Driving, Driving, Driving

Anthony and I stayed with his friend Shane in Galway for a few days. We went for a ride through the countryside one day that was absolutely beautiful. Ireland really is the greenest place I’ve ever seen. From remote roads all you can see is green for miles. After the weekend, we rented another car from Galway to do a tour of the south of Ireland. This time the car company gave us a brand new VW Golf. I thought car companies usually give you the cheapest cars to rent unless you pay a lot for it, but not in Ireland. When I rented in NZ, they gave me a 1992 Toyota Corolla that had about 100,000 kilometers on it. Old or new, they get me from here to there, but in Ireland I was driving in style. Since I’d already driven a fair bit of Ireland in a manual, I was more confident this time around, but the roads in the south were fairly narrow and windy, and it took a great deal of concentration not to crash into oncoming traffic or the trees on the side.

We first stopped in Ardrahan where Anthony’s aunt and cousins live on a proper Irish farm. After dropping our stuff and enjoying a cup of tea, we left to visit the Cliffs of Moher on the Clare coast. It was supposed to only take an hour to get there, but we went the wrong way from the start and it took a bit longer. Since we arrived late, the visitor center was closed and we didn’t have to pay to view the cliffs; I don’t think you should have to pay to view a natural phenomenon anyhow. To our amusement we also got out of paying for parking. They were charging 8euro just to park, but when we got back from viewing the cliffs a little after 7pm, we saw that the parking attendants had gone home. We stayed with Anthony’s aunt for the night and left stuffed full of Irish breakfast in the morning. On a side note, I absolutely love Irish breakfasts. I can feel my arteries clogging every time I eat them, but I just can’t help myself. I figure I might as well eat as many authentic breakfasts as I can while I’m in Ireland. I’ll get back to my oatmeal when I get home.

Dingle, on the aptly named Dingle Peninsula, was our first destination. It’s only a small town, but very scenic. It took us a good four hours to get there from Ardrahan, and we passed right by the hostel once we got in, but we found it eventually. We took a walk in town, but it was dead with only a scattering of people here and there. Instead of hanging out in town, we bought food to cook dinner and holed up in the hostel for the night. The hostel was a huge old manor house that used to serve as a soup kitchen during the famine. The weather had taken a turn for the worse, so Anthony and I hung out in the common room, lit a fire, and relaxed with a bottle of wine for the night.

The next day we headed for Killarney, but first we drove around the famed Ring of Kerry, which is basically interconnected roads along the Iveragh Peninsula. It was an absolutely stunning drive, albeit a tough one to navigate. I stopped a few times along the way because I was concentrating so hard on the roads that I missed most of the scenery. I thought I had seen beautiful views before, but the Ring of Kerry really is breathtaking. We then made our way to Killarney, the beginning and the end of the loop. That night we went out to a pub to catch a trad session (traditional music). I love listening to Irish music, and I love how informal it usually is – just a few guys with instruments jamming while drinking a pint each. The pub was packed and we seat-hopped until we scored a plush couch, where we set up camp for the night. An Irish band came on after the trad session and played a mix of traditional Irish songs and rock music. They were great and though I was nearly falling asleep, tired after driving for hours, I couldn’t tear myself away from the music and we ended up staying until they finished.

We left for Cork the next morning, and I have to admit that I am not a fan of the place. People rave about how great Cork is, but I didn’t think it was anything special. It was probably due to the circumstances when we arrived; it was pouring buckets, having made no prior reservations we found that the hostels were booked out for the weekend, and the roads were impossible to navigate. The only detailed map we had of the city was in the Let’s Go guide, but even that omits the smaller streets that are essential to know in order to find where you are in the city. After finding the first hostel was booked, we tried to make our way to the second hostel but to no avail. We drove around for over an hour, yelling at each other in the car, until I finally pulled into a spot on the side of the road, and Anthony jumped out to find the hostel on foot. An hour later, he finally came back and told me that he’d been to three hostels, which were also booked. We called our last and final option, and luckily they had beds left. It was a little out of town but better than nothing. By that time it was 4pm and neither of us had eaten anything since breakfast so we went out in search of lunch. We were dead-set on Domino’s, which Anthony had seen on the way to the hostel but couldn’t remember where it was. We ended up getting stuck in the city center for an hour and a half in traffic, moving only an inch every minute. I finally pulled into an illegal spot, and Anthony left to find a Domino’s. He returned after a half hour with Subway. Apparently, the Domino’s had been a mirage. We ate in the car since we couldn’t leave it parked illegally, and then headed back to the hostel. When the rain finally stopped, we set out toward the city to have a look around –I wasn’t very impressed. Ironically, we passed a Domino’s on the way into the city, which we ended up having for dinner since we hadn’t found it earlier that day. We went out for a quiet drink afterward and then headed back to the hostel.

We made our way to Blarney, only 8km away from Cork, the next day to visit the Blarney Castle and stone. We spent a few hours exploring the castle and the grounds and made our way up to the Blarney stone at the top of the castle. It’s really only a small piece of a stone slab that you arch backwards to kiss. Legend has it that if you kiss the stone you’ll never be at a loss for words again. Legend also has it that local boys drunkenly stumble to the stone in the middle of the night and pee on it knowing tourists flock in hordes to kiss it. It had rained heavily the morning that we made our way to the stone so I was hoping that if it were true, at least the pee would have been washed away.

After visiting Blarney, we left for Kilkenny, a quintessential Irish city. I was pleased that we arrived at our hostel and found a parking spot easily. I was hoping Kilkenny wouldn’t be like Cork in the way of driving, and thankfully it wasn’t. We went out in Kilkenny that night with a few people from the hostel. After a few drinks at a local pub, we decided to hit up a nightclub and dance. The first one we entered was a bit too goth and rockerish for my tastes so we left. The next one we came to was charging a cover, and as backpackers, we don’t do covers so we moved on. We turned down another street and entered a club, not initially realizing it was the back entrance to the club we had just tried to go into. The bouncer didn’t stop us and we were pleased that we’d gotten in for free somehow. The place was dead and was playing horrible music so we didn’t stay very long. I was happy we hadn’t paid to get in to only stay for 15 minutes.

On our way back to Galway the next day, we stopped in to visit Anthony’s aunt again before making it back to Shane’s apartment. We dropped the car in the next morning to my delight. I was proud of myself that I had driven all over Ireland on the “wrong” side of the road in a manual car, but I wouldn’t want to do it again anytime soon. I’ll be happy to get back to my automatic when I’m home. Gas go, Brake stop, no clutch needed.