Well I honestly don’t know where to start! First of all as is now customary I shall tell you where I’am typing this. I’am in the Galway Clinic waiting for Chris to come back after an operation and hopefully this might take my mind off the worry!
An awful lot has happened lately, at the start of November we had a trip toBirmingham to visit the coach show, we had a great time and it was a fitting end to what has been a really tough season. We have been operating weekend tours through November and December indeed our last tour will be this Saturday.
Unfortunately most of the activity for us is away from business at the moment, Chris’ mother has been unwell lately and so she headed across to England to be with her for a few weeks ago, I followed for a brief visit and returned with my father to visit the Irish Coach show in Dublin, we had a great weekend and it was lovely to have my dad with us for a few days, he also kept me company on a couple of tours before he headed back to England.
But the big news is that Chris has been in hospital for a major operation for the last few days and as usual for us things haven’t gone to plan, she has had to have more tests and operations, today is hopefully the end of it and with any luck she could well be out on Thursday, she is in the Galway clinic which is a marvelous place although needles to say of course it is a private hospital this is despite the fact that we now pay a levy for our health service but it unfortunately proved to be entirely useless in this case.
Chris has been in 11 days now and I have been traveling between home and Galway regularly (about 1.5 hours by car) but typically even that has not been easy due to us having truly awful weather conditions. We have not had much snow but we have had temperatures down to minus 10 at night and daytime temperatures barely above freezing, because of this and to be with Chris I have spent a few nights in Galway which would normally be one of my favourite cities but it has held little cheer for me lately!
Road conditions have been unbelievable with sheet ice even appearing on major roads, I was traveling up to Galway on Sunday to pay a surprise visit to Chris for the day, at home the ice had to be seen to be believed, literally everything was frozen I even had to defrost pad locks on the gate and garage as well as door locks on the coaches. Roads from home were pretty bad but being a Sunday morning I made good steady progress until I got into Limerick, heading out of Limerick on the main Ennis Road I was steadily negotiating a roundabout only to find the back end of the car slipping, I managed to correct it but the entire road was literally a skating rink! I called the Garda to report it and apparently I wasn’t the first near miss! I can appreciate the difficulties of winter maintenance to our cash strapped councils but this really was amazing!
Also around this I have been running tours and Saturdays’ Cliffs tour was particularly memorable first of all because I had a very nice group but also because of the weather again, we had freezing fog for a while out of Limerick but it was after Ennis that the fun began, we had our usual photo stop at Leamenagh Castle before heading towards the Poulnabrone Tomb, the road across the Burren was very icy but I took things very steadily and all went well, when we reached the Tomb I found the car park to be a sheet of ice so warned everyone to take care. Once we left the Tomb we descended into thick freezing fog for a while however that cleared and the views around Black Head were stunning with a few photo stops. We reached The Cliffs safe and sound and again the views were lovely, everyone seemed to have had a great tour and my passengers mostly drifted off to sleep as it was getting dark for the return journey. After Ennistymon we ran into freezing fog which persisted all the way to Limerick. Whilst I had a great day I don’t think I have ever been more pleased to see our yard and get out the bus, this weather really does take it out of you indeed I settled into my chair with a pint of Beamish and promptly fell asleep!
Back to the patient now the operation seems to have been a success and she s now sleeping off the sedative next to me on the ward, I will leave soon for my B&B and another lonely night in the City of The Tribes, my next installment will be much sooner and hopefully more upbeat!
One last thing, you might of heard that our beloved country is effectively bankrupt and today the budget is announced which will further squeeze our slim margins and inflict untold misery and do you know something? I look at Chris sleeping next to me and realise that the IMF, Cowen and all the other misery mean absolutely nothing to me at the moment, if they bring in 100% tax, diesel goes to Eu100 per litre and Paddywagon run a free tour from Limerick that’s fine but your health is priceless and oh so delicate, indeed I may drink a pint to that thought tonight even if I cannot afford it – Slainte! more news soon!
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