Trip to Limerick

Myself and Clare are teaching at Meitheal Summer School this week in Ireland (www.tradweek.com). Our journey there was complete madness though. We set off along the A71 on Sunday – the quickest way to Prestwick Airport from our house – and half way along it we found that the road was shut and were being diverted by East Kilbride (opposite direction). We decided to not go this way and drive to Muirkirk, a parallel road as it would be quicker. As soon as we started we both felt that it wasn’t looking so good but we raced our way to the airport anyway and right enough were too late. The flight hadn’t taken off – not even boarded – but Ryan Air wouldn’t let us on anyway. We had parked in car park in our desperate attempt and i couldn’t find the ticket – bought moments before – to get us out. I then thought I had found it and I vaulted my way accross fences to the ticket payment place to find that I was using a Glasgow City Centre ticket which never worked – no way I hear you say. I then vaulted back (I think i looked quite athletic) because we were actually parked at the barrier for driving out of the car park and no-one could get past. I then found the ticket on my seat and paid. The stressssss was kicking in and we had to decided how to get to Ireland. There were no more flights from any of the airports and the next one was 4pm on Monday which was no use. We decided to drive to Troon and check out the boats but it was going to cost £350 return + petrol + 7 hour drive to Limerick. In the end there was no option but to take the boat however we decided only to buy a one way and call a centre to check out return prices later. We were both starving and we managed to get an ‘interesting’ meal on the boat and have a wee sleep. When we got of the boat at Larne we needed petrol but I said to Clare ‘let’s wait because the petrol will be cheaper nearer Belfast’ Well that turned out to be a disasterous decision because no-one was open anywhere near Belfast and the yellow petrol light was flashing. We had to the end drive back to Belfast and into the town and locate a 24hr garage gaining an hour onto our journey time. I suppose it all got a bit smoother after this and we made it to Limerick at 4.30am a whole 9 hours after we were meant to be there.

The 9.30 get up time was fun of course and I was wiped at the end of yesterdays teaching. The kids are great though and they are all fantastic musicians. The speed they pick up the tunes is amazing. In the UK you would never get two classes of young people playing the concertina so that is inspirational in its self. Only a few more days to go when of course I will not be flying home as planned but driving a few more miles…

A wee tester

I’m just getting used to this new wordpress software but so far it looks good. Today is is my birthday and tasks for the day include creating 4 podcasts (well 3 1/2) and having a shot of the Wii. That latter was meant to happen yesterday but I ran out of time – again…