I will be going to Ireland this coming July. There I will visit all the places that my immortal shapechanger Mary McCarthy travels during the first two books that I’ve written about her. I will use Google maps to show the paths I travel and important locations I visit. I will add photo icons on the map. This will let you click on them to see the photos I’ve uploaded of those locations, though they will be pretty disorganized and of random quality until I return home and can edit them.
I plan to leave L.A. on Tuesday and fly into Dublin on a Wednesday (July 21st ) and stay over a few nights. This will let my bioclock adjust, give me a chance to see the parts of the city that Mary McCarthy experiences, and go to a Thursday and a Friday milonga (Argentine tango dance party). The people I meet at the milongas can give me some pointers about traveling in Ireland that I might not get from all the online research I’m doing.
On Saturday (25th) I’ll fly to Galway. This area is where Mary grew up and lived until she died the first time. I will rent a car and drive around the eastern edge of the bay to overnight in the town of Ballyvaghan. (Click their lodging and tourist Web sites for more info.) This is where Mary and her family shopped and went to Mass. Her farm was west of that, perhaps a half mile beyond Gleninagh Quay. This is where she died and turned into a shapechanger in her grave.
On Sunday (26th) I’ll follow her path where, newly alive, apparently 13, emaciated, she treks a few miles west to Blackhead Point, where an automated light house exists today. Then I’ll drive south down the coast. I will pass through or near Doolin, Lisdoonvarna, Kilshanny, and Callura East near Lake Lickeen.
There are two ways to get to the lake. Mary walked this path while I’ll be driving these roads. She would take about 6 hours if walking 5 km/hr (about 3 mi/hr). However, she went slower than that, stopping often to rest and nibble on her food. She would also have to hide from any other people.
Me, in a car, could take a half hour – but I’ll be stopping often, immersing myself in the views and taking photos. It’ll actually take 3 or 4 hours to get to the lake. I’ll eat lunch there and spend a couple of hours around the lake and its western approaches. This is where Mary spent three months learning what she is and exercising her powers, including the ability to stay underwater for a couple of hours.
Then I’ll drive on to Ennistimon, Lehinch, Quilty, and Creegh. I’ll spend a bit of time there. It is where three petty English nobles (Mary believed) thought to rape, torture, and murder a young peasant girl. Until Mary sliced them to pieces.
The time to drive this should be faster than earlier in the day, because of fewer places to stop and view. And Mary should have made better time, too. She was in perfect health and several times stronger than an ordinary human. Most of the time she jogged (though not when others were around) but did not hide from anyone.
The rest of the 15-km drive to Kilrush should be brief, about a quarter hour for me. (Mary took about an hour, jogging as she did.) I should arrive there in the mid-afternoon. I will overnight in Kilrush at the Fortfield farm and spend the evening at Crotty’s pub.
Monday (27th) I will motor to Ennis and Limerick. This should take an hour and a quarter, with a few stops to photograph landmarks seen by Mary and her two friends when they made the trip. They would have stopped near Ennis for lunch and slept at an inn in Limerick.
I’ll probably lunch in Limerick and continue on to Cork. This 100-mile trip should take me an hour and a half. It took Mary and her companions perhaps ten hours. Well, ten plus the time for Mary to kill a few bandits and recover from being killed herself!
I intend to do some local research in Cork. It was an important city in Mary’s life. I’ll especially want to visit what began as Queen’s College Cork. It is on land which once was the far western edge of the city. Mary used the college to further her plans for bettering Ireland, partly by setting up a research and invention-licensing program institute using money gained from the criminal empire she began setting up a year after settling in Cork.
Not that difficult a task when you’ve (VERY carefully) enhanced your brain from bright to brilliant. And can appear to be, and are as dangerous as, the mythical cat lady, Sharptooth Irusan’s-daughter. Or an Mor Rioghan, the Great Queen, the Morrigan to the English, the Grey Lady, Mistress of Ills and Healing, Cuchulain’s lover and The Crow, sayer of your death time.
I’d like to meet with a few people, including Prof. Emeritus of History John A. McCarthy, author of The College, a history of QCC I used a good deal.
On Wednesday (29th) I’ll drive to Galway, reprising Mary’s 1862 train ride to that city. This is a three-hour drive for me plus rubber-necking and lunch time, and was about twice that for Mary. Thursday I’ll explore the city and drive a few miles west on the shoreside road to where Mary had business in Furbogh with villagers in her selkie persona. Late in the afternoon I’ll drop off my car at the airport and take a cab to my hotel downtown. That night I want to go to the Galway milonga right across the street from my hotel and one block from the train station.
On Friday (31st) I’ll take a train to Dublin connecting to Belfast. This takes six or seven hours, about the same time Mary took to get to Dublin.
On Saturday (August 1st) I plan to visit Holywood, a suburb of Belfast, and intend to go to a milonga that night. Most of my time I’ll spend at the Culloden Hotel, where Mary stayed when in Belfast and where she met with the local heads of her criminal enterprises. This is also where she stayed when she masqueraded as angelic Aireal and as the Morrigan and forced the five owners of the richest linen manufacturies to adopt safety precautions and devices to better the lives of their horribly treated workers.
On Sunday (2nd) I’ll fly to Manchester, reprising Mary’s boat trip to Liverpool, and overnight. I intend to go to the milonga in Manchester.
On Monday (3rd) I’ll train to London, following the route Mary took when she went to save Prince Albert from his illness, and had to fight another shapechanger before she could do so. There I’ll visit Buckingham Palace and the parks where so many scenes from Georgette Heyer’s books are set. I’ll also do a bit more exploring and dance in nearby milongas Monday and Tuesday nights.
On Wednesday (5th) I’ll fly to New York and stay in the hotel near the Empire State Building where my 16-year-old model character Sara Silverman stayed. Each night I’ll go to a milonga and during the day explore NYC.
Finally on Sunday I’ll return to L.A.
