X Factor winner has a ball during Connemara break

An X Factor winner currently belting out tracks made famous by the late Whitney Houston is seeking out her Connemara roots…and a few pints of the black stuff.
Alexandra Burke, whose most successful single was a cover version of the Leonard Cohen classic Hallelujah, took a break from her role in The Bodyguard currently showing in Dublin to take a road trip to Galway.
Unfortunately she did not get chance to get reacquainted with some long lost family.
“My nan is actually from Connemara. I’m not sure what town she was from, but I wanted to take this time while I was here to research my background and my roots,” she told a Dublin press conference.
“But there wasn’t enough time, so I’m hoping next year, with my family, we can take at least a week off of work and stuff to research where she was from.”
The highlights of her jaunt out west were Kylemore Abbey, sheep and Guinness.
“It was incredible driving past it [Kylemore] and seeing this massive castle and then randomly stopping in for afternoon tea and visiting where the boarding school used to be and seeing the background and stuff of who used to live there. It was really, really beautiful.”
She posted a photo of it to her Instagram account with the caption: “Visited the beautiful Kylemore Abbey yesterday! Such a stunning place!!!”
But her sojourn out west was not all about historic buildings and scenery.
“I got completely hammered on Guinness – it was an incredible few days off.”