R ed Hook is unlike anywhere else in Brooklyn. The community is home to artists, chefs, craftsmen and workers, all of whom will welcome you with unique food and handmade crafts.

This gives Red Hook its own laid back yet active feel that locals and visitors alike have come to appreciate. Come for an hour or two for a bite and some shopping, or spend a weekend exploring Red Hook’s parks, shops, bars and, of course, its amazing waterfront.

We’ll start at the Red Hook Community Court.  District Attorney Charles Hynes will lead the tour and tell the group about the innovative employment programs run by the Court.

Then Elizabeth Demetriou, the Director of Revitalization & Development at the Southwest Brooklyn Industrial Development Corporation (SBIDC), will lead a walking tour down Van Brunt Street, stopping in a few businesses along the way. She will speak about the work of SBIDC.

Finally, we’ll meet up with Greg O’Connell, the developer and visionary for many great new developments in Red Hook, at the site of Fairway Market. Greg will discuss the adaptive reuse of this old warehouse into a supermarket and housing.  He will also lead a tour of the Beard Street Warehouse that is filled with many small businesses (carpenters, glass blowers, etc.) and plays host the Brooklyn Waterfront Artists Coalition events.

Click here to view the Red Hook guide.

Lock us up and swallow the key!

I was in Donegal at the weekend and I asked a man how he planned to vote in the south’s up-coming referendum. “Well,” he told me, “ if Sinn Féin say no about something, I say yes”.

Big man of GAA celebrates in style

Veni, Vidi, Vinci . I came, I saw, I conquered, was the powerful message sent back to Rome by Julius Caesar when he won a war in Zela (currently known as Zile in Turkey. After spending two days with the Gaels of Glengormley, Mícheál Ó Muircheartaigh might well have sent a similar message back to headquarters. Throughout the two days he won the hearts of all who met him as he demonstrated his love and passion for the Irish language and Gaelic games.

That’s not the way to do it as summer nears

THERE’S nothing funnier for children to watch than a long-suffering wife getting battered with a cudgel by a short-tempered violent husband – or so you’d think if you watched a seaside Punch and Judy show.

Blues make it a double

Linfield replicated their end of season celebrations from 12 months ago as they lifted their second trophy in the space of a week, defeating Crusaders 4-1 in Saturday’s Irish Cup final.

My marathon highs and lows

HIGHLIGHTS 1. Sheltering in City Hall with marathon veteran from New York Fr Brian Jordan — chaplain to the trade unions of the Big Apple — before the 9am start while thousands were getting drenched outside waiting for the Lord Mayor Niall Óg to sound the starting horn (gun for off apparently decommissioned).

Who calls the shots in Europe?

I enjoy elections. I enjoy them so much, I was delighted when the Fianna Fáil wheeze of introducing electronic voting machines backfired, leaving them (and the taxpayer, of course) with machinery that couldn’t be used and cost a packet to store.