A Happy New Year to all our friends and supporters.

A long awaited trip by association members is fast approaching and preparations on the ground are building up. Members participating are promised a memorable voyage and no doubt people will want to see the fleet en route. The Royal Canal poster is available here. Details of the planned trip are available at HBA on the Royal.

Members should also be preparing for a Summer event - HBA 13 @ Athlone, which is our first in this important waterways town. Date is from 12th to 18th of August and not to be missed. More information to follow so watch this space.

Waterways Ireland are as usual busy with their Winter work program and are so far having a mild weather spell which is no doubt of great benefit to progress. Some pictures of the dredging of the Grand Canal Circular Line from early December, are available here.

Offaly County Council's art grant produced the amazing "A Grand Experience" which was shown on TV and an exhibition on the venture has been staged at venues countrywide. A copy of the DVD is great value and details of how to purchase or download are at [www.mixedbagmedia.com]

River Rat Calendar sales have broken all our projection figures and at present there are less than forty copies available, if you want one buy now, or be dissapointed. Congratulations to all involved from painting to selling, a job really well done.

Our Memories page contains many items of interest, so do pay it a visit.

The latest in the series of Labour History on Irish waterways can be found under Snippets 8.

Brian Goggin's "Irish Waterways History" site is always worth a visit and an article on a bridge in Broadstone Harbour on the Royal Canal in Dublin is a recent addition.

Also worth a look-in is the continueing story of Hawthorn and her much travelled crew, with writings on a mixture of interesting topics

New Ross Boat Yard were in contact with us recently and we would reccomend a look around their very interesting site.