Travelling has become considerably easier these days and most caddies can afford the luxury of flying to each event. The stories we used to hear of adventures between tournaments are a rarity. But you still come across the odd gem, such as the following.
Gerry Byrne decided during a few idle weeks in March that it would be a good idea to take up his brother's offer of the loan of a camper van. He was going to make the getting there interesting while cutting down on expenses. In only his second year on tour, the idea of long overland journeys filled him with wanderlust.
This kind of travelling obviously makes more sense with accomplices. So he rounded up the Byrne brothers from Bray and convinced them that a trip in "Wanda", the brother's van, would be an attractive option. They were easily persuaded so Gerry began his trip on April 14th, south from Letterkenny for Dublin to pick up the first of his passengers.
The ultimate destination was Marrakesh in Morocco but the first leg to Dublin took almost twice as long as it should have due to some clutch trouble: it was already looking like the rocky road to Marrakesh and Gerry had only got down the road to Dublin.
Matthew Byrne, who was waiting patiently for Wanda's arrival, envisaged trundling through the plains of Spain and over the Atlas mountains of Morocco but found himself instead calling his local mechanic in Bray to fix the clutch on Gerry's van. He and Gerry ended up on the Tour charter from Gatwick to Marrakesh. At this stage Matthew's younger brother Dermot was called on to the Wanda case. He was to drive the repaired van to England and meet Gerry and Matthew on their return from Marrakesh and continue their voyage south, this time to Girona in Spain.
Wanda had found fresh vigour with her new clutch and the three Byrnes rattled down to Paris from Gatwick in record time to rendezvous with their next passengers, Myles Byrne, a brother of Dermot and Matthew, and Stephen Byrne, no relation. So the van was loaded with Byrnes and a new clutch and ready for a relaxed ride through France, around the Pyrenees and over the border to Spain. The journey was taking on the atmosphere of Summer Holiday even though it was only Spring. The trip was becoming enjoyable after the early teething problems. Full of banter and just short of bursting into song while easing through the brilliant yellow rape seed fields of central France, the passengers became aware of a flickering red light on the dash board. Somewhere past the Massif Central, Wanda's predicament became more permanent, the warning light was bright with little sign of disappearing.
Five kilometres after a diesel stop, the Summer Holiday went up in a puff of smoke. The engine blew up in the Languedoc region of Southern France some four hours short of the Byrnes's destination. To a seasoned traveller like Matthew you never left home in a vehicle without AA 5-star insurance. Such detail had not seemed so important to Gerry on his first major overlander through Europe. Wanda and her hapless inhabitants were hauled off the motorway in the middle of the night and deposited in the sleepy village of Saint Flour. The insurance had taken care of the motorway removal and the accommodation. The problem was how to get Wanda back to Ireland. The landlady of the hostelry was suddenly landed with a truck load of thirsty Byrnes at an hour of a Monday night when normally she was fast asleep.
Tuesday was a day of big decisions. The Byrnes were due at the golf course in Spain the next morning for duty. The options for the wagon had to be considered before the boys continued their journey south: Firstly, get Wanda patched up locally for £3,000Stg. Secondly, get the van towed to Ireland for £600Stg and fixed there for £1,600. Neither of them were that appealing to the driver but the latter would probably be the least painful option to take.
The next trick was getting to Spain. There were no rental cars in the town or in any neighbouring towns. Saint Flour was not exactly the centre of the Southern French rail network so they began a milk run from Saint Flour to Beziers to Narbonne to Perpignan and finally to Cerbere, the French side of the Spanish border. Ending that day's journey at 11 p.m., the next train south was at 5.35 a.m. Anyone who has had the pleasure of training through Europe will be aware that train stations, although frequently architecturally pleasing, are often best seen fading away in the distance. When you are obliged to spend a night in one, the romance comes to an abrupt halt. So it was for the already travel-weary caddies who were now destined to deck down in the dank and fetid surroundings of Cerbere train station with what seemed like the cream of train station lowlife.
The Byrnes bedded down on the station floor for a night of disturbed slumber. They were joined by two tramps who didn't smell great and a drunk with a wooden leg who kept on getting up and strapping his leg on so he could go and relieve himself.
The journey seemed like it had ended in Girona at 9.15 on Wednesday morning. Until Gerry realised he had left one of his bags back at Port Bou on the border. His bag was found and held for him at the station - perhaps his luck was changing. Gerry eventually arrived at the golf course some 61 1/2 hours after leaving Gatwick, tired, stressed and considerably out of pocket. His accomplices joked that if Gary Emerson (his player) won the tournament, he would break even for the week.
This prospect seemed highly unlikely when Emerson opened his campaign for the Spanish Open with a quadruple bogey eight on the first (a snowman as it's known in the caddie shack). Emerson rallied to miss the cut by one. Gerry has still got the problem of getting Wanda back to Ireland. I saw him in Paris last week talking to one of the Tour travel agents. He seemed to be suggesting that Gerry should fly for the rest of the season. The caddie looked interested. I hope Gerry's wanderlust has not been prematurely dampened.
