LIKE any great wanderer, Howard Buckley just cannot escape his roots.

The 24-year-old left Bolton for Ramsgate a year ago to take up a new job.

And he quickly discovered that although you can remove the man from Bolton -- you cannot easily remove Bolton from the man.

That is because, although he now lives 296 miles away from his home town, he has teamed up with a girl living in Bolton house . . . in Bolton Street.

And now he is living there, too . The house is owned by his girlfriend, Kirsty McDonald, aged 28, whom he met six months ago.

He only realised fate was on his side when Kirsty drove him to the house -- and all he could see was the word Bolton.

"It was like, 'Are you kidding me?'. It was so weird," he said. "I saw Bolton Street first, but when I walked up to the front door and saw Bolton House, I was in disbelief.

"Kirsty said she couldn't think of anything else to call the house, so went for the boring option. I told her there was nothing boring about Bolton."

Since then he has underlined the Bolton connection by handing Kirsty his old Wanderers shirt and taking her along to a match at the Reebok Stadium.

Kirsty is now a Wanderers fan, but she hates watching Peter Kay's Phoenix Nights on Channel 4 -- because Howard never stops pointing out the Bolton locations.

He said: "I really annoy her by saying, 'That's where so-and-so works' or 'I used to hang out there'. She just tells me to shut up and watch, but I just love the town."

Howard went to Smithills School and Turton Sixth Form College.

He studied drama and music at Manchester Metropolitan University before taking a job as marketing officer for the Marlowe Theatre, Canterbury, where he met up with Kirsty.

On his induction at the theatre he spotted Kirsty, who he later found out edited the Kent County Council's internal magazine. He e-mailed her a photo and a piece about a band he was in and the pair became close.

Kirsty, from Canterbury, has since moved jobs and works in London. But she still lives with Howard at Bolton House.

"It would be hard to move away," Howard said.