Sanity Returns

Anybody who knows us is aware of the enjoyment we derive from travel, usually to far flung places.  This time it's different because far flung in the case of Ireland is basically an hour's flying time from our home.  Nonetheless, this is a place, with the exception of Dublin, that we have never explored and so my initial golfing trip had provided the opportunity for us to right a long term wrong!

It was yet another beautiful day in Westport as I departed for the three hour drive across to Dublin.  It is very noticeable in Ireland to just what extent the country has benefitted from European (read UK) money for improving their infrastructure.  New motorways have been built, roads resurfaced and lots of banners with gold stars thanking the EU for their support are on every corner!  I have to say that after the UK experience, the Irish road network is a dream and it was pure pleasure to drive across the country without the constant effort of dodging large potholes!

Linda was duly collected and we were able to make a quick escape to the South from Dublin due to the quieter than normal Monday traffic, this being a Bank Holiday.  Our first destination was to be Kinsale in the far South and we reached it without problem arriving around 2000 hours at our spectacular B&B sitting high on a hill above the town.  Rivermount House far exceeded expectations and the welcome was exactly what we had come to expect from the Irish, warm and friendly.

It was so wonderful to be back with my sleeping partner of some 45 years and not have to worry about the lawnmower being started or the Queen Mary docking in Portsmouth!  Sorry Mick, but Linda is definitely my preferred room mate and will be accompanying me on any further golf tour acting as my caddy!

Not A Problem In Sight

After the traumas of the first couple of days, Sunday turned out to be a breeze.  Crikey, I even managed 5 hours sleep thanks to me getting to bed at 2300 hours on Saturday night and my room mate not getting to bed until 0400 on Sunday morning!  Basically, he was coming to bed as I was about to get up so this room sharing thing actually worked pretty well.  To clarify Mick's lateness to bed, he is in a band at home and always takes his guitar with him wherever he travels in the world.  Basically he loves to entertain and on this occasion, he found himself performing in The Helm until the early hours.  He is so good that the punters wouldn't let him retire to his bed until they were ready to leave and in an Irish bar, that indeed can be an extremely late finish!

Our tour organiser, Gerald, had managed to re-schedule our golf on the Sunday to Carne Golf Club, some ninety minutes North of our base and remarkably, the journey passed off without incident.  So did the golf and again under beautiful blue skies and with barely a breath of wind to be felt, everyone experienced the magnificence which is Carne Golf Links.  This is a course crafted by mother nature and whoever looked at this piece of land and created the 18 holes, he has to be a genius because it is surely something the likes of which I am never likely to experience again.  The bonus as well was that I had started to get into the "links mentality" and actually repeated my score of day one which was hugely satisfying.  I wasn't to make the prize list but my satisfaction was in playing ten times better than the previous day.

I there was any downside to the final day of golf, it was the late return to The Helm which meant that I actually ordered my main course of the evening meal at 2230, half an hour after I am normally in bed!  Fortunately, I had brought along my jumbo size packet of Rennies indigestion tablets which put the gastric fire out before I climbed into bed and thanks to those and to another of Sir Michael's late finishes, decent and prolonged sleep proved a bonus.

And so the golfing part of the trip came to an end and I packed and prepared for an early start to Dublin in the morning to collect Linda, who was to bring some sanity and  dignity back into my life for the next 8 days.  The golfing trip had been terrific and I can only commend the cracking bunch of people with whom I shared the first few days of this Irish adventure.

How Did That Happen?

Saturday dawned beautiful and bright - yes I was tired - but the surrounds of Westport acted as a stimulus to my weariness.  The mountain Croagh Patrich, provides an incredible backdrop to this West of Ireland town and my early morning walk, prior to breakfast, was a further catalyst to any tiredness left in my bones.  It also provided a boost to my appetite for the full Irish breakfast awaiting me in The Helm.  
Duly fed and watered, the coach was loaded with our golfing gear and we set off on the two hour journey to Connemara Golf Club, a links course, which enjoys a superlative reputation among golfers of every class.  For me, this was a particularly special event because I had never previously played a true links course and was told by a number of my golfing colleagues that I was in for a treat.

However, before that treat occurred and only 10 miles from our intended destination, it became obvious that there was a problem!  It wasn't a small one either.  It turned out that we were heading for the wrong course!  The one we were due to play was Carne Golf Club which at that stage was 90 miles to the North of us and at least three hours by bus!!  How could this have happened?  However it did happen and with no chance of playing anywhere else, Connemara Golf Club pulled out all the stops and we ended up playing our round of golf an hour later than originally planned and in the middle of a Club competition.  It was typical of the Irish way and we were all eternally grateful for the stops that they pulled out for us on that day.

