Hamish Champ: Mine was an Irish Christmas

I'm usually ensconced at home in south east London over any given Christmas holiday, but the most recent festivities found me in the west of Ireland. On the Dingle peninsula in County Kerry, to be precise, in a small village called Inch, where my in-laws live.

It's a lovely part of the world. You may know it. Perched on the outer reaches of the famous Ring of Kerry, the scenery about the place is nothing short of breathtaking, equalling my other Favourite Part of the World for dramatic landscapes, the north west of Scotland.

As well as the peninsula's majestic mountains and cavernous valleys there's Inch Strand, a three and a half mile-long spit of sand dunes and beach jutting out at right angles from the main coastline. It was the setting for much of David Lean's film 'Ryan's Daughter', and a walk along its windswept shore works wonders in ridding one's self of the excesses of the Christmas lunch.

Better still, the area's pubs are dynamite. My own favourite is Foley's, which is situated on the Dingle to Castlemaine road, opposite Inch's cemetery.

My in-laws' local as well as a favourite watering hole of BBC newsreader Dermot Monaghan when he's visiting nearby relatives, Foley's is a class act; genuinely welcoming and consistently serving the best pint of Guinness I've ever tasted. The 'kids' might quaff Bulmers over ice as if it's going to be their last drink on this earth, but the Black Stuff in Foley's is to die for. Meanwhile, the service, courtesy of husband and wife team John and Fidelis, is second to none.

Like many pubs in rural Ireland, things don't get going until well after 10pm. You get a few tourists in before then, the pub being where it is an' all, but the vast majority of punters are locals - farmers, builders, etc - and they pitch up when they're good and ready, and not a moment before.

Once inside it's abuzz with conversation and, if you're lucky, some decent musicians whose performances are sometimes planned, sometimes impromptu. Everybody knows everybody else, and if you want to learn about what's going on in the area, or meet friends, family, etc, it's the place to be. It is the quintessential community pub, but outsiders aren't shunned.

I've heard all sorts of stories about the number of pubs closing in Ireland as a result of the country's well-established smoking ban. Things in some parts of the country may indeed be as bad as reports make them out to be.

But Foley's - along with other hostelries I visited throughout the Christmas period - was doing a roaring trade. Long may it continue…