Meet Teddy Larkspin

Our original weekend plans for our time in Ireland included hiking, climbing, castle watching and sheep observation (I suspect that in their natural habitat, sheep stand around chatting about the appalling state of the fencing on the cliff-side bluffs around the Irish countryside, plotting a campaign to increase safety standards in the work environment, but taking the obligatory time out to complain about the weather).

When we arrived in Cork, we made it a priority to acquire last year’s “Tour the Aran Islands” mountain bikes at a very reasonable rate from our friendly local bike shop. We love the freedom of biking around town, avoiding all the worst traffic and parking issues that come with living in a city riddled with one way streets, traffic circles, and zoned parking. Traffic laws don’t pertain to those who own bicycles… (Lizz Robnett, perpetuating the problem). Even going to the grocery store is an adventure on a bike! One can only get home by conjuring up childhood Tetris skills in an attempt to fit all their grocery store purchases into two small bike baskets. YOU trying fitting a box of cereal, a bag of

granola, a jug milk, a head of lettuce, a bag of apples, a bag of pears, a sack of potatoes, celery, cucumber, fish, bread, a container of pesto, two mozzarella balls, a container of yogurt, an 18 pack of eggs, 2 chocolate chip cookies, strawberry-rhubarb jelly, the smallest jar of peanut butter I’ve ever seen, a heart attack sized salami, and a stuffed chicken into a 9”x14” basket that has been precariously zip tied to the back of YOUR bike! …I rocked at Tetris…

Aside: Peanut butter is SOOO American – I know this because I hear about its American-ness ALL THE TIME! Please, tell me about how bad peanut butter is for me while you spread a thick layer of Nutella on your brown bread, go ahead, but a few things first: 1) I admit that Jiff has its problems, but all natural peanut butter is actually quite nutritious. 2) Though it is believed that peanut butter was developed by botanist/inventor/peanut product aficionado George Washington Carver of Missouri (circa 1890), in actuality peanut butter was developed by the Aztecs, who I’m pretty sure, in the 15th Century, had a very different idea of “westernizing” the world. Still worried about Americans taking over the world, one jar of peanut butter at a time? Well, in a slightly disappointing turn of events filled with irony and my own disillusionment - it was a Canadian chemist by the name of Marcellus Gilmore Edson who originally gained the patent on today’s version of peanut butter. So, HA! The cat it out of the bag Canadians! Don’t worry; we won’t blame you if you feel the need to slap American flags to all of your bags in order to shield you from all those comments stereotyping Canadians as Peanut Butter lovers.
I find myself liking peanut butter even more now that I’m having to defend its honor on a weekly basis.


All that fun aside, we recently decided that in order to realize our dreams of a weekend adventure that doesn’t necessarily involve 2kg of potatoes and a litany of dairy products, we would either need to commit to something with four wheels or be stuck wishing that the local bus system came with cup holders, a place to put your wet gear, and about 10,000 more “off the beaten path” bus depots.

As we all know, car years are more similar to cat years than our own, in that we’re not exactly sure how they work, but we’re pretty sure that they have a considerably shorter lifespan, no matter what you feed them, and that there is some exponential component that hits you entirely out of left field; one day you’re fuzzy little friend is vibrant and zooming around with endless amounts of energy and the next, you spend $3000 replacing the EVERYTHING.

As our time here in Ireland is yet to be determined, we decided to forego the unwanted attachment issues and sentimentality that comes with the honeymoon years of owning a new vehicle by skipping straight ahead to “do you hear that funny rattling sound?” 

Meet Teddy Larkspin. Teddy makes up in character and retro style photo ops what he lacks in youth and general function.

What was that Teddy? Everything hurts? AND you hate hills? Push on Teddy… push on.

Seeing our mechanic’s eyebrows arch when we told him Teddy’s age was about as amusing as the fact that the purchase of this vehicle essentially resulted in an immediate relationship with our neighbor’s mechanic.

Though we were originally going for something which might accommodate two adults comfortably resting in the back seat with hot chocolate, sleeping bags, and a travel sized game of Yahtzee, we’ve settled on something with a bit lower gas mileage and room in the “boot” for a 2 person tent, a Jetboil, and an unidentifiable object that continues to rattle about.



On to bigger adventures, my friends… On to Hiking in Ireland! To be continued…