My first experience of links golf almost destroyed me and from being top five the day before, I sank into the relegation zone and but for the generosity of one Olly Burton, I would have finished bottom of the pack!  The ignominy of it but thanks to Olly for being a crappier golfer than me on the day!

I couldn't blame the weather nor could I blame the conditions.  A more perfect day to play links golf simply doesn't exist and despite the poor quality of my golf, Connemara was a true golfing paradise. I can well understand why people fly in and out of this course by helicopter to enjoy the challenges it offers.

We had thought that on departing for our return to The Helm that the troubles experienced to date by the touring party were well behind us but how wrong can you be?  You see on returning to our base, it is traditional to stop off at a local hostelry to re-fuel with Guinness or whatever takes your fancy.  A quick stop that it is and then back on the bus.  All fine until 10 miles further along our journey, another elder member of the party, Tom (known as Purple) Hayes announced that he had left his man bag in the pub!!  A decision was made to return immediately to retrieve it and John, our bus driver, executed a twenty three point turn on the narrowest of roads and with something of an overhang behind us - think The Italian Job - and we were on our way back to the pub where the bag was handed over.

The rest of the journey passed without incident and despite the problems that confronted us and the pathetic golf that was played by a few, the consensus was that we had experienced a day never to forget.  I had to agree.















   

How To Survive On Two Hours Sleep!

I did find out on the Friday that my room mate was to be Mick Hirst, known in the touring party as Sir Michael, due to his being awarded an OBE in a previous Honour's List.  Great for me because I have known Mick a long time, get on very well with him and in fact Linda and I met up with him and his wife Susan, in South Africa earlier this year.  We enjoyed a lovely meal at one of our favourites, Cafe Bon Bon, in Franschhoek.  What I didn't know about my friend was the problem he has with snoring and this quickly became evident during the night! 

Some people class me as anti-social but actually, I just need to get to bed early because I am a morning person .  0500 is my normal wake up time and I jump out of bed at 0600 with a smile on my face and ready to take on whatever challenges the day ahead has to throw at me.  The smile is generally there because if I wake up then I am alive!  It's a brilliant way to start the day...being alive that is and having a smile on my face.  Anyway, back to Sir Michael.

I had barely got to sleep when my room mate appeared, waking me up of course but I didn't let onto that fact.  I merely turned over, hoping to return quickly to the land of nod and dream of the golf and the tour of Ireland that lay ahead.  Dreams?  You must be joking!  Within two minutes of Mick's head hitting the pillow, he started to produce a sound which I could only compare to my petrol powered Honda lawnmower.  It was actually a quiet start on his part because as the hours rolled on he became progressively louder moving onto an impression of a Harley Davidson before ultimately producing his piece de resistance which was the siren of Cunard's Queen Mary 2 as it left port!  The room shook and I swear that on the intake of breath, the walls actually moved in on us!  Needless to say, while Mick slept the sleep of the dead, I was consigned to a night of burying my head under the pillow trying to find the silence and some sleep!  It never came and dawn welcomed a weary and somewhat fraught individual who determined to find some method of generating sleep going forwards.

But A Not So Great Start For The Touring Party!

Friday was to be the first day of golf but of course before that could happen, I needed the arrival of my fellow golfers in order that I at least had somebody to play with.  Unfortunately, their journey proved to be not quite as smooth as mine and it wasn't the airline's fault!

The last communication put out by our organiser Gerald, was don't forget to bring your passport!  A simple instruction and one that you would expect a bunch of people, some of more advanced years than others, to take on board and perhaps include it as the final item on their pre-departure check list.  Apparently on departing our golf club in Skipton, the question asked was, "have you all got your passports?"  A collective yes was the right reply and so the journey to Manchester Airport was completed trouble free...at least until the check in process began!

Our erstwhile Captain, Mr William (Bill) Simpson, known to everyone on tour as Will I Am, handed his passport over to the check in staff only to be asked the question, "where is Mrs Simpson?"  Yes, he had brought his wife's passport rather than his own which was laying in a drawer some 70 miles away!  Disastersville for Bill.  His only option was to get a taxi home to retrieve the relevant document, arrange another flight, this time from Liverpool to a different airport and then organise another taxi back to the new departure airport.  Nobody subsequently dared to ask him the additional costs incurred for his golfing trip but they were substantial, that's for sure!

