Ireland Observations – August/September 2006
I flew out of Dublin for Frankfurt on the 7th September, 2006 after being on Irish soil from 27th August.
My eyes filled with tears as I watched the land I loved disappear under the clouds we were flying above. I wasn’t born in Ireland, nor was I brought up in a home where Ireland was discussed. And yet, from a very early age, I read books about Ireland and had this ‘thing’ about the Irish. Later in life I realised that the ‘thing’ I had was a very strong feeling of my heritage from my Grandfather, a McGrath. I didn’t meet my Grandfather as he passed away before I was born. I wish I had known him, I truly do. I’m a redhead with fair skin, but I have brown eyes and of course, being born in Australia, millions of freckles. My Great Great Grandfather and Grandmother were both born in Ireland, in Dublin. We have a family tree that my cousin worked very hard on, together with an uncle, but our heritage can’t be traced back any further than our Great Great Grandparents because of a church fire that destroyed the records.
I met an Irishman in 1999 and we had an affair that lasted about 7 months. It was a no win affair, and yet he brought out in me things that were buried deep in my soul. I found my Irish part by knowing him and learning about the land and the people. I loved to listen to his voice, his jokes, and I found Irish music through him and folklore and the wonder that is Ireland. I learned a bit of Gaelic and used to write to him in Gaelic. He laughingly said I knew more than he did, even though he majored in Gaelic when he was growing up in Ireland. He was a student for two years in the Priesthood in Ireland but left when he realised it wasn’t his calling, eventually marrying and moving to Australia to live and raise a family.
Travelling to Ireland was a must for me and the feeling that I should go has been strong for the last few years. To finally realise my dream was thanks to my parents who have both passed on and left me a small inheritance. I think they would have been very happy to know that I used part of that inheritance to follow a dream and to go to the place that inspired me so.
Ireland, to me, is the most beautiful place I could have wished to ever go to. Every day out on the road was awe-inspiring and captivating. My only regret is that I didn’t do what I really wanted to do – spend my whole time overseas in Ireland. I read a lot of travel information and stories from other people and assessed that 7 days on the road would be plenty of time to see it all. I was mistaken by a long shot. 7 days wasn’t nearly enough and the itinerary I travelled to was far too adventurous for the time allowed. If I had spent the 26 days away in Ireland I may have seen most of what I wanted to. As it was, I saw just a snapshot of all the wonders and history that I could have, and should have. I hope that before too many years pass by, while I’m still able to get around okay, that I will have the opportunity to return and see a lot of what I missed.
As I travelled around Ireland I kept a diary of each day, notes on places I went, and on my impressions of Ireland as a tourist driving in a foreign country. I hope that some of the information below may be of interest and help to others who will follow the same roads I travelled on. While I have written 3 stories about the 7 days on the road and the time spent in Dublin, the notes below are tips that may make some one else’s trip a bit easier. The notes are therefore written as a guide for those of you who are thinking about going on an adventure trip to Ireland.
Car Hire booked in Australia
Make very sure that the car that is being booked for you is large enough for the amount of luggage you will have. Some of the cars only hold 1 large case and perhaps 3 smaller cases. Don’t hire a large vehicle as the roads are very narrow and the less car you have on the road the better. If you don’t ensure this then you may be caught as we were with an extra charge totalling close to $600AU for a larger vehicle. We ended up with a Nissan Tino, a hatchback that seated 5 and had enough luggage space for the two of us. We also had the back seat of course.
You don’t need a high-powered car, as most of the driving will necessitate travelling at 60 or 80 km an hour maximum. The highways are 110 to 120 km an hour, but if you are doing a tour through a lot of Ireland, most of the time you will be on narrow winding roads where power isn’t a priority.
The cars are fitted with satellite navigation systems for an extra cost per day of course. Consider this carefully as it may well be the very best extra cost you ever paid. We were lost a lot, and found things we wouldn’t have found by being lost, but we also used up valuable time tracking back and trying to find roads. In hindsight I believe we should have paid the extra for the navigation.
Money for Ireland
In the Republic of Ireland, the south, you will need Euro. In Northern Ireland it’s pound sterling, as in the UK. If you are Australian, then remember that our dollar is worth less than 50 cents Euro in the Republic of Ireland and not much more in Northern Ireland in pound sterling. If you use cards instead of traveller’s cheques, remember how much you are actually spending is much more than the Euro cost or sterling cost.
I took American Express traveller’s cheques with me in US$. I lost money on the exchange in Australia, but US$ are worth more overseas everywhere than the AU$. I guess what I lost here I may have made up overseas. It’s a personal choice and I preferred not to use my cards if at all possible, knowing the problems when ATM machines chew up cards and also knowing that there aren’t that many banks overseas that my Bank is affiliated with. There are also charges if you use your cards, unless you can find an affiliate bank. With traveller’s cheques you can find places where there are no fees on exchange.
