We had a very successful book launch in July at the Secret Bookshelf
This is not so much of a blog post as a quick photo album to show what we got up to whilst at home in chilly, damp Northern Ireland!
Pretty much as soon as we got home, we launched our other boat, Clar Innis.Our daughter, Laura, visited from Canada. This was a brief stopover on her way to a conference in Poland, before she came back to stay with us for a week or so.While Laura was here we visited the Gobbins, a challenging walk/scramble along the sea cliffs of County Antrim. We were very lucky with the weather!Laura also had some Canadian friends over to visit, so of course we took them out for a sail. No one was actually seasick, but a couple of folks went slightly pale…Laura tried to work out how use the remains of the men’s urinals in an abandoned railway station up near Cushendall, County Antrim.I mentioned the book launch earlier. We really enjoyed signing lots of our books, and the audience seemed to enjoy the delicious book-themed shortbread cookies and cupcakes too!
I should probably add a shout out here for Jo and Chris, owners of The Secret Bookshelf bookshop in Carrickfergus. They were wonderful hosts for our launch, but it’s also a brilliant bookshop at all times. You can tell from the moment you walk through the door that the owners truly love books and reading. Also many thanks to The Little Bake Shop in Donaghadee for providing the yummies.
Charlie, on show at Donaghadee Pier. Unfortunately the car next to him took more of the limelight!Charlie is cautiously making friends with our new addition to the fleet, Bo, a large Skoda diesel, with plenty of oomph to tow Clar Innis. They are still trying to sort out their pecking order, but Charlie was happy once he realised Bo would not fit in the warm, comfy garage.Fraser intended to complete in Donaghadee Triathlon on his trusty Brompton, but the officials told him ‘no’, it was illegal. He had to buy a second hand racing bike a few days before the race, much to his dismay.Despite the late bike change (or maybe because of) Fraser somehow scraped a third place in the over-sixties.Donaghadee Triathlon was a Dad and daughter event, with Katrina doing well in a very competitive age group, despite a wee bit of technical issues with her bike gears- had to use her lowest gears most of the way, with the legs flying around rather rapidly.Fraser emerges from the swim section of the triathlon in the top few swimmers, secure in the knowledge that he’ll lose a few places on the bike ride!The following week, father and daughter took part in an open water swimming race. Fraser emerged from the sea miles ahead of the field.Katrina also did an amazing swim.Not much fishing this summer, but on this attempt Patrick dropped his worm in and came up with a large Wrasse almost instantlyMaybe room for a couple more buildings in our back yard?We squeezed in a garden ‘man’ shed for Fraser’s useful ‘man-stuff’, and also a summer house for the cats, our so they thought anywayThe cat’s summerhouse. Mo also allows us in if we have food on us!Back in 2023, when we returned from our epic trip to Greece, Fraser took this photo of Katrina, Mabel and me.This year, on almost the same date, we recreated the photo.Mabel has grown a bit bigger over the last few years. For Katrina’s birthday, we all got on the ferry to Rathlin Island with our bikes and cycled around in the pouring rain. Poor Katrina had a rental bike, which was heavy work and had dodgy gears.At the north west end of Rathlin, we took a break to watch puffins on the cliffs and have a coffee and snack.Beautiful views from the clifftops on Rathlin Island.More bike shenanigans…A ‘spur of the moment’ trip to Millport to re-live some of Maureen’s (Fraser’s Mum) childhood memories. She stayed on the top floor of Cross House (behind us) over 80 years ago!Most of the tourist attractions of Great Cumbrae seems to be painted rocksWe thought this would be fun, but it was sheer pain to cycle and we gave up our attempt at cycling around the island.Fraser’s seasickness threatened to come backMaureen had not lost her touch in a very competitive game of crazy golf
