Saturday, March 31, 2012

Leaving London

Hello!

Welcome to what will hopefully be a regular update of our adventures over the next few months. We've been in London for a while, and now we're slowly making our way (back) to Adelaide, our home for the next little?/long? while. Episode 1 is written from a big comfy couch in Clifden, Ireland...

We had a lovely last day in London, in which all preparations leading up to the departure from our home-for-the-past-little-while felt chilled out and easy, and we had time to sit around talking crap with friends and housemates, and eat late-night Chinese on the street under a blossom tree with Sarah A and candles.

This morning we had an early wake-up from a handy online alarm clock- this was needed as we had both rid ourselves of our phones (and most other material possesions) in the past two days; even our bikes were gone, picked up by the incredibly generous Marjan and Patrick last weekend and currently being babysat in Belgium.

London gave us an appropriately-grey final morning, but we both felt "the sunshine in our bodies" (Taco just said that in a super sultry voice sitting next to Claire, currently acting as scribe, on the couch). We had a smooth train ride to Gatwick airport, and an easy flight to sunny Dublin... but then it went a little bit poo.

Taco's brave little suitcase burst forth boldly through the conveyor curtains; Claire's was a bit slow... Quite a bit slow, in fact... Actually where the HELL is the bloody bag?! In London, it might appear, at this stage, although we're yet to confirm that. The Ryanair lady kindly took our contact details ("We don't have any"), instructing us to call at some point later on for news of the AWOL bag. We had a little moment of tears and swear words and questioning what to do. Quickly we decided that we would stick to the plan of catching the only bus that would get us to our destination in the west of Ireland. There remained the tiny issue of lacking any marathon running gear, which was sort of the point of going to the west, but we thought we'd figure it out on the way.

Once in Clifden, we sited a shop that looked promising on the shoe front. It turned out our man there only had hiking footwear.
Claire: "Is there anywhere else that might sell running shoes and would still be open?"
Our man: "Der's a sport place oop de road dere, Gannon's."
Claire and Taco: "Oh! We're staying at a B&B called Gannon's, is that nearby...?"
Our man: "Oh yeah, s'the same place. Gerry owns de sports store and de B&B."
We had a good old chuckle, headed up the road and €130 later Claire is set to go for the marathon tomorrow. Will Ryanair pick up the bill, we wonder?

Off to bed, pores straining with carbohydratey goodness thanks to Taco's amazing pre-race pasta cook-up extravaganza. More news on the other side of 26.2 miles. Hopefully.

Love Taco and Claire xox

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