Love Your County – Cork

As part of our Love Your County series, our focus today is on Cork, Ireland’s largest county whose greatest GAA moment came with a unique double in 1990.

Sporting moment 1990

No county has won more combined number of All-Ireland titles than Cork (30 in hurling, seven in football), but 1990 saw a unique double as the Rebels won in both codes in the same year.

Teddy McCarthy will go down in history as the first, and so far only man to win both in the same season as the footballers made it two in a row with a two point win over Meath, while the hurlers completed the landmark achievement two weeks later with a high-scoring win over Galway.

Kiss the Blarney Stone

A hugely popular venue for tourists, the Blarney Stone is said to give all that kiss it “the gift of the gab”, with the word blarney having come to mean “clever or coaxing”. The stone was set into a tower of the castle in 1446 and thousands go every year to get the gift.

Fota Wildlife Park

Home to nearly 30 mammal and 50 bird species, Fota Wildlife Park is a 75-acre area that will keep people of all ages entertained.

Animals roam freely with the visitors, such as the ring-tailed lemurs and squirrel monkeys, while larger animals, including the giraffe and bison, live in paddocks with unobtrusive barriers to allow viewing the animals in a more natural environment.