The second trip (in less than a year) was precipitated by my son having won a year abroad scholarship. He spent his first semester in Lille, France and we were slated to visit him there. However, the night before our flight, our new dachshund chewed my wife's passport up. It wasn't terrible, I sent pictures to a rep at the airline and she said we were good. However after driving 3 hours to the airport the desk agent would not allow us to board with it. We had bought non refundable tickets and were shit out of luck. Those will be the last dollars that airline (French Bee) gets from us, ever.
His second semester is in Cork and so we waited and then visited him there.
We flew Aer Lingus. The flight was fine, much more comfortable than the last time. I had booked a Nissan Qashqai because I wanted something I couldnt drive over here, but they gave me a Hyundai Tuscon. :dissappoint: But Actually it worked out great as it was a bit bigger and thus more comfortable for the four of us. And hey, right hand drive and shifting a manual left handed is something challenging and new, so zfg.
This is the route I painstakingly mapped out.
This time we took my middle son , Griffin along and we flew into Dublin and then made a leisurely trip by car down to Cork. I had stops planned, the first of which was Powerscourt Waterfall in the Wicklow Mountains. However we got there pre dawn and the park didn't open until 9. My re-introduction to driving on the left was in the rainy dark and after a red eye flight and twisty single lane roads, I decided to chill until daylight. The next POI was to be Sally Pass in the center of a renowned road-trip route between Glencree and Glendalough. It lived up to the hype. Just beautiful.
We stopped for a bite at Bunters Coffee Shop in Newtown Mount Kennedy....a real local type joint, no frills but really cozy (sat right next to the fireplace) and really good.
Next stop was Miners Way. 1800s ruins of a lead mine. Set in a picturesque valley.
We then drove up to Glencree Centre for Peace and Reconciliation. This was originally a British barracks in the early 1800's then a reform school, then briefly a refugee sanctuary now part of a
world wide charity focused on conflict resolution.
{photos not found} The pics I found don't align with our experience driving into it. It was cool, kind of tucked into woodlands and seemed more ancient than it really is,
We pretty much made our way down to Cork from here. Got some snacks along the way. I loves me some Taytos.
Got into Cork. My first real city-like driving in Ireland. No sweat. Checked into our B&B which was adjoining the College of Cork Campus and just a few blocks away from my sons apartment. We chilled and waited for him to be done with class for the day.
)
for lyfe....
.
But I'm sure you did the right thing.
