Passengers have hit out at Ryanair after claiming they only received notification that their return flight to Cork from Lanzarote had been cancelled hours before take-off.

The temperature gauge in the Go Bus reads 21°C at 5pm as we are driven from Dublin Airport down the quays and along the Liffey to pick up more passengers for the three and half hour drive to Cork.

Skinks catching the sun might be mistaken for dribbles of gold escaped from a smelter. Glossy black skins peppered with gold spots, they are strange creatures, neither lizard nor snake, somewhere in between.

Looking for some winter sun? Beat the post-Christmas gloom with Ciara McDonnell’s last-minute sunshine offerings.

The challenge is known as the world’s toughest row.

Stepping out of Central Station, Belfast, at about 7pm on the Saturday before last, I saw, at the end of the street, a murmuration of starlings wheeling about the sky.

 

The countryside is closing down, the village shops, post offices and pubs closing their doors and the citizens without cars left grocery-less and drink-less. 

One woman has died and nine are feared missing following the collapse of an apartment block in a Tenerife resort.

A friend of my son’s here on the Canary Island of La Gomera, a bank official about 35 years old, is regularly to be seen standing tall and erect on a large surfboard, propelling himself with a long paddle, along the island’s coasts, writes Damien Enright

I received a beetle in the post from Ireland the other day. I don’t think my Gomero postman realised. A reader from Kanturk had sent it, asking me if I might know what kind of beetle it was. 

An environmental alert has been activated as an oil slick threatens holiday beaches on the south-western Canary Islands.

Last week, my regular column, now in its 25th year, returned to the Outdoor page after appearing in the County supplement since August 2012.

Airline Jet2 is creating almost 90 jobs at Belfast International Airport as it announced four new routes from its base in the North.

A consultant obstetrician is one of two women who drowned off the coast of Tenerife after reportedly getting into difficulty as they attempted to rescue their two children swept out by a wave.

From budget breaks in Bodrum to direct flights to Canada, Travel Writer of the Year Pól Ó Conghaile picks his top overseas destinations for 2014.

Playa Blanca, Lanzarote, Canary Islands

Spanish police have arrested an 85-year-old Irish Roman Catholic priest suspected of sexually abusing three altar boys in Britain over many years.

GREEN Gomera! This small Canary Island that, tragically, had 10% of its land mass and 30% of its World Heritage forests devastated by fires only seven months ago is now greener than Ireland.

An Irishman has died after apparently falling from a balcony while on holiday in Tenerife.

Cooler temperatures and favourable winds are helping firefighters battle the 11-day-old blaze still raging on the Canary Island of La Gomera.

Morocco has sent two water-bombing planes to help Spain battle a 10-day-old wildfire that has burned nearly 10% of the land on the Canary Island of La Gomera.

Two firefighters have died battling a wildfire in the Spanish province of Alicante.

Two firefighters have died from injuries sustained while battling a wildfire in the eastern province of Alicante, a Spanish emergency service official has said.

Five people were seriously injured in a gas explosion at a tourist hotel on the Canary island of Gran Canaria today.

TODAY, when we woke and opened the curtains, the skies over the Straits of Gibraltar were again peerless blue. The sea, azure and sparkling below them, broke on the sand in a white, crinoline frill.

NOBEL literature prize winner Jose Saramago, who left his native Portugal after arguing with his country’s government, has died at the age of 87, his Spanish publisher said yesterday.

RYANAIR is expected to go head-to-head with Aer Lingus in a battle for holiday-makers with plans for a number of low-fare routes from Cork to sun destinations.

RYANAIR is expected to announce a series of routes from Cork to a number of sun destinations today.

Strong winds fanned forest fires on the Canary Island of La Palma, and firefighters were forced to retreat as flames raged out of control near two towns.

STRONG winds were fanning fierce forest fires for a second day on the Canary Island of La Palma while a fresh outbreak has been detected on nearby La Gomera island, the Spanish government said.

Strong winds were fanning fierce forest fires for a second day on the Canary Island of La Palma while a fresh outbreak has been detected on nearby La Gomera island, the Spanish government said today.

A fierce forest fire fanned by high winds has forced the evacuation of around 4,000 residents on the south-eastern tip of the Canary Island of La Palma.

Two major wildfires are still burning in eastern Spain but seven have been brought under control.

Police in Spain foiled a plot to use a zeppelin to help a prisoner break out of jail, officials revealed Friday.

Robinho insists he is happy at Manchester City and left the club’s training camp in Tenerife to return to Brazil for family reasons.

WALLETS might be thinner in the current economic climate but Irish holidaymakers are still splashing out on faraway sunspots this winter.

Spain's aviation authority says Spanair, the airline involved in a crash that killed 154 people this week, has had another technical problem with one of its aeroplanes.

BUDGET Travel joins the list of companies offering winter breaks before summer is even over.

Spain’s Interior Ministry said forest fires are raging on the Canary Island of La Gomera, destroying homes and forcing an evacuation of 500 people.

The crew of a merchant ship rescued two men whose boat had been adrift in the Atlantic Ocean south of the Canary Islands for 20 days.

A ship today rescued two men whose boat had been adrift in the Atlantic Ocean south of the Canary Islands for 20 days, officials said.