Finally there’s a semblance of warmth in the air, the days are longer and brighter and the dark and cold days seem to be behind us, at least for now. Over the past few weeks we’ve (that’s me and Travis) therefore been making final preparations for this year’s summer getaway – destination Ireland!
Armed with little more knowledge than where Ireland is (hopefully) and one travel book that I’ll refer to as we go along (if I remember) we’re soon to be on our way. The ferry is booked, work is as up to date as I can get it, Travis is packed, serviced and raring to go. In fact we already are on our way, sat on the ferry from Fishguard to Rosslare making our way across a favourably calm Irish Sea or St George’s Channel depending on where you look up the name of that bit of water.
Well in actual fact the real truth of the matter, because the above statement is not entirely truthful… is that we arrived in Ireland a couple of days ago. I had intended to write a post whilst on the ferry over however what I actually did was drink coffee and eat crisps and fall asleep. Nonetheless I can put myself back in the moment to write this, and you can pretend the above never happened and we needn’t tell anyone else.
So here I am sat in the fancy lounge of the Stena ferry having recently departed Fishguard. I paid the extra for the flexibility of being able to change the booking if I so wished. In the end I didn’t change it but it came with complimentary access to the free crisp area so here I am, crisps and all. Even Travis is proudly sporting his priority boarding badge on the dashboard. Parked near the front of the boat, eager for a rapid departure on arrival to get exploring as soon as possible. I don’t think he got any crisps but I’m eating enough for both of us.
It’s always a bittersweet moment departing on these adventures. I’m so excited to be back on the road and seeing new places and experiencing new things and meeting new people. But at the same time I miss all the people I’m leaving behind. All the friends who have been so good to me over the winter, the rest of the band Someone Else Ahead (shameless plug) who generously put up with their singer disappearing for months during the summer, all the other friends I’ve been able to catch up with or meet for the first time since I’ve been back. it has been so good to see everyone during the last few months and the last few weeks have been a whirlwind of rushing around trying to catch up and spend time with everyone before I left and it has been lovely.
But now it’s back to me and Travis, the dynamic duo. Well half of the duo is dynamic, the other half drinks coffee, eats crisps and falls asleep in front of the TV when he’s supposed to be writing. Thankfully Travis hasn’t fired me yet, but I think he had a wistful air about him when we popped in to visit his previous companion on the way here.
The plan, such that it is, this time is to drive around the coastline of Ireland from Rosslare in the south-east corner in a clockwise direction along the south coast including the Copper Coast, then north along the wiggly west coast making up the Wild Atlantic Way until eventually crossing into Northern Ireland to see the Giant’s Causeway etc then back down into Ireland again along the east coast to where we started.
Whether we’ll actually get to do all of that before the weather turns chilly again, or whether we’ll get distracted by all the many beautiful places to see or even end up going back to Scotland from Northern Ireland who knows. To be honest it doesn’t really matter exactly where we go. There’s no list to be ticked off or itinerary to follow and we’ll see how long we want to stay in each place and where to go next as we go. That’s all part of the adventure and there’s always next year if we don’t manage it all the way around.
Ireland here we come! Ok we’re already here. Shush!