Two brothers will walk the coastal Raad ny Foillan path over Easter weekend and make a film they will donate to help promote tourism.
Joel and Barney Rookwood live in England, but their family’s attachment to the island – particularly Port St Mary – stretches back several generations.
Their parents met on the boat to the island in the 1960s. They were on their way to beach mission – the annual gathering in Port St Mary which attracts hundreds of children – in which the family had been involved for several generations.
The Rookwood’s spent two weeks every year at the beach mission until he was 14. The family nearly moved here in 1991 when Joel’s father was considering the job as chaplain at King William’s College. So when Joel and Barney’s mother died in 2012, it seemed right to spread her ashes on Chapel Beach and buy a memorial bench, which is on the lower promenade.
Joel has trekked across England and Ireland, so walking around the island seemed like a natural thing to do. As did talking his brother Barney, 44, a GP in Newcastle, into joining him. They start and finish at the memorial bench.
Joel, 35, a senior lecturer at Southampton Solent University, intends to donate the film to Isle of Man Tourism.