First day in Ireland

I’m in Ireland. Incredible! I still can hardly believe it.

After 27 hours of travel from Idaho Falls to Dingle (including the car ride, plane trips, layovers, and bus rides), I’ve finally arrived. It’s a bit disorienting to have my sleep and eating schedule so different, but we plan to get a full night’s rest tonight and then we should be good. (“We” = Lori, Suzanne, and I. The three of us are traveling together until we meet up with the rest of our study abroad group on Wednesday.)

The trip itself was surprisingly smooth. We had a delay at the beginning, but it was made up with the first layover. Once we landed in Ireland, we took three different buses to get to Dingle (above you'll see Suzanne and I jetlagged at the airport bus stop). They all followed succinctly after the other and we never really had to wait. The bus ride was about 4 hours to Dingle, but it was worth it! People say that Ireland is one of the most beautiful places on earth and that Dingle is the most beautiful place in Ireland.

When we were landing in Ireland, the sun was shining and we could see the fields, separated by hedgerows, all in different shades of green. Our four-hour bus ride helped give us a sense of the landscape—we saw beautiful planes, hills, and forests. The fields were speckled with cows and sheep. The towns offer quaint houses and lovely churches. We were so excited to see all of it!

Once we arrived in Dingle, we walked a few minutes to our hostel. The owner has turned most of her house into a youth hostel. She gives us a key to the front door and the three of us are crammed in a little bedroom. There are a few other people staying in the house as well. Helen, the owner, told us a bit about Dingle and how it’s grown over the past few years. One of the unique things in this part of Ireland is that people still learn Irish (Gaelic) as their first language. We heard lots of people speaking it around town and wished we understood a bit.

Our first task was to find a bank. We meandered down the streets of Dingle, surprised by how colorful the buildings are. After exchanging money at the bank, we took some photos on the grounds of St. Mary’s Church (below) where there were some gardens and a cemetery for nuns. We next went to a pub for dinner. I was just glad to eat because we hadn’t had much to eat since our airplane dinner that had been at about 3:00 am Ireland time. It had started raining hard—we were very grateful for our waterproof coats! (They come in all colors, as you can see from the photos. I’m glad I didn’t end up getting the green one I wanted . . . we would have looked like Robin Hood’s band of brothers or something.)

Next we checked out the wharf and then went to the grocery store (there’s a kitchen we can use at the hostel). We got enough food for tomorrow so we can take snacks for our bike trip (above you see me with one of my favorite houses downtown -- it's purple -- and with a bag of groceries). We are excited for tomorrow, but especially excited to sleep tonight. Although drinking is a common pastime here in Ireland, we realized that we don’t need any drinks to feel a bit woozy!