Miles away — but always close to the heart

They may be thousands of kilometres from home but friends and family left behind in Ireland are never far from the thoughts of the thousands of

You will see them front and centre these next few weeks as pictures of the British & Irish Lions are beamed back into your living rooms from their tour of Australia, the sea of red created by 20,000 supporters from the four corners of our islands peppered here and there with a Tricolour and green jersey. Or the Kildare flag proudly draped over a stand at Paterson’s Stadium in Perth on Wednesday night when the Lions played Western Force. That belonged to Anne and Gary O’Doherty, the parents of four Irish-born kids aged between two and six, trying to make it work six months after deciding to try their luck in Western Australia.

Donncha Lowney left West Cork’s Beara peninsula four years ago and is now happily settled in Perth, working as a civil manager for a company in the gas industry. His office on the 29th floor of a downtown skyscraper is a world away from the highways and byways of Allihies on the tip of Beara but on July 20, the 27-year-old will be on those lanes in spirit after marshalling around 100 fellow expats, many of them from West Cork, and locals to embark on a 60-kilometre cycle to raise funds for the fight against Motor Neurone Disease.