Eire 2005

Our journey started at 4am on Saturday morning, the Stenna fast line was booked for 8.55am. We had to check in 45mins before departure so we had 4 hours to make the 175 mile journey. We got up at 3am the weather was great, Dave arrived on his 13 at 4am the weather was just starting to break so we opted for waterproofs. A good choice as it rained for the whole trip to the ferry. It didn't just rain but it poured it down. We were soaked to the bone so much so the guy's on the ferry took our clothes an dried them for us during the crossing.

Once we arrived in Ireland the weather started to change, it just rained instead of bucketing it down. After about 50 miles or so the rain became intermittent and we enjoyed the dry spells as much as we could.

On route we caught up with a slow moving object or 4 of them! The tail back of cars was huge so we just white lined it to the front where a Garda (Policeman) stopped us and said we couldn't pass. We sat there for a while and where joined by more and more bikers heading the same way as us. Eventually the Garda who now felt a little intimidated relented and organised the load to pull over so we could pass.

The journey got better and dryer from here on in, we continued south towards Cork following the other guy's as they seemed to know where they where going. An observation I made on this journey though...Are Harley Davidsons made in Ireland? Ireland is full of them. 9 out of 10 bikes we saw where Harley's. We arrived at the Ducks rally to find the bikes weren't allowed onto the camping field which wasn't much of a surprise seeing as the heavens had dumped the months supply of rain on us within a day. Below gives you an idea of the site:-

Below are some of the bikes at the rally, note Damians Turbo 13. He and Mags came down from Athlone to meet us. Mags came on her bike; a black bike damn can't remember what it is? Too much Caffery's.

Because the site was so wet and the journey so long we decided to only stay one night at the rally then head on northwards towards Kilkenny where we'd get a B+B for the night. Opting to do this gave us chance to ride slowly (in the dry) and enjoy the scenary and stop whenever we wanted without the fear of missing any deadlines. We found Ireland to be a fantastic place, the people were great, really friendly and welcoming and the fact the place is unspoilt with masses of open roads and no Police or cameras. Below are a series of picture taken during the journey back.

The picture below is to prove to all the doubters of Daves 13 that he does ride it and it does get mucky. Dave has won more trophies than I've had Kebabs with this 13 and I'm sure he'll carry on winning too.

We found a B+B in a village out side Kilkenny and the owner let us put our bikes in her garage which was real cool of her. below is the B+B.

Apart from a great B+B the village had more pubs than houses (Result) so we just had to try them all.

We concluded the trip on the Monday clocking a total of about 800 miles. (The furthest I've ever done in one trip) Ireland we loved you and we'll be back next year and hopefully with a few more guy's.