Hector Goes

We're an island race with a very strange attitude to the men and women who fish our waters. They put food on our tables, sure they do, and they sometimes die doing it but really, if we're honest about it, do we give a flying fish who lands the bloody things? Hector goes to sea, talks quotas and even engages with the Spanish trawlers on his seafaring journey.

It seems that quite suddenly we live in a world of speed dating and online match making. How do boys and girls (or any combination of boys and girls) actually meet in the time sink that is 21st century Ireland. In a freshly laundered shirt and with the Blue Stratos splashed on, Hector sets out to find a mate.

So... what are we actually made of? We're not taking about the artistic soul of the warrior Gael here - but rather about the ground beneath his feet. What is Ireland made of? What's under this green and fertile and stony grey soil? And how much of it is there? And who have we sold it to? With his divining rod in one hand, his panning pan in his back pack and the metal detector back in the camper van, Hector will set off to find out about the zinc under Navan, the gold in Croagh Patrick and the water in his own back garden. We'll talk silver, lead, coal, copper and gas and we'll talk fracking (why?), we'll talk turf cutting (why not?) and we'll talk pipelines !

Hector immerses himself in one of the most successful amateur associations, of any sort, in the world. Part sports association, part social services, all about passion and all about parish -- Unless you come from Cavan...Anyone for a game of handball? Or rounders?