A series of good news bulletins just to fill you in on the last year since you last heard from me...
1: I made it home safely to Ireland in eleven days of hitching from Greece - I realise my last post, almost a year ago kind of left things hanging a bit, but I haven't spent the past year in someone's basement - I just didn't have time to write when I was on the road (was literally hitching from dawn to dusk) and when I got back the prospect of writing about ALL the wonderful experiences I had on my way was daunting so I put it on the long finger. Turns out that finger is pretty long. The floods of concerned emails to see if I was alright was touching, though. Or at least they would have been, had there been any. Thanks.
2: I had a lovely Christmas and New Year.
3: I am still hitching.
In fact that's not exactly true, have only hitched once since last year when my car was being fixed. But I've been involved in the organisation of a hitchhiking event that started today.
Going to keep descriptions very brief as it is late and I have to get up early tomorrow, but here are the basics:
Event Name: Discovering Ireland Hitchhiking Challenge
How it works: Basically the same general format as the Discovering Ireland Board Game, if that helps. Each team (we're going in pairs), randomly chooses a card from each deck of destinations (five decks of destinations split into zones - North, South, East, West, Midlands) they are also given one 'Off the Beaten Track' card, selected by the committee, that will take them into the wilds of rural Ireland - places like Malin Head, Valentia Island, Mullet Peninsula. This all happened this evening, in The St Leger bar in Tramore, Co. Waterford.
Now, tomorrow morning the teams will set off on a week long adventure, hitching to each of their chosen destinations, and finishing in Bundoran, Donegal next Friday for the Sea Sessions festival.
That's the basics.
My destinations are:
Banagher, Offaly
Killmallock, Limerick
Quin, Clare
Mountmellick, Monaghan
Moville, Donegal
My out of the way destination is Claddaghduff, Galway.
Unfortunately at the moment I don't have a team mate, as there was an uneven number of attendees, so I'm going solo, until such a time as I find a partner along the way. I haven't ruled out the possibility of that yet.
There are five full teams, though, and everyone seems excited about the whole thing so it's good. Originally the plan was to camp in Fitzmaurice's Camping Park, Tramore, but when we arrived at 5pm the weather was horrific, and showed no sign of letting up, so the first five arrivals decided to upgrade and rent a mobile home for the night - €100. Of course the weather pretty much cleared at about 7pm, but still, it was a good base for mission control. Some hardier (and later arrivals) took the option to stay in the dunes by the beach. Also a good option.
I've figured out how to tether my phone to my computer, so I should be able to update this page wherever I am. But I'll wait to get a wifi connection to upload pictures - just to keep my data usage below the limit.
Must dash now, sleep beckons.
1: I made it home safely to Ireland in eleven days of hitching from Greece - I realise my last post, almost a year ago kind of left things hanging a bit, but I haven't spent the past year in someone's basement - I just didn't have time to write when I was on the road (was literally hitching from dawn to dusk) and when I got back the prospect of writing about ALL the wonderful experiences I had on my way was daunting so I put it on the long finger. Turns out that finger is pretty long. The floods of concerned emails to see if I was alright was touching, though. Or at least they would have been, had there been any. Thanks.
2: I had a lovely Christmas and New Year.
3: I am still hitching.
In fact that's not exactly true, have only hitched once since last year when my car was being fixed. But I've been involved in the organisation of a hitchhiking event that started today.
Going to keep descriptions very brief as it is late and I have to get up early tomorrow, but here are the basics:
Event Name: Discovering Ireland Hitchhiking Challenge
How it works: Basically the same general format as the Discovering Ireland Board Game, if that helps. Each team (we're going in pairs), randomly chooses a card from each deck of destinations (five decks of destinations split into zones - North, South, East, West, Midlands) they are also given one 'Off the Beaten Track' card, selected by the committee, that will take them into the wilds of rural Ireland - places like Malin Head, Valentia Island, Mullet Peninsula. This all happened this evening, in The St Leger bar in Tramore, Co. Waterford.
Now, tomorrow morning the teams will set off on a week long adventure, hitching to each of their chosen destinations, and finishing in Bundoran, Donegal next Friday for the Sea Sessions festival.
That's the basics.
My destinations are:
Banagher, Offaly
Killmallock, Limerick
Quin, Clare
Mountmellick, Monaghan
Moville, Donegal
My out of the way destination is Claddaghduff, Galway.
Unfortunately at the moment I don't have a team mate, as there was an uneven number of attendees, so I'm going solo, until such a time as I find a partner along the way. I haven't ruled out the possibility of that yet.
There are five full teams, though, and everyone seems excited about the whole thing so it's good. Originally the plan was to camp in Fitzmaurice's Camping Park, Tramore, but when we arrived at 5pm the weather was horrific, and showed no sign of letting up, so the first five arrivals decided to upgrade and rent a mobile home for the night - €100. Of course the weather pretty much cleared at about 7pm, but still, it was a good base for mission control. Some hardier (and later arrivals) took the option to stay in the dunes by the beach. Also a good option.
I've figured out how to tether my phone to my computer, so I should be able to update this page wherever I am. But I'll wait to get a wifi connection to upload pictures - just to keep my data usage below the limit.
Must dash now, sleep beckons.
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