A Day on the Road

With friends from Denmark and Germany waiting for the 0630 ferry from Hallig Hooge.
The truck in the back has everyone's luggage and all our equipment in it.
The smiles belie the fact that no coffee had yet been consumed!

When asked about being 25 years playing music with the Rolling Stones, the drummer Charlie Watt replied that they'd only be playing music for 3 years and the other 22 were spent hanging around.

I concur - although at a much reduced level than the Stones.

Touring is wonderful - we get to see great places and having a string of concerts together gets you well honed and into good shape.   And the concerts are always wonderful - people are kind and generous.  

But the down side is the time in the car on the motorway.   We are constantly looking for new ways to travel over to the Continent that involves getting the most sleep - let's say that this one didn't fit that bill very well.  We were away for 12 days and with the exception of 3 of them we were up and well away long before 9 and on several days we were actually travelling by 6.30 A.M.!!!! (in the vain hope of avoiding traffic jams).  Then sleeping afternoons (if there was time) and getting ready to play in the evening.  And all the time the weather was showing off at its best 30-33 degrees C.  We travelled 2,300 miles through 7 countries, did 7 concerts and sold lots of CDs.

After a week of it I was totally shattered.  But thankfully we were staying with friends most of the time and towards the end of the trip we had 3 nights in one place and our friend Rita fed and watered us and let us lay about the place for a day which helped enormously.  

And here I am, home again and planning to do it all over again!   Are we mad or what?

So today we're taking part in #FairPlé - a day of musical activism for Gender Equality in Folk and Traditional Music in Ireland.   I'm hosting a session at 2pm (the sun's still shining - will anyone want to be inside in a pub?)  and afterwards we're going for dinner to celebrate Tom's birthday.
Please, sun, wait around for another couple of days.  Pretty please??