How I Met My Partner: A love story that began in Australia for Cork city councillor

Garret and Leona Kelleher met in Sydney nearly 20 years ago, and six months after, decided to travel the country together.

Garret, a Fine Gael councillor since 2019 who is running in the general election in Cork North Central, was in Australia travelling when he met Leona, a nurse originally from Tipperary.

He told The Echo: “It was 2005, Leona had gone out travelling with a few friends and was working as a nurse in Sydney.

“I was just after spending three years in Luxemburg working with the European Commission and wanted to travel for a bit with my own friends before returning home to Ireland.

“I joined Michael Cusack’s GAA club in Sydney, we’d had a match one Sunday night and went out after the game, and met Leona for the first time in a bar.

“For one of our first dates, we went to the races – Leona was not particularly impressed because she’d put more effort into her dress than I had. 

“I had training or a match later and I had a gear bag over my shoulder, so it was not a great first impression.” 

Luckily, Leona was not deterred, and after six months of dating, they decided to see more of Australia together.

“I was going to visit my cousin in Melbourne and I asked Leona if she’d be interested in coming down with me, and she was, then I suggested we might do a bit of travelling together.

“It was a big decision to make, a bit into the unknown for both of us,” but they decided to do it anyway, he said.

“We flew up to Darwin and bought a jeep from a farmer there, then drove all the way down the West Coast and stopped at some fantastic places along the way.

“We were staying in accommodation with a lot of people the same age as ourselves backpacking, it was a great way of meeting people.” 

They got to Perth, where they stayed with a former primary school friend of Garret’s that he had kept in touch with and his wife, then continued their journey, driving up to Alice Springs and then back to Sydney.

“We were only ever going to be in Australia for a year, and we both came back in 2006,” Garret explained. 

The couple moved into the home where they currently live in Ballincollig in 2008, and three years later, Garret proposed.

He recalled: “We booked a holiday to New York in 2011, and we got engaged in Central Park. Then we got married in 2012, in Leona’s home church just outside Templemore in Tipperary."

Two years later, their daughter Siún was born. Garret said: “She’s ten now, we have a son Cormac who’s seven, then Cian who is four now and then another daughter Sibéal who’s two.

“They were all born in the house here in Ballincollig, we had four home births.” 

Leona works as a nurse in Ballincollig Primary Care Centre, and Garret works at a medical devices company as well as a city councillor.

“As a family, things are very full on – our children are at a stage when they have a lot of activities of their own and we’d be very involved in Ballincollig Tidy Towns, then there’s a lot of time involved in my work as a public representative, so we’re very busy!” he said.

“At this stage, we’re looking forward to watching our kids grow up, develop, get through school and play their own part in the community, making friends and making their own lives here in Ballincollig.”