Thank you for teaching me how to read a map. Boy, did that come in handy in Ireland...
Love, Kate
I have been eager to visit Ireland for many, many years. In 2005 I worked for a lovely Irish woman named Angela at Webster University Geneva and I've always enjoyed hearing her talk of her homeland. She has made me eager to experience the people, sight, sounds and tastes of this beautiful country.
We ported in Galway (on the western side of Ireland), poked around a bit and then picked up a rental car. Lisa lost the rock paper scissors game and was elected to drive. Thus began the start of our adventures. For those of you who don't know, in Ireland, driving happens on the left hand side of the road. To make it even more fun (& to save significant euro) we opted for a stickshift in the car instead of an automatic transmission. Lisa handled it like a champ, although navigating and helping to remember the correct side of the road was a team effort. Another challenge was that the lanes felt like small bike paths - oh so narrow! Good thing the cars are mostly of the small variety. There were many moments I thought we were going to hit the bushes/rock walls that lined many of the streets, but Lisa kept us all safe and sound.
After a consultation with my favorite travel guide (Rick Steves via his book) we had decided to head South to drive around the Ring of Kerry before heading to the Dingle Peninsula. The drive took much longer than we anticipated and one of the reasons that it took so long is that I, along with Lisa and Emily, really like taking photos. Needless to say, there were many photo and art breaks in our day.
We stayed at a quaint B&B just outside of Dingle. We had initially hoped to stay in Dingle, but had trouble booking a room...came to find out it was because the Dingle Marathon was happening that weekend - this added some fun challenges to our driving and parking efforts. =) The B&B was lovely and was run by a very kind woman, Didre. Didre made us a wonderful breakfast and then we were off to explore a bit of Dingle before heading up the coast to the Cliffs of Moher. Didre suggested an alternate, and definitely more scenic, route which unfortunately took us much longer than the highways likely would have.
This route also took us over Connor's Pass which was quite nerve wracking, but we decided to brave it. I'm guessing it would have been lovely, but by the time we got there it was foggy and drizzling, so we really couldn't see anything - probably a good thing or we would have tried to stop for many more photos!
By the time we made it to the Cliffs of Moher it was (unfortunately) still very foggy, getting late and we couldn't see a darn thing. Needless to say, this was disappointing to the camera happy folk.
We eventually made our way back to Galway, retuned the car the next day and hopped a train to Dublin to explore the city and meet up with the ship. We saw a lot of the Irish countryside, but I'm thinking another trip to Ieland will need to be in my future... I'm determined to see these cliffs.
This is what we should have seen...
borrowed from Patty Brdar Photo
But this is what we actually saw...
More photos coming soon...
Miss and love,
k
