Travel writer Pete McCarthy dies

McCarthy's Bar was published in 2000

Travel writer and broadcaster Pete McCarthy has died at the age of 51.

McCarthy, author of the best-selling book McCarthy's Bar, died at the Royal Sussex Hospital in Brighton.

A spokesman said McCarthy, who was married with three children, was diagnosed with cancer eight months ago and died on Wednesday.

McCarthy, who also wrote The Road to McCarthy, presented the Channel 4 series Travelog and hosted BBC Radio 4 panel show X Marks The Spot.

McCarthy's friend and tour manager Adrian Mealing said: "Pete was a writer, broadcaster, comedian and hugely popular performer.

"He was thrilled and delighted with the worldwide reaction to his books and had been planning his third, eagerly anticipating journeys, chance encounters and all the promise of a new venture."

Book awards

McCarthy was born in Warrington to an English mother and Irish father.

In McCarthy's Bar, he explored his Irish heritage and travelled from Cork to Donegal, with the premise that you should never pass up the opportunity of having a drink in a bar that shares your name.

The book sold nearly a million copies and won him the newcomer of the year prize at the British Book Awards in 2002.

His more ambitious follow-up book - The Road to McCarthy - took him on a journey across four continents in search of far-flung Irish connections.

'Lovely man'

Mr Mealing added: "These books endeared him to several generations around the globe who were either Irish, part Irish or who embraced the Celtic alternative to the Anglo-Saxon rule book.

"Pete's books caused seismic public laughter on suburban trains, transatlantic planes, storm tossed ferries, in cheap student accommodation and very definitely on the London Underground.

"The man himself was lovely and shall be missed."

McCarthy started out as a stand-up comedian and later wrote TV scripts for comedians Mel Smith and Griff Rhys Jones. In the 1990s he became a TV travel presenter.

McCarthy's Bar was published in 2000, followed by The Road to McCarthy in 2002.