Day Four: the last knockings of our return
trip to the Republic of Ireland

Between 31 May and 3 June 2001,
the Morris Men of Little Egypt
made a second trip to Ireland
to sample the pleasures of a
beautiful country and to
demonstrate a little
of our own traditional dance.

This is a record of the trip.
Details of Day 1 are available here, Day Two here
and Day Three has now appeared

Sunday 3 June

Whose idea of a joke was this?

So let's get this straight. The last minibus got back to Ennis at 03.00; the first sound of rousing at Kelly's was at 04.25, before 05.00 we were on the road. Makes sense, doesn't it?.

At 05.15, New New decided to fill the bus with diesel.

"Where's the filler cap?"

At 05.30 we left the filling station.

At 05.41, we were at the airport.

At 06.15, Cleverdon was drinking another pint of Guinness.

Proffo was drinking tea.

The plane left on time, and landed at Stanstead at 08.10, to a round of applause for the hostess who was on her first mission and got through the Ryanair farewells in record time. Thence we went our separate ways.

Cleverdon was last seen falling for the oldest Little Egypt "Goodbye" joke in the book. He must have been tired. Trevor was last seen measuring the size of the long stay car park - so keen was he that he missed his bus stop. Bangs was last seen trying to blag himself into an empty car on the airport transit, only to find that there WAS NO doorway there.

For the rest

And for the record

It was a great weekend.

Huge thanks are hereby offered to all who put in so much hard work to make it successful: they know who they are.

Thanks to everyone who went. Apologies to anyone who feels left out of this digest. It's not deliberate.

Thanks to Tommo and Mike for letting me use their photos.

Thanks to all the lovely people in Ireland who made us so welcome. Thanks to May Kearney's, Kelly's, Vaughan's, Dick, O'Connor's and Pepper's.

Finally, a few photos I couldn't leave out:

• Day One of the Epic
• Day Two
• Day Three
• Life at May Kearney's: Proffitt tells all
• Morris index
• Home