In forty eight hours we will be on a boat half way across the Irish Sea girding ourselves for the over night drive across Ireland to Cork and hoping that we make it out of Dublin without getting lost.

As far as I can tell no one has started to pack. It feels strange to be going so early in the summer. Over the last few years we have left it until the last two weeks of August. If the weather stays as it is we will have got it right.

We are going to have a busy time of it this years with friends, relatives and other visitors all crossing over and some of the activities are starting to mount up. It seems we have been booked into the quiz night in Arundel’s that is due to be hosted by the famous neighbour. That could be an interesting evening and who knows edited highlights may appear here in a few weeks time.

The activity won’t matter too much so long as there is time for lobsters, time for a couple of hours by myself in the bay, orange lines wrapped around my ankles bloodying myself hauling mackerel out of the water and time on a hill in the wind with Bantry Bay to my right, Dunmanus to my left and the vast waste of the Atlantic in front of me – time gone in the air and the water. Maybe some time too nursing a pint at a bar and thinking on talk with a man with a black beard. Time to stand still for a while and take it all in.