May

It’s been a month and a half since my last post, and not a lot has happened really. Well, my girlfriend made it over from Germany and is living with me in Galway, I guess that’s something that happened recently. It took a couple of weeks for Abby to find a job here, but she’s now working at Hewlett Packard, handling customer orders and product integration and stuff.

So, now we’ve both got nine-to-five jobs for the rest of the year, Abby at HP and myself at Thermoking. I’m working as a design engineer in a R&D department. I got the job through my brother’s mate’s father, which is just a little obscure, but it’s worked out good. Thermoking makes refrigeration units for heavy vehicles, in case you wondered.


Thermoking, where I’m working at the moment

Abby bought a helmet the weekend before last, which meant I could get the bike out and we did a quick trip out to Aughnanure Castle, out towards Clifden on the N59. This was our first two-up trip on the bike and all went smoothly. It should be the first of many trips as we come into summer and hopefully some better weather.


Abby was awful pleased with her new helmet, I couldn’t get her to take it off…


Outside the flat, with the CBX ready to go.

Built in the 1500’s, Aughnanure Castle used to belong to the O'Flahertys. It’s a pretty utilitarian castle compared to some of the places I’ve seen in Continental Europe, built more for defence than show. We had a good look around the castle and grounds for an hour or so before heading back into Galway.


Aughnanure Castle. It’s not actually on a lean, that’s just “artistic” photography.

In about two weeks time my parents land in Ireland for a month. I think they’ve always been interested in visiting Ireland, but now that we’re here for the rest of the year they’ve got an excuse to come over. We’ll be teaming up with them over the weekends and will do a fair bit of travelling while they’re here. The first weekend is a long weekend for Abby and I so we’ll probably head up north to Belfast for a look.

Oh, another thing that’s happened, I’ve bought another bike. I’ve decided the CBX isn’t really the bike for Irish roads; they’re not as flat or well maintained as I’d imagined and a street bike isn’t ideal. So, I’ve decided to buy a Yamaha TDM 850. I’ve got it for a song (800 euro), but it does need a bit of work done. All going well, I should be able to do it up, ride it for a while and then sell it for a profit before I leave. Should make for a good project anyway, and I’ll post some photos as soon as I can.