Aleria's Adventures

We've been to Kinsale in County Cork several times by boat and we love it there. This time we went by land, driving there via Kilrush in County Clare where our boat is on the hard. It was an Irish Cruising Club (ICC) Committee meeting and Alex is a member. I'm a member of ICC but not on the Committee so I get to tag along without having to work. Aleria with Lilly our new VW Passat Estate (2017) Aleria was just fine in Kilrush, propped up nicely and firmly against the shed. Alex hooked up electrics while I scraped the few barnacles off the prop and bottom. They came off so easily. We shortly continued on to Cork and got stuck in abominable traffic trying to get through the middle of the city. I was driving our new used car - an amazing VW Passat Estate. It was the first time I've driven in city traffic in many years. We checked into the Trident Hotel just in time for Alex to make his meeting. Dinner with Maeve and Adrian Bell was a joyous occasion at the Black

Not for me, thanks. Nailbiting extreme. But I have to compliment the captain, the crew and especially the pilots with nerves of steel. A great promotional stunt.

We chose Kilrush this year for two reasons: 1) it is close to Shannon Airport and 2) the operation there has become first-class under owner Louis Keating and manager Simon McGibney. It's also reasonably accessible for us by sea in a three-stop hop from Clew Bay. Being close to the airport was important as we have offered Aleria for sale. It's only a 2.5-hour drive for us now with the motorway open and that means we can drive down to show her fairly easily. The OCC discount didn't hurt either. We had a raucous delivery down the coast which I wrote about in a separate entry. Then we kept rescheduling the haulout because the weather conditions were unpredictable and pretty awful -- gale-force winds day after day and changeable forecast hour by hour. Pouring rain and lashing storms. Finally, we had one day -- one day -- when the wind would be less than 20 knots, Simon's cut off for hauling Aleria . We arrived in Kilrush around 11 am and started the final offloading of