You would have thought that this was the end of the problems for the day but another one did occur resulting in the delayed departure of the flight.  Ryanair believed that Bill's golf clubs had been loaded for the flight and therefore had to be removed from the hold, as is normal practice, because the passenger was no longer travelling.  It was some time before the pin dropped and the airline realised that Bill's clubs had actually never been loaded!  Eventually, the flight departed nearly 60 minutes late with the result that the golfers had to travel directly to the first golf course rather than enjoy a leisurely lunch at The Helm.

As for me, I had a delicious full Irish breakfast, enjoyed a wonderful couple of hours exploring the area and arrived at Westport Golf Course fit, refreshed and raring to hit the fairways of this beautifully situated track.  Eventually, my playing compatriots arrived and finally, Will I Am, some six hours later than originally expected!  Needless to say he didn't get to play a full 18 holes but everyone was glad to see him arrive safely although with a considerably thinner wallet!

As for the golf, it was terrific.  Gorgeous sunny skies although a touch cool, great course, fantastic location and I managed to finish in the prizes.  For me, a perfect start to the trip and a day to remember.

A Great Start For Me

It was a pretty easy start to the golfing trip for me because unlike the remaining 31 participants, I actually travelled out to Ireland the day before because I chose to fly with British Airways at a sensible time from Leeds Bradford airport.  The downside of course was that they don't fly directly to Dublin which meant me connecting through London Heathrow, although in fairness, this was a minor inconvenience but avoided two vital things - 1) I didn't have to get up at 3.30am on the Friday morning for a coach ride to Manchester and 2) I avoided having to fly with Ryanair which doesn't have the greatest reputation for passenger care!

And so I landed into Dublin around 3.30pm in the afternoon, collected my hire car and set off on the three hour journey to our base, Westport, which lies across the other side of the island.  It was a delightful and very easy journey under beautiful blue skies and on roads that were dramatically quieter and better surfaced than those we are used to on mainland UK.  Many of the signs along route suggested that the country had been the beneficiary of considerable EU money to establish the wonderful road network!  As for those skies, I did wonder if they were a positive omen for what might lie ahead?

Our base was to be The Helm in Westport - Google it - and on arrival I declared myself as the advance party for those following tomorrow.  Like many people, I had been told of the warmth and friendliness of the Irish folk and this was demonstrated in huge fashion by Vinny, the owner, his son Shane and all the staff working in the pub, restaurant and apartments.  His words were, "treat this man like a VIP" and that is exactly what they did with nothing being too much trouble.  The welcome boded well for the 10 days ahead.

To keep cost down on a golfing trip, there is a necessity to get on with your fellow travellers which includes sharing rooms.  I was shown to my two roomed apartment comprising four beds although only one of the beds was a double!  Oh the benefit of being the advanced party.  My claim was quickly staked although at this stage I had no idea who my golfing room mate was to be.  Thursday night was actually to provide the best sleep of the three nights in The Helm but more on that will follow. 

Ireland Beckons

We hadn't really planned a trip to Ireland this year but when somebody from my golf club announced that they were repeating a three day trip to Ireland which first happened in 2018, I was quick to put my name forward as a participant.  I wasn't the only one mind you and it ended up with 34 golfers heading to Westport on Friday 3rd May to play three rounds of golf including two on Links courses which I had never previously experienced!  More on the golf in the next post.

The minor problem for me with this trip was that I had only just returned from a similar one to Florida with Richard and Sarah, leaving Linda at home while we enjoyed not only the golf but the delightful warmth of Florida state.  Anybody who knows Linda appreciates that she craves warmth and it did feel a little selfish when the three golfers agreed unanimously that mum should stay at home!  No reflection on the lack of Linda's presence but the time spent playing golf with the kids was fantastic albeit it left me feeling a tad selfish.

Mind you, I perhaps wasn't the only person feeling a little selfish as Richard also left behind Charlotte, Annabel and Sam but I am certain that there will have to be some pay back there and rightly so! 

However, with the Irish trip, the seed was sown in my mind that perhaps I could extend my stay by getting Linda to fly out to Dublin after the golf and we could then take a little time to explore the wonders of this wonders of this country having been told on so many occasions just how wonderful it was.  Certainly no 28C temperatures guaranteed and very much the strong possibility of wet weather and gale force winds but Linda jumped at the suggestion and so the tickets for our short Irish adventure were booked and confirmed and the plans laid as to what we would do with our week.