There was a huge crowd at the Dungourney versus Lisgoold

hurling game in Castlelyons last Sunday. After a rip-roaring match, the men from Jamesey Kelleher’s parish won.

One very interested and vocal Dungourney supporter was Dan Leahy, or to give him his correct title, Brother Nicholas Leahy. He celebrated his 87th birthday the day before the match, so overall it was a great weekend for the affable and adventurous octogenarian.

At an age when many might think of slowing down, Br Dan still has an amazing zest for life - for walking, talking, following hurling, charity work, and sticking with the vows he took a long, long time ago.

I think I first met Dan Leahy over 15 years ago - maybe in 2007 or 2008. There’s a saying in the Irish language, ‘is ait an mac an saol’ - literally, ‘life is a strange son’, or you just never know what to expect from life, and it perfectly sums up how I met this remarkable East Cork man.

His sister Betty Flynn had suggested I should go and meet a 90 year old man in the parish of Dungourney. “Why?” says I to Betty -“Because he’s a great man for stories and history and ye’d get on great.”

Well, a few weeks after that recommendation I turned my car down a narrow boreen to meet a man named Jim Willis. The Willis house is situated way down a long, long boreen half a mile in from the road. I drove the car down to the house.

What a setting! As one went down into the glen, a patch of ground was covered with bluebells - it was like the place was painted blue, apparently this was where the good fairies lived.

You know in the tale of the Red Riding Hood, the beautiful picture postcard house in the middle of the woods with the roses round the door?........

© Evening Echo