Have you seen the old man...?

*sigh*
I suppose the time has come to relate the terrible goings-on of our English final leg. Arriving in England was ok. The ferry had been a bit bumpy on the way, but we didn't mind this too much thanks to the litre of vino we put away en route.

So, we arrived in Harwich pink and panicked, not knowing exactly how or when we'd get home, but hoping beyond all hope for a bus to Holyhead or Stranrear or anywhere we could leap the Irish Sea from. We got to Victoria Coach Station in London on Tuesday evening (after being stung for the train fares from Harwich! I'm still bitter about that...) only to discover the next bus from London to Dublin was on Thursday, although after much pestering and whining we discovered there was one to Belfast at 9am. This meant we had only about eleven hours to hang out in the station until the bus whisked us away.

Now, Sarah had thought sleeping rough would be fun for one night. Hey, we're inter-railing, it wouldn't be the same without a bit of vagrancy. Our sleep-over in Hoek van Holland was her one night and it didn't live up to her romantic expectations. I'm still not sure what she thought it would be like, but she was disappointed anyway.

Not enough hobos and camp songs or something.

...And so, when they kicked us out of the bus station at midnight and told us we could sleep wherever we liked, just not in there, we had no option but to bed down in our sleeping bags outside the station. The entire time Ralph McTell was running through my brain, "Have you seen the old man who walks the streets of London..." Um, yes, he's trying to hop into my sleeping bag and has asked me for change and cigarettes numerous times over the last three minutes. I still do not have any...

People kept directing us towards all-nite cafés. We found one after asking a taxi driver. Now, imagine, if you will, a couple of miserable looking tired people approach you at 1am laden with bags and ask if there is an all-nite café nearby do you, a) apologise, saying there is no such place for sitting down in at this time of night, or b) say, "Yes, there's one just over there" referring to a coffee STAND surrounded by people in blankets quickly emptying their cups so they can get on with shaking them at people so they can buy another cup of coffee...?

We were not especially impressed by this and went back to the bus station. It re-opened at 4.30am and so we were able to bed down on the floor in there, although I was almost happier outside. A funny thing, nobody said anything about us lying there, although everyone stared as they went past. I reckon if I'd gotten myself a cup I could've done a bit of begging... Although it didn't seem too lucrative a business in that place. It's not easy begging among a group of people sleeping in a bus station because they have Nowhere Else To Go.

Someone asked me for two pounds, in exchange for which he would provide me with a bit of skunk. Something about him made me believe his story, but I didn't have two pounds. Even if I had, my Rotterdam experience was still very much on my mind and dope was the last thing I wanted. It's bad enough being in that situation without adding cannabis-paranoia to your already fragile mind.

Besides, Sarah would've stabbed me. With a plastic spoon. (OUCH!)

At 9am the bus took us away from that horrible place and we were on our way to Carlisle...

All the way the bus driver discussed the terrible weather conditions in Scotland. Floods and misery and locusts and god knows what else seemed to be plaguing things... This filled us with joy of course, considering how seabound we were.

I asked the driver something about the connecting bus and he rounded off his information with a wonderfully witty, "Rather you than me on that boat tonight!" Fuck off, is almost exactly what I didn't say to him.

For the first time in days things went our way and we missed the bad weather altogether. Funnily enough, we weren't even aware of it except through scare stories told by fat Scots...

We found out then that there is no late bus or train between Belfast and Dublin so we called up my Aunt Veronica and begged her to let us stay on her couch. She didn't hesitate to join the list of people who saved our lives at some point along the way. (Honorary mentions go also to my Folks, Ian and Declan. Cheers! We woulda died in gutters without you! Oh, how poorly planned this trip was...) Veronica even gave us a packed lunch of chocolaty stuff, so she is on Sarah's Most Loved and Admired list (someday I hope to make that list, but until I achieve the controlling interest in Cadbury's I don't see it. Sniff...)

And to end this tale of woe, I found myself thinking, "My, my, the Spike looks lovely today!" as we arrived in Bus Aras, before I realised this was simply homesickness taking on some of the darker qualities of dementia. It's still a piece of shit. Right!!

I actually met someone who thought it was cool. Mind you, this was the same French bollox who told me about the verb 'cinématiser'... It's not true, not true at all. Why do they always seek to humiliate us anglophones? Is it because their language and cultural history is so much richer and better than ours? Could be, still... Cheese-eating surrender monkeys!

(It was at this point that Stephen was gassed and kidnapped by the Alliance Francaise to be kept in a cage and force-fed for weeks before hitting the French supermarché shelves as Foie Gras d'Etienne.)