Mayan Prophecy Countdown

Well, I woke up a bit seedy this morning and that was thoroughly expected 😉 After a small breakfast around 9am I hit the road, it was raining of course, so I took a few photos of the pub and headed off north. I only had 280km to get to the ferry terminal and I had already checked out the ferry times, the boat leaves at 15.30 so I could take it easy, which I did.

Not much to spruike about for the next few hours, just some wet narrow roads to start with before I found the main highway to Dublin then Belfast. I got to the ferry port about 2pm well in time and had a chance for a rest and a snack at the passenger terminal. Here I was again surprised by the friendly locals, a security guard told me not to buy the over expensive coke from the machine, so instead I gave him 50 cents and he went down to the staff canteen and got me one from there, thanks m8 that was well appreciated 🙂

It had sort of stopped raining in the past hour but it was still very overcast and now that my ticket was booked I actually felt happier. I even found a bit of Irish logic, everyone laughs at the Irish sense of humour, well, check out the signs on the door of the passenger terminal.

Of course it was a manual door, I wonder how many people besides myself got sucked in and stood there waving their arms around trying to open the door 🙂 So, I arrived in Cairnryan in Scotland about two hours later after a very foggy run across the Irish Sea. I had spoken to some people near me on the boat and they had said a nice place to stay was Dumfries, about an hour or so inland. I was actually aiming for my friends place in Harrogate, Yorkshire. This was the home of Graham and Sue Whittington, we had met in Peru a few years back and rode for about a month together through parts of South America including the Atacama Desert. Anyway, after disembarking I headed off with only 74 miles to go to Dumfries.

I got to Dumfries after nearly running out of fuel. I was so used to getting better range on the higher octane, like 97,99 etc, but I have been using the 95 they have on offer and I am losing 50km at least in range! But, I did get to the birth town of Peter Pan and found, after much asking, a bed in a small hotel. All the B&Bs were full 😦 But, it was quite cheap and the best thing of all, they served food and beer 🙂 And funnily enough, up here in Scotland I had a great roast beef and Yorkshire pudding with vegies 🙂 Even more of a bonus, I asked the owner about a local garage, I wanted to make a wire brace for my chain oiler, if I could push the oil tube against the sprocket and hold it in place, I could stop worrying about it. I was also out of chain lube in a can anyway, so something had to be done until I could get to Holland. Anyway, he said he would show me a servo on a map later, but while I was eating he came back with a piece of wire and some cable ties and out of that I should be able to fashion something 🙂 Thanks heaps 🙂

I only had a couple of beers, as I needed to sort some stuff out, contact some people about the next few days ahead. It was not far to Graham’s place and I planned on being there after lunch, maybe find a cache or two on the way. It depends on the rain, it was back again, not that it had left of course. The room was warm and comfortable and I got started on some blog entries before crashing out around midnight.

Cheers from Dumfries, Scotland
TravellingStrom