Apollo Bay is a small coastal resort on the marvellous Great Ocean Road in Australia, and is about as far as it gets from Ireland, with Google suggesting that Belfast is more than 10,000 miles away.
Most of the people passing through it are tourists heading for the world famous Twelve Apostles limestone stacks - although there are actually only eight of them left - which is about an hour’s drive away, and the town has no particular connection with any diaspora.
It was therefore something of a surprise on a Sunday afternoon stroll last month to hear the unmistakeable sounds of jigs and reels echoing out of the Apollo Bay Hotel, practically the most southern licensed premises on the Australian continent.
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We felt obliged to check it out, and found the bar packed with people of all nationalities, including a number from Asian backgrounds, as a talented Irish traditional group went through its full lively repertoire.
The audience lapped it up, especially the closing medley of songs with what might be called a political flavour, featuring among others God Save Ireland, A Nation Once Again and the Merry Ploughboy.
All these ballads date back more than a century, and reflect historical strands which are unique to Ireland, so it is debatable how much the lyrics meant to the visitors from Japan and China as well as the ordinary residents of Apollo Bay.
However, the enthusiasm of the crowd, clapping and cheering loudly throughout, prompted some thoughts about the power of Irish culture and the way it can reach out to people even on the other side of the world.
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We often take our music, dancing and literature for granted, and it probably takes a long haul trip to appreciate the extraordinarily positive image which Ireland generates among people with very different heritages.
It is unlikely that a selection of melodies from many other far flung locations would entice a diverse gathering to abandon the barbeques and the Southern Ocean beaches, and instead join in a prolonged celebration over a couple of schooners of lager.
Wherever we went in Australia, a massive country which is not much smaller than Europe, the Irish influence was hard to avoid. A monument to Daniel O’Connell stands proudly in front of St Patrick’s Cathedral in Melbourne, symbolising the close links which have been in place for almost 250 years.
British imagery attracts some different views, as demonstrated when a statue of King George V was beheaded and covered in red paint in another part of the same city earlier this year.
Garret FitzGerald approved the transfer of the Queen Victoria statue to Sydney, with the irony of a British monarch being transported by ship to Australia not lost on a range of commentators
The blatant act of vandalism was only the latest such attack in the area believed to have been carried out by Australian rather than Irish republicans, with other targets including tributes to Queen Victoria and Captain James Cook.
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Another statue of Queen Victoria, which was originally unveiled outside Leinster House in Dublin in 1908, sums up the sometimes complex relationship between Ireland, Britain and Australia.
It became the subject of sustained criticism after the creation of the Irish Free State in 1922, over Victoria’s role in the Great Famine, and was unkindly referred to by James Joyce as the “auld bitch”, before being moved to various less prominent locations.
In 1986, the then taoiseach, Garret FitzGerald, approved its transfer to the Queen Victoria building in central Sydney, where it still remains, although the irony of a British monarch being transported by ship to Australia was not lost on a range of commentators.
Tens of thousands of Irish citizens made the same journey in the past, some voluntarily and others less so, with many leaving a strong mark across all aspects of Australian society. Their tradition of playing a key political role continues to this day, as prime minister Anthony Albanese is the son of an Irish-Australian woman.
I visited Australia to see my youngest daughter Clare, who organised a tour stretching from Apollo Bay to the spectacular Whitsunday islands close to the Great Barrier Reef in the north-east, where she then got engaged to her Australian partner, Max, who is now in possession of an official GAA email, welcoming him as a Down supporter.
It was a wonderful trip but the distances are not to be underestimated as, after leaving Clare’s apartment in Melbourne, and avoiding any undue delays, it was still 33 hours before we made it home to Belfast. While the Irish and Australian people are very close spiritually, geography is quite another matter.