We made sure that each time we left a country we bought some cash for the next stop for tips and something to eat and drink when we arrived. Of course all the airports have exchange desks but by the time you get through customs, find your bags and your transfer company, the last thing you want to do is drag all your luggage around looking for an exchange window.
Buy a money belt and wear it all the time, with your passport safely inside it and your money and cards. There’s no safer place than around your middle under your clothing. You will have to remove it to go through the scanners at the airports though and put it through with your shoes, belts etc.
B&Bs
Make sure you have a small bag with you so that you can take out whatever you need each night from your main bags and leave them in the car as most B&Bs are upstairs and it’s very difficult to get heavy bags up and down those steep staircases.
We didn’t book ahead for B&Bs as we didn’t really have plans on where we would spend each night. You will find plenty of them located outside towns, and in towns as well. You may find you have to visit 2 or 3 to find a bed, but usually one of those 2 or 3 will ring around for you and find you a room for the night. The costs range from 25 Euro per person to around 40 Euro for bed and breakfast. Breakfasts are good and you can have cereal, juice, bacon, eggs, hash browns, baked beans, sausages, toast, tea and coffee or your choice of what’s on offer. It’s a good idea to make sure that you either eat dinner before you look for a B&B or make sure you are close to somewhere that you can get a meal after dark. Some pubs in some towns don’t cook after 4.00 pm.
You can book ahead if you know where you will be staying by going to a Tourist Information centre in a town. I’m told they have the B&Bs on computer and will book for you that way or will phone and make the booking. These offices are very handy for brochures and maps and general information on the area they are in.
Roads in General
Make sure that one of the first things you buy when you arrive in Ireland is a good road map that has all the roads marked with numbers. That map will be your bible, unless you use satellite navigation to find the roads.
In the Republic of Ireland you will soon find out that few roads have signage. Follow the double yellow lines painted around corners at intersections. They depict a main road, as narrow as it may be and as unlike a main road as you are used to.
When travelling on the major roads, keep to the left where there is a yellow line painted along the edge of the road. This gives cars behind you enough room to overtake without crossing double lines. It’s expected that you drive that way.
Lights that flash orange mean you can continue on, you don’t have to wait for a green light.
Don’t expect to travel a short distance in a short time because you will find driving in Ireland is very different to Australia, as an example. The roads are very scenic and to be that way they wander around cliff edges, with many blind corners and narrow roads. A whole road in Ireland is about the size of one lane in Sydney, sometimes even narrower. There are places where the roads are widened out slightly so a car can move over to let another one pass that is coming in the other direction. Many times you are driving with a cliff face on one side and a sheer drop over a cliff into a valley or into the sea on the other side, the only thing between you and that drop, a low rock wall.
In the Republic of Ireland it’s kilometres, in Northern Ireland it’s miles. In Northern Ireland you find street signs – amazing. Just remember that if you hire a car in the Republic of Ireland you have to try and convert the km speed to mph and also the distances between towns.
When travelling into the bigger towns it’s often not easy to find your way back out. Roads are again very narrow in the towns and cars park on either side, half on the road and half on the footpath, leaving a narrow lane up the middle for one car only, on a two-way road. Be prepared for lots of traffic jams and hold-ups in the towns and cities.
Always be mindful of sheep on the roads, as you will see them all over Ireland. They love the grass along the edge of the roads and don’t seem bothered at all by cars. You can come around a blind corner on a narrow road and be confronted by sheep wandering across the road in front of you.
Speeds are usually 60, 80, 100 but there are also 50 zones and 40 zones. You don’t get a warning of the change of speed, the signs are just there in front of you and it’s slow down on the spot.
Parking
Park in car parks and pay the price because ‘clamping’ is rife in Ireland. You will notice as you drive around a very strange phenomenon. If you are travelling north as an example, and want to park but there are no spaces on your side of the road, you can cross over the road to the other side and park nose into a car. Weird, and yet how many times would we like to be able to do that in Australia?
Be very careful about parking – best scenario is if in doubt, don’t.
Petrol
Most towns have petrol stations, but there didn’t appear to be many, if any, that weren’t in towns. So plan your petrol needs carefully. The distance between towns isn’t great, but don’t take chances on running out of fuel in the middle of nowhere.
Mobile Phones
I had auto roam put on my mobile before I left Australia. I used my phone to send text messages all around the world and only found a few places where it was difficult to get messages out, such as in houses or hotels. You do have to have a late model mobile though to use this facility, or at least it has to be digital.
