Blogs from Hillsborough , County Down, Northern Ireland, United Kingdom, Europe

Beannachtaí (greetings) from Northern Ireland! I’ll begin this blog by commenting on the weather (surprised?). Northern Ireland is famous for its weather, especially bad weather. Well folks, we have been bathed in sunshine since we arrived. The great weather has followed us from Wales. We’re very happy to be back in Hillsborough with David and Barbara and family. David and Barbara live on a beautiful property near the Hillsborough village. Their main crops are flowers and eucalyptus which they sell locally. Barbara also grows tomatoes WITH flavour! Their secret ingredient is alpaca poo. The Erwins have two alpacas whose main role is lawn mowing but they also provide great fertiliser. Rest assured that the poo is mixed into the soil and not spread on the tomatoes! She also make the BEST jam you’ve ever tasted. She ... read more

Hi everyone Well we're here in Northern Ireland having a wonderful time The weather has been fine and everything looks wonderful in the sparkling sunshine The conference is now finished and looking back on it, I'm pleased about how things went. My second paper for the stakeholder panel was well received and I actually enjoyed presenting it (hard to believe but true!). This year was the first time we had a stakeholder panel and we were very pleased with the attendance. I'd though we'd have 5 or 6 people but we had about 30 at one stage. That's pretty good given that there were probably over 50 panels to choose from. Next year the conference is in Rome which is a very exciting prospect. Our hotel, the O'Callaghan's Mont Clare, was well situated adjacent to Trinity ... read more