A few days after I got home from Spain, I was to go to a good friend of mine's 21st birthday on Clare Island, off the west coast of Ireland. I was so excited. Myself, Jon and Conor set off on a Glen Coco Experience roadtrip from Dublin, with Jon driving. As I had only ever gone to Clare Island from Cavan before with Mum driving, we weren't too sure on which roads to take so of course we consulted the source of all knowledge, Google. Google told us which roads to take and how long it would take to get there. I was suspect of the 3.5 hours it told us it'd take to drive west across the country seeing as it takes that long to get from Cavan to Mayo. Regardless, I knew it would be closer to 3.5 hours (in the region of 5 I predicted) than to the few weeks it took Mr. Kerouac and Co. to get across the USA. This just reminded me of how depressingly small Ireland is.
We set of at around 1.30pm with the aim of making the 5.30 ferry. Man, did we underestimate the journey.
I sat in the back seat, behind Conor, the window open, my head propped up with my jumper, my hair blowing out the window and delightfully, the May sun beating down. I drifted off to sleep sometime after we had left Co. Dublin behind us and were on the N5 westwards to the sounds of Benny Goodman. I soon began to dream of being in On The Road; Jon's Daewoo had transformed into an open top Cadillac, I was now sitting behind Jack Kerouac instead of Conor and in the driving seat was Neal Cassidy bouncing up and down in his excitable way. Benny Goodman still came swinging from the car radio. It was a surreal dream as it was like reality had just been skewed slightly rather than a clear cut dream, if that makes sense. For some reason I felt a great, peaceful happiness; something I'd not felt in months. The dream became more surreal, with Kerouac talking off picking up William S. Burroughs in Longford. I figured my brain had conjured this image after I semi woke for a few seconds to hear Jon and Conor talking about visiting our friend Sean as we passed through Longford.
Abruptly the dream came to an end when out of the radio of the beat up Cadillac came Sabotage by the Beastie Boys. The Cadillac transformed back into the Daewoo, I was once again sitting behind Conor and the excitable driver was once again Jon, who dragged on his rollie. Beastie Boys soon finished and the open chords of The Times They Are a-Changin emanated from the car radio. As I sat there thinking about how On The Road influenced that dream, I realised that if it wasn't for Kerouac, the song playing would in all likelihood not exist. Bob Dylan once said of the books influence on him, "It changed my life like it changed everyone else's".
Five and a half hours after we departed from Dublin, we found ourselves racing to make the 7.30 ferry, the last one of the day. For those of you who have not driven on roads in the West it is important to know that at times there is barely one lane for traffic, let alone one in each direction. This can pose quite the problem when you've missed your turn and then realise you've only minutes to make the boat. We bombed along at a speed fast enough that we'd make it, but at the same time slow enough so we could stop to avoid being crushed wreckless Dubliners on holidays driving like lunatics in their Range Rovers. The plan was that Conor and I would jump out and buy the tickets as Jon parked the car. (In case any of you were picturing a car ferry, think again. There's maybe space for 2 cars at most on these boats and even then they have to be crane lifted on.) Fail that, we'd pull a Starsky and Hutch and speed the car off a hypothetical conveniently placed ramp and onto the departed both. Luckily for us, the Daewoo and the good ship The Pirate Queen we hadn't to revert to Option B, much to the malaise of the adrenaline fueled kids inside us.
It was a fantastic night on the Clare Island. We partied until nearly dawn and after a few hours sleep were provided with a mountain of food for breakfast by Marian's mum. Once we'd eaten, The Glen Coco Experience embarked on our quest to climb the larger of two mountains. I, unwisely, did this topless and suffered pretty bad sunstroke that only really set in on the trip home and required me to get covered in Sudacream by Jon in a petrol station forecourt in Tulsk, Co. Roscommon. Between there and Edgewardstown, where Mum was collecting me, I was shivering uncontrollably and blacking out from the pain. Needless to say the journey east was not near as pleasant as the one west.I really hope to travel a lot more over the coming summer months and from reading the book, I've put my shyness aside and contacted clubs outside Dublin and in the UK for gigs so, as well as gigging, I have the journeys to look forward too.
"What is that feeling when you're driving away from people and they recede on the plain till you see their specks dispersing? — it's the too-huge world vaulting us, and it's good-by. But we lean forward to the next crazy venture beneath the skies."
- Jack Kerouac, On the Road, Part 2, Ch. 8
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