Clongeen II

This seemed to generate some interest.

Foulksmills is indeed a delightful and pretty part of county Wexford, Ireland, and the parish of Clongeen. This small part of Ireland is where Honey Fitzgerald had a house (I have been to it) . His Grandson had a bad day in Dallas years later in November 1963.

So, we are going there to visit Seamus who hails from that part of the world and now has his own house on a field his Dad and Mum gave to him. We are going for a Stag do, or a Bag do as Bag is the man getting married. There will be a little handful of us who all used to work together here in Bristol (oh and Mike!) when we worked together at the HO of Somerfield, a UK Supermarket group. This is why we all came to Bristol and we have all been BS5ers too. We are now spread about a bit in Ireland, the north of England and yours truly still in BS5.

The weekend will be raucous but also civil. We are doing a little paint balling, some drinking, some barbecuing and some general larking about in open fields, country roads, village pubs and get away places in the middle of nowhere where the air is clear and the welcome constant. I am constantly happy when I am in in this part of the world and could live there happily. When I lost my job in April 2007 I just headed to Ireland in VX52 and spent 15 days all over the country with a welcome billet at the ever kind Seamus's house, and with his sister in Cork too. It was great. Head clear, baggage abandoned and completely rested! In fact I went into a pub I had never seen before , 8 miles from Seamus's house and on my own; the barmaid (his older sister's daughter, unbeknown to me) piped up 'Ahh, now you have to be Dickie, don't ye - are you staying with Seamus, so?'

Wellington Bridge is a small village close by which is where I met Gigi, so that has to be close to the top of the list of places! As well as being the place I met that fabulous woman, it is also the place I have drank the most ever with 15 or 16 pints of Guinness taken of an afternoon.

Seamus's village has a great bar run by Larry. When I was there for the days mentioned above, we went along to Larry's at about 3pm to place a bet on the Irish National - kinda stayed until 6 the next morning.

Can't wait!