The Goal.

As I lay in intensive care back in Sept 2012, one of the things that kept me focused was a determination to complete my planned charity cycle (although with tubes and wires everywhere it wasn't looking as though it was going to be anytime soon). However here I am 15 months on, and although things aren't quite perfect yet, they are a whole lot better than what they would have been!!

I've been looking at possible options for recipients for my cycle and the aim is to complete a charity cycle at some point in 2014/15.

Season's Greetings

Autumn on The Bann

Herons in the Park

The famous Raleigh Heron meets the real thing.

Hillsborough Lake

Today the road took 'The Raleigh' and I to Hillsborough Park, a beautiful although at times overcrowded setting if ever there was one. A popular spot for walking and, for the slightly more energetic, running. The forest path surrounds a lake which is stocked with the wily rainbow trout.

The Colours of Autumn

The Brontë Connection at Magherally

Took a short 23 mile run, well cycle, into Dromore this morning, and on the way I stopped at Magherally Old Church near Banbridge.
It was in this church in the summer of 1776 that Hugh Brontë and Alice McClory (grandparents of the famous Brontë sisters) were married. Although engaged to Joe Burns, a local farmer and fellow Catholic, Alice had secretly decided to take a different groom to the altar, and in a different church.
The McClory family did not approve of Alice’s friendship with Hugh. Not only was he not local and little known about him, he had no visible prospects and most importantly he was not a Roman Catholic. On the other hand Joe Burns filled all the McClory’s desires, though not Alice’s.
Today the church stands roofless but proudly on top of a County Down drumlin just a couple of miles from
Banbridge. Built in 1770 to replace an older and smaller church, which was in serious disrepair, it in turn was replaced in 1886 by a new church on an adjoining drumlin. The well-kept churchyard surrounding the ruin is still in use today and attracts visitors not only for the Brontë connection, but also to visit the grave of a well-known playwright and author, Helen Waddell. Although born in Tokyo she was brought up in the Banbridge area and expressed a desire to be buried at Magherally.