Laundromats
I never did see one in Ireland and had to resort to washing out underwear and T-shirts in showers or bathtubs, drying my clothes over heaters in the rooms or over the suitcases in the car. The cost of having washing done in hotels is beyond belief – 3.50 Euro for one pair of undies! It’s a shame that B&Bs don’t cater for travellers by providing a laundry with a machine and a dryer. It would be extremely beneficial. I ended up having to buy underwear in Dublin before I flew out for New York where I found as many Laundromats as restaurants.
Cigarettes
If you smoke a specific brand, take enough with you to smoke while you are away. In Ireland the lowest mg you can buy is 7 and the highest 9. They sell really long cigarettes or the normal size and I didn’t see any brands that I knew. Buying cigarettes duty free was a waste of time too as I couldn’t buy my brand anywhere, including Sydney airport.
Transfers to and from airports
We had transfers booked for each trip except Dublin airport to Dublin and back. It was the easiest transfer of all as we caught a bus right outside the airport that took us to the corner of the street in Dublin where our hotel was and we drove the hire car to the airport the day we left.
All of the other transfers around the world were a pain in the rear and I would never organise for them again.
Hotels
We stayed at the Davenport in Dublin for 4 days and it was a really nice hotel to stay at. Close to the city so you could walk without problems. The only out of the way part of the stay at the Davenport was getting to Hertz to pick up the car. I’m sure there must be car hire companies that will deliver the car to the hotel. Suss it out, don’t leave that to your travel agent to organise as I did. The more you can do yourself I think the better.
We spent our last night in Ireland at Cassidy’s Hotel in Dublin. We had the hire car to park there that night and I was assured by the travel agent that we had a spot booked. Not so. The hotel was difficult to find and the car park was like an ensuite in a B&B and we were very fortunate to find a spot to put the car. So if you are driving a car when staying at a hotel, make very sure that you do have a car parking spot and that the car park is easy to find and get in and out of. Again, don’t leave that up to your travel agent to organise, as they really don’t give a fig as long as they get your booking.
Make sure before you go to Ireland that you have a map that shows you how to find the hotel by car and how to find the airport from the hotel. The Irish say ‘just up the road and turn right, then left and then go straight ahead’. That’s all Irish to us as it didn’t actually work and we were hopelessly lost trying to find our way to the airport from the hotel. Only for a kind taxi driver who led us to the airport, we would still be over there driving around in circles.
Trip Itinerary
Don’t do what I did and plan your itinerary comparing road distances in Ireland to road distances in your own country. 56 km between towns sounds a breeze to me but I soon found out that it wasn’t a breeze in Ireland. If you have limited days to travel then don’t try and travel too far in that time. There is so much to see that you will want to stop often and time runs away. The trip we took was far too adventurous for 7 days and nights and we should have cut it off and spent more time meandering around rather than just sitting in the car driving from place to place, missing so much.
We saw a lot and we experienced a lot, but we missed a lot more too because of our not understanding the terrain and not knowing how many times we would be lost and have to back track to find roads and things we wanted to see.
Weather Conditions
Take an umbrella with you and/or one of those lightweight plastic ponchos with a hood. It can be sunny and in 5 minutes raining. I spent more time in Ireland damp than I ever have in my life before. Carry them always; it will be worth the effort.
Police
There are no Police in the Republic of Ireland. They are called Garda, guardians. In Northern Ireland they are Police.
Purchases in Ireland
Tourists don’t have to pay the tax on items they buy, however mostly you will pay the tax. Ask the person serving you to give you a Refund Tax cheque. If you don’t ask then often you won’t be offered the service. Save these up over the time you are in Ireland and at the Airport there is a desk where you can go and get back the tax you paid before departing. You will also be given an envelope with each refund tax cheque and you can post the papers away to get your refund if you don’t want to line up at the airport.
If the tax isn’t charged then you are given papers that you have to have a Customs officer sign at the airport and then hand the papers in or post them. If you don’t do that then in 60 days they will deduct the tax out of your credit card. Total pain in the rear. I chose to forget about both after going to the desk to claim back the tax and finding a line up. I was tired of lining up at airports so I just posted them once I arrived back home and the tax that was deducted on one purchase I will have taken out of my credit card because I couldn’t be bothered finding someone to sign a paper for a few Euro.
In summary
Enjoy the adventure of going backwards in time to another age out there in the countryside of Ireland. Honestly, I was looking for the little people I was so entranced. Forget all the frustrations of travel and enjoy the adventure. My notes above are not negative; they are things I found out by travelling around that I can pass on to others to make their travel perhaps a bit easier.
If you have any questions you would like to ask me about Ireland, please email me at caitlinireland.msn.com and I would be happy to reply.
I hope you have enjoyed reading about Ireland through the eyes of an Aussie.
Vena McGrath
October 2006
