Day 14
This morning we awoke to rain, the first rain we've seen since the brief shower at the Rock of Cashel on day 3. In between, we had ten of the most beautiful sunny days imaginable. The glistening window sills and raindrop sprinkled windows makes me wonder if Ireland is sad that we're leaving. I'm certainly sad to be leaving her.
St. Stephens Green in the rain
Most of our goodbyes were said over breakfast this morning. It was sad to say goodbye to these newfound friends. We had shared everything these past two weeks. Last night at our farewell dinner I looked around at our group and realized that somewhere in the past two weeks these people had stopped being "tour members" and had become friends, friends for life probably. At least twelve of us are already starting to plan our next Rick Steves trip together.
Somehow, the rainy weather seems a fitting end to the trip. This is what I expected to find in Ireland, not beautiful, warm, sunny weather. So these rainy bookends at the start and finish of the tour framed the unexpected experiences, unexpected weather and unexpected little surprises by Pat.
St. Stephens Green in the rain
Almost all of my preconceived ideas were blasted to pieces. I expected to eat simple "pub grub" for two weeks and instead had wonderful food prepared with locally grown ingredients and locally caught seafood. I loved the food on our Rick Steves' Village Italy tour (who doesn't like Italian food!!) but I have to say that the meals on this trip were even better and rank with the best I've ever had.......who knew!
I expected the countryside to all be relatively flat, maybe some rolling hills and all covered with green grass. There was certainly plenty of that but the country was incredibly diverse, from beautiful beaches to rocky crags, from old growth oak forests to barren, stony flats.
And the unexpected constantly occurs.
~~Sir John Pentland Mahaffy
I expected the people to be friendly but I certainly wasn't prepared for how friendly, how hospitable and how incredibly warm they were. My biggest "Wow Moment" was definitely the people. I didn't meet any leprechauns and I didn't meet any fairies. Instead, I met the farmers and shopkeepers and musicians, and they told me their stories. They were stories of tragedy and of triumph. They were stories of feast and of famine. They were stories of their fathers and of their father's fathers.
I know I'll return to Ireland. There are many new places I'd like to see and plenty of now familiar sights I'd like to experience again. And I will never tire of Ireland's greatest resources -- it's food, it's music and of course the people. Besides, I still need to find a leprechaun. When I mentioned to a shopkeeper in Dingle that I hadn't seen a leprechaun yet she said "you will - just keep believing".
On the plane I spent much of the flight thinking about the last two weeks and everything we had experienced. I didn't look out the airplane window (click to view picture) until just before we landed back home. When I did, I realized that Ireland was still with us. Thinking back over our wonderful experiences I realized she always would.
