We cheered and roared and toasted with the locals. They even turned off the horse racing during the playoff, something akin to shutting off the Guinness over here. Spending a Sunday watching golf instead of walking was going to muddy our itinerary during a week in which I was already trying to squeeze in a detour down to the farthest corner of Ireland, an unplanned visit to the links at Rosslare — but it was the Open and an Irishman was leading! Hell, even God kicked up his feet on Sunday.
So we stayed glued to the action, and with four million of his countrymen, sent up the loudest collective F-bomb in Irish history as Padraig butchered the last at Carnoustie. The playoff put us well off schedule, and though it's only been for emergencies or scheduling snafus that I've taken a lift, I informed Tim that we would be taking a taxi today, that I don't walk in the dark. Go ahead, call me a cheater — I'm going to cross the 1,000-mile mark this week and I think my feet would disagree.
Tim is the anti-Chip. Whereas Chip had never been to Europe and was as go-with-the-flow as could be, Tim is something of a seasoned traveler, and a man who likes to steer the ship. Among our friends, Tim is the planner, the organizer of our golf and travel. Turning over the reigns to me was going to be tough for him, this much I knew. But I was surprised that on his first night in Ireland, I was already issuing the disclaimer: "You're on your own, Tim. If you die, it's not my fault."
Allow me to also say that Tim is not cheap. Quick to pick up a tab or throw around Phillies tickets, he doesn't covet money as much as he adores a good deal. Something of an eBay tycoon, he's sold everything from cars to Pope coins (I'll save that story for the book) on the Web at significant profit. I wasn't surprised to get his text from the airport: "Should I invest in duty free smokes as currency?"
Neither of us smoked, but with cigarettes going for $10 a pack over here, it was a business opportunity Tim couldn't pass up. What he was adamant to pass up, however, was the taxi I had arranged to take us to our next town.
"I'm hitching," Tim insisted. Considering this was Tim's first day in Ireland, that he had no phone and no idea where we were headed, if it was north, south, or sideways, I told him hitching alone at dusk was basically the worst idea ever. Predictably, my protests only strengthened his resolve, and soon I was watching Tim head off down the road, waving duty-free cigarettes at passing cars as I waited for my cab.
It wasn't the cost of a cab that bothered Tim, it was paying for a service that you could get for free, just by sticking out your thumb. Sort of that sick feeling I get from paying for parking, or wireless internet (little old ladies are still charging me fivers for the broadband signal in their B&B!). I arrived safely in Courtown, 30 Euros lighter, and Tim was nowhere to be found. I waited in the hotel, then headed out to scour the town for his neon green wind breaker. As I contemplated an unpleasant phone call to his wife ("Yeah, hi, I lost your husband") and yearned for the erstwhile days of Chip and Brian — travelmates who stuck to the itinerary — I did what one does in such moments in Ireland. I went to a pub, a place called The 19th Hole, and toasted my friend turned roadkill with a lonely pint of lager.
On some subconscious level, I must have known that if there was any place on this planet where I was going to be reunited with Tim, it was in a pub called The 19th Hole. Drawn to it like a moth to flame, I wasn't three sips into my pint when a miraculous green jacket walked through the door, a familiar voice calling out, "You think any of these people smoke Marlboro lights?"
An aside for the tax man: Tim had almost no success in funding his travels with duty-free tobacco. I lectured him a bit about it being a real downer to my book if one of my friends gets abducted along the way, and he almost agreed, and the next day we did enough road walking to break his will. After 20 miles on the N25, the next time I suggested a taxi, Tim would be only too happy to wait.
After a lovely side trip down to Rosslare for golf at St. Helen's Bay, a family friendly golf resort with three killer closing holes, and the Rosslare Links, as true and natural a links as I've found in Ireland, I put Tim on the bus to the airport, alive and well, legs good and sore. He was planning on spending the night in Limerick before his morning flight. I explained to him that Limerick wasn't the safest spot in Ireland (they call it Stab City), that he should really make some arrangements for a place to stay. But Tim was back at the steering wheel now. He was going to do it his way.
"I don't know where I'm going to stay," he explained, climbing onto his bus. "I'll figure it out when I get there."
Did Tim spend a free night in the Shannon airport, carton of Marlboro Lights for a pillow? Too bad I couldn't find a Ladbrokes. It would have been a lock.
Next, on to Old Head.
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