First Trip of the Year - Ireland & Scotland

[Earache]

This was the Lord's office area. Pretty swanky, eh?

[Earache]

The top floor was occupied from 1946 until 1971 by Lady Christobel Amptill. Looks pretty gross to me, be she must've liked it. The place was a ruin when she bought it, so she was the one to restore it.

Thanks Lady....

[Earache]

Another roof top to go out on - sweet! More holes for shooting people. The open slot by my foot is for pouring hot oil down on the trick or treaters that are trying to break down your front gate...

Some more shooting holes located on the rooftop....

[Earache]

Castle is surrounded on three sides by a peat bog / mosquito breeding ground. Makes it easy to defend but the number of bugs in the summer must really suck.

Even on a cold day like today it smelled kinda ripe. Bet in mid-summer it smells worse than my old college roommate's bedsheets after a long week of sport fucking......

[Earache]

More of the surroundings...

[Earache]

Enough with the castles, it's really raining hard now and we need to get our asses to Galway for a warm room and even warmer beer.

Tonight we're staying at the fancy-schmancy Park House Hotel in downtown Galway. Old school luxury at it's finest, very cool old place.

Judy went for the biggest suite they had (it's sooooo much less expensive when I travel alone - I'd stay in a shithole for 15 Euro a night, but she ain't having it). Three, count'em, three beds. Two twins and a queen. All in a row. Weird. I get the queen-sized!

Nice sitting area, dining table, free wifi - I'm all set...

[Earache]

Hallways had carpet stolen from some casino. I took this pic without the flash so you could see the LED lighting they had. Super bright pinpoints of light in a dark hallway. Creeped me out bigtime. I wasn't going out in the hall at night - no freakin' way...........

[Earache]

Long day riding, so I nip down to the hotel pub for some Nectar. Shitload of wood panelling in this place and teh oddest bar stools ever. Look how long the seat portion of the stool is. Not too comfy at all.....

[Earache]

Galway is an old sea port town and it looks it. Kinda rundown and in need of a couple of coats of paint, but it certainly isn't hurting for atmosphere. Great numbers of pubs, restaurants and shops along the town square area...

[Earache]

Ya wanna talk "atmosphere"?

How about the town drunks sitting in the middle of the square in the rain, drinking and fighting loudly about who can do the most push ups?

Personally, I didn't think the fat old drunk bitch could do any push ups, but I was proved wrong once again when she busted out a couple of them....

[Earache]

Back to the hotel and down the scary assed hallway to our room to get cleaned up and dressed for dinner....

[Earache]

We had planned on walking all over the town square to check out places to eat, but of course, it started to rain like a cow pissin' on a flat rock.

Ended up across the street at Murphy's Pub for beers and then down the street to the next pub for more beers and some pizza...

[Earache]

Ended the night back at the hotel pub for, you guessed it, a couple more pints. If you don't like to drink, then don't go to Ireland as you're gonna be bored. All they do is drink...and lots of it.

Little towns don't have a gas station, no food store, no hardware store, no restaurants....but they'll have four pubs. I like this place!

[Earache]

Gonna take a break now. Will continue the trip later.

Hope I haven't bored you to death so far...

[max power]

Man, thats some vacation. Thanks for the pics Earache.

[Earache]

The next day is our last on the BMW. Time to hump across Ireland and drop it of at Paul's shop. Nice 160 mile ride in a driving rain and 40F temps. Lovely.

We get to teh shop and Paul meets us. Great guy and cool shop. Has all sorts of bikes from cruisers to big dually's for rent. All in great shape and low mileage. Also has a huge assortment of gear - from boots to helmets - that you can use if you don't have your own stuff....

[Earache]

Paul said he has 100 sets of gear in the shop. I don't doubt it...

[Earache]

Bye, bye Beemer....

[Earache]

Now we're heading for Northern Ireland to attend the Northwest 200 raod race. My bud Mark picks us up in Dublin and we head for his house for the night.

Arrived just at feeding time for his five girls. This one has an eating style that is much like my own - face first...

[Earache]

Being the only male in a household with 6 females, Mark needs a good man cave. And he built a nice one.

My pics suck as I must have hit a button on the camera and messed up the settings, but you'll get the idea.

Garage with sccoters for street and track and a car for the curves...

[Earache]

Above the garage is his office, guitar jam rooms, pool table, flat screen and a mini-bar. Noice!

Mark's into custom US Jacksons. I'm more into ESP's, but he has a few of them as well.

[Earache]

Mark lives in a tar paper shack in the middle of 22 acres. Poor bastard...

[Earache]

When Oliver Cromwell swept through Ireland in the 1600's, he outlawed practicing Catholicism and tore down a shitload of Catholic churches.

The Catholics moved their alter's to weird locations that Cromwell's soldiers wouldn't find them.

One such alter is located on Mark's propery and is known as Alter Bridge as it's located under an old bridge...

Services are still held there once a year.

[Earache]

The Catholics are making up for it though, building some pretty kickass churches in small towns like this one...

The Irish don't have a lot of love for the English. The Northern Ireland town of Londonderry is an example. All of the local roadsigns have been vandalized so that they read "Derry" with all mentions of London covered up or scratched out.

Ask an Irishman where Londonderry is and he'll reply "Never heard of it". Ask him where Derry is and you'll get some directions and a smile with a wink.

[Earache]

Got stupid assed drunk with Mark and his wife this night. So much so, that I didn't take any pictures. Sat in some pub that was playing ABBA at full volume all night. Dunno why. But if I ever hear "Dancin' Queen" one more time, I'm gonna go postal on someone.

Got up at 0-dark thirty the next day and headed for the race at Colerain. Another beautiful day. 40F, rainy and windy as Hell..