All Roads Lead to Swatragh - Chapter 35

The weekend finished on a great note and the girls headed back to Dublin for the workweek. Grace and Sue would work on marketing and booking Aine's Cottage for the next couple of weekends. Grace needed to make up a grocery list for Chloe and get her recipes that should be used. Breakfasts only at this point. That would make it easier for Chloe. Grace was not sure Chloe would have the long term commitment for this, and feared that if her relationship with Peter went sour, she would give it all up.

Sue helped Grace get the Internet site for the B&B going and contacted a few places to let them know about the cottage. Peter posted a flier about the B&B being open again at Rafter's Pub hoping that might also help. Brandan, the bartender, knew of the cottage and promised to pass on the information. Before mid-week had come and gone, to Grace's surprise, they had bookings every weekend for the next two months. While the cottage was not going to be full every weekend, they would have paying guests.

When Grace shared the information with her co-workers, she was surprised to know that many were interested in staying a weekend at the cottage themselves after hearing about it from Chloe and Sue, and others who had visited. It was less than an hour away from the Causeway Coastal Route and centrally located in Northern Ireland.

Grace now was faced with working on a budget for the cottage that would bring in sufficient money to supplement her cut in salary, upkeep for the cottage, and some pay for Peter. As organized as she was, this was not something she was used to doing and needed more help. Sue suggested she contact one of the people at the firm who worked in the finance department to see if they could help, and that Grace could “pay” them with a complimentary weekend.

Mitchell was the finance person Grace knew the best so she asked to meet with him one day at lunch. Grace explained the situation and Mitchell was glad to help. He told her he was not really interested in staying at the B&B, but would love to give the opportunity to his parents as a gift. Grace agreed and a budget was developed that would bare the test of time.

The week passed quickly and Grace passed all the necessary information on to Chloe for the upcoming weekend and crossed her fingers hoping that this would work out. It was difficult for her to turn over the running of the cottage to someone else after spending so much time there, but for now, this must be done. Over the weekend Grace tried to busy herself with other marketing details, research, and tweaking the website for the cottage. While she was working away, Grace realized how much she missed being out in the fresh air and countryside of Swatragh. It would be 3 more weeks before she was back again.

Grace's cell phone rang. It was a number she didn't recognize.

“Hello, this is Grace.” she answered tentatively.

“Hello, my name is Francis. I saw your advert for Aine's Cottage at Rafter's Pub,” the caller replied. “I got this number from the flier.”

“How can I help you?” Grace was please to see that the flier was noticed.

“My band, there are 3 of us, will be playing Rafter's Pub next month for a weekend and would be interested in staying at the cottage. It's too far for us to travel back home after the gig, and we'll be playing for two nights. We're not a noisy group, we play folk and trad, but come in late and sleep late. I hope that would work,” Francis explained to Grace.

After some additional conversation with Francis, Grace worked out the dates and rooms and made the reservations for Francis. This might be a weekend where Grace would make the trip to Swatragh to listen to their music, and give Chloe a break. While breakfast at the cottage is served from 8:30-10:00, standard for most B&Bs, Grace would be on hand to make a late breakfast/lunch for these guests.

Grace was very pleased with how things were moving along. She also noticed that taking care of details for the cottage was taking more and more of her personal time. She had already passed up two invitations with friends to go out.