Blogs from County Cork, Ireland, Europe - page 37

wrote this message a while ago but it didn't get posted for some reason... here it is now though. enjoy :) Arrived in Cork after a very long, tiring, train mix up day but we did arrive none the less. kissed the blarney stone yesterday... so now we will have luck and eloquence for eternity or something.... lets just make something clear though, this wasn't just a bend down and give a random old rock in the middle of a huge stone wall a big wet smooch.... ohhhhhhhhhhhh nooooo to give this amazing, treasured gift from the earths molten lava core a snog there are three steps: 1. lay down on your back 2. lean back way out on the edge of this ledge so really your ass is the only thing still touching something solid ... read more

This morning Erica woke me up with “Wow, do you know what time it is?” It was almost 1pm - thank god, we needed it. We turned on our Irish cell phone to find several texts from Donal, asking when we were going to go workout and run around “the pitch!” The what? The “pitch,’ is the “field.” We were shocked that he still wanted to, considering the form he was in the night before. However, when we knocked on his door only 20 minutes later, he had already eaten a grease filled Irish breakfast and was ready to workout. I told him I wanted to go on a run, and asked if I’d be safe simply running along the roads and rolling hills. He pointed me to a loop I could run, that would take ... read more

We have arrived...we are in BalliDesmond which is part of Cork County (I think? I'm pretty sure....). We got in at 1pm...drove one hour with Derry back to the countryside and ate some traditional Irish potato stew, courtesy of Ruth. Air Lingus of course lost our luggage, so it is still in Dublin. Luckily we both have pretty heft carry on backpacks. I had my sleeping meds and my computer, that's all I really needed for one night. Our luggage is supposed to arrive in the morning. We spent the afternoon going with Ruth to the market - they call the shopping carts "trollies,", visiting with little baby Sive who is now 7 months old, taking a walk into the little downtown strip of BalliDesmond (which included a few pubs, a post office, a futbol field ... read more

I (Andrea) was contemplating whether or not to bring my laptop with me on this trip. I mean, there was absolutely no reason to bring it; Derry works for Autodesk and has full-fledged high speed Internet at his house. However, I’m glad that I have it now, not only for my newly populated iTunes (Friday Night Lights Season 1 and a chill music mix), but so I can start my blog early. Right now we are about 5 hours into our flight. According to the little map on my screen we are above the Hudson River. I’m choosing not to think about the activities that recently took place over this body of water, simply for my own anxiety sake. I am doing okay, trying to keep my mind occupied. Erica is a pro at flying. Even ... read more

We started today out slowly. We got up and took our time getting ready. At this point, we were all ready for a good internet fix and so we spent some time in the internet café that was attached to the Kenmare hostel. I blogged, while the girls checked their email. We finished up and got ourselves onto the road. We headed for the Blarney Stone. We got ourselves to Blarney and found a good pub for lunch. At lunch, we asked the woman sitting next to us for some advice of some other places to see. She was sweet and gave us some suggestions for County Cork. We finished up lunch and headed for Blarney Castle. The grounds were slightly damp for the morning’s light rain but it was good for the girls’ to see ... read more

We got up in the morning fairly early, but decided to forego the churches in favor of getting on the road. We got an upgrade to slightly larger car because they didn’t have any small automatics left. I wish that we drove automatic better, but since we’re driving on the wrong side of the road, a strike against us, we didn’t think it would be wise to try to struggle with a manual car as well. So we forked over the higher fees and paid for our “luxury” car. It worked out well. Driving on the other side of the street actually takes quite a bit of getting used to. I’m still not used to it. I actually haven’t driven yet since Lisa got the car in her name, but all that will change tomorrow. The ... read more