Meet the people who live on Ireland's waterways

Floating the idea that you can live on Ireland’s waterways might not be as strange as it sounds. Rita de Brún meets some of our barge people

Johnny Depp has a lot to answer for. When he played Roux, the handsome, guitar-strumming, pony-tail-wearing, barge-dwelling rogue who stole the heart of Juliette Binoche’s character Vianne in the movie Chocolat, he awoke a wanting in many for the freedom and avant-garde lifestyle, that only living on the water can bring.

That film was released in 2000. Intriguingly, that was the year in which the 48-foot barge on which Tullamore man Tom Doheny lives, was built as a live-aboard for a couple.