Last year when we drove overnight across Ireland to the Cottage it was late August, it was cold and wet, great gobs of rain on the windscreen the whole way down. This year it was warm and dry and rather than rain it was white moths caught for a moment in the headlights of the car before either passing in the dark or splatting in quick dash of blood.

For the first two hours out of Dublin there was a heavy deep yellow moon in the sky in front of us in the West. It got bigger as it slipped down until it disappeared over the horizon.

There were hardly any cars on the road and from Bandon to Ahakista I only saw one lorry. As I drove the headlights caught at the eyes of foxes and rabbits by the side of the road.

There were pockets of thin mist in the lanes from Bandon. It would come up quickly as the road dipped and we were through it before I had a chance to register it was there.

Once we were passed Durrus I could see over my right shoulder a lightening in the dark horizon to the East as the sun started to nudge its way up the black sky turning it to a dark blue.

We were in bed and asleep before it was light and woke up four hours later to clear blue sky, a hot sun and still water.

But it was a Friday and Bantry market was on. I made a better fist of it than last year and had money in my pocket. The colours stood out clear and sharp in the sun. I was by myself and made my way quickly past the tractor seats and heavy work gear to the corner where the food stalls are.

The fish stall was there and had a whole tuna at the back that looked tempting but I kept myself short and bought a monkfish tail and a bag of bones for soup.

Well we are on the way but so far it has been an unsettling journey. Work was busy and I was conscious that I was leaving things behind. at least the desk was cleared and I managed to clear off most of the outstanding emails before they started to mount up again.

Then it was home and the rush to finish packing and the annual squeeze of everything into the car, making use for one of the few times a year, of all the space that a Volvo Estate has to offer. We left on time and despite the promises otherwise the traffic was not too bad until we were brought to a halt outside Bangor. There was no obvious reason why apart from the apparent need to give some grass cutters a break.

After twenty minutes we were on our way again. Pulling up to the ferry terminal I was asked why the illuminated signs all said ‘Next ferry 20.30’ and i had been reassuring every one we did need to be there until five to nine.

The explanation came quickly when i handed our ticket in and was told that our ferry had left 12 hours earlier that morning. I explained to the lady in the kiosk and she nodded her head in agreement as she wrote us out a new ticket. She then explained that all places in the Stenna Plus Lounge had gone but that was alright wasn’t it. The family howled in anguish behind me. there would be no comfy seats on the crossing.

On the ship we shifted seats trying to find somewhere we could sit together that wasn’t next to the cafe, a loo or a passageway and from where we could avoid having to watch/listen an endless run through of Madagascar III. We failed.

The good news is that I have left behind the USB lead for my camera so there will be limited opportunities for sharing pictures of bloodied fish. Hopefully some of will be disappointed at that news.

We are now halfway across the Irish Sea. I have eaten soggy chips and dried chicken. I am going take a swig of wine and try go to sleep listening to Lone Pigeon and the lady next door to us complaining again as the house of cards she is making collapses again. Looking forward to the four hour drive that starts at midnight. i do have the new Grant Hart CD to listen to though which I was able to pick up today although it does not come out proper until Monday!

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.

Jones, the man who washed up on the Sheep’s Head having floated across the bay from the wreck of The Bohemian, took to living in one of the abandoned cottages in Gortavellig. The cottages had been built by the miners who briefly worked the hill there to try and get out its copper. The copper was difficult to reach or not there and so the miners left after a couple of years. Their cottages perched on the top of a cliff looking out over the bulk of  Bantry Bay. It is a rough empty exposed spot and only a man who had spent too many years afloat would want to fetch up there.

The cottages had only been empty a few years when Jones found them. They still had their roofs and strips of sacking hung on nails over the spaces for windows and a door. The floor was only the bare earth and Jones pulled up armfuls of bracken and laid it down in thick heaps to sleep on.

For water the miners had built a dam across one the streams that ran down from the hill and a small pool had been created. But the water was always brackish from the spray that blew up from the sea at the bottom of the cliffs. But it was good enough to live on. Jones cleared the ground outside the cottages and made space to grow potatoes and greens.

In the summer water lillies would bloom in the pool the bright yellow looking out of place against the grey and the brown of the hills and the water.

He bought his goats and then he bought three sheep. The animals ran wild through the hills over the summer and he would follow them up there tramping over the land alone with the clear air and all that he could see. There were nights that he spent up there, curling down to sleep in a flat hollow in the grass, bracken and heather where a sheep had lain in the day. The warmth would still be there and if it was cold he could call to the sheep to lie back down in the spot their rough coats an extra blanket against the night.