have been doing some recordings eg of the nice lady on the ferry who put out a notice on the tannoy for a lift for me as the boat was late  and I was going to miss the bus ....  However I can...