Ireland we have arrived: Cork and Killarney

Our last night in paradise involved pizza, early night, and loud music and neighbors... But at about 12:35 I finally fell asleep. At 6:00 we left our perfect air conditioned room, left the keys on the table, and headed to the train station. Minus some issues opening the train doors... (Yes some Italian men got to laugh at me) we made it to La Spezia and then Pisa Central and then Pisa Airport without issues.  At the airport we tested our bags, mine slipped right in thanks to the shedding of a few pieces of clothing. After about 46 minutes of lines, we made it through security and began our hour wait to board. It was soooo unorganized!!!! No seats, lots of screaming, and a lot of gross smells!!! After 30 minutes of waiting people started lining up. We had no idea why... Since we still had an hour left to board, we got nervous and followed... I guess it's because we don't have seat numbers for Ryanair flights... Well.... It was our first flight with them.  Once the line started moving it was great! Lots of stress over the bags but we made it!!! Avoided the smelly crowd and sat on the very back row!  

And then the screaming Irish babies. The flight itself was great, but the 2 year old and the 4 year old in front of us where unbearable. Parents didn't even look up during the entire 2.5 hour plane ride to Cork unbelievable. Felt sooo bad for them. 

A side note is needed here: why Ireland? O really don't know... Maia and I have had a crazy desire to go to Ireland for a long time. I don't know if because of movies or because we loved Scotland so much... But we just wanted to.

Once landing in cork, a city we knew very little about, we saw fields, fields, cows, and more fields! It was like that romantic comedy movie where the girl arrives in the middle of nowhere with her suitcase... Well picture that but the two of us arriving in a hot and sunny Ireland that hasn't been seen since 2006.  It is hot and we did not prepare for this. 

Two girls, two huge backpacks, one city, one room in a tiny house that can not be used (check in) until 6:30. At the airport we waited for the city bus which was 5 euros each. Since it was late, another American lady approached us and asked if we wanted to share a cab to the city center and we agreed. We paid the same amount and got to have an awesome Irish cab driver. The American woman had been in Italy and was wrapping up a year of teaching English in Spain. It was great to talk to some strangers! 

After dropping her off at the hostel, we said our goodbyes and headed out.  Sooo we headed out walking around the city with jeans and jackets while the rest of cork enjoyed shorts and tshirts. First stop: McDonald. Why? Cheap and supposedly with wifi. Fail on wifi. After lunch we continues walking the streets. The houses and cafes lining the streets are adorable. Just what we pictures. Scattered around, there are old churches and evidence of the city's history. It was beautiful!  But it was sooo hot. We followed 2 maps to fin where the room we rented was located. And after crossing two streets after the wine colored house with shutters we followed the strew and found our cream home with blue door. Still had 4 hours till our host would be home.... Soooo we stopped at a cafe and used the Internet to find out of our airbnb host had emailed us any information.  After some refreshing water, we headed out to the other McDonalds (yes you read that right) so that we could use the restroom. A short walk from there, we found the famous English market with all sorts of delicious goodies and a trillion olives, YUM!  By then we only had 2 hours. So we continued walking through the charming town and sat by the river on a shady bench. 

There we witnessed some security guys chase someone down (not sure why), a table with a group of deaf ladies having a ball over numerous beers, and am Asian couple driving their car on the sidewalk.  

At 6:00 we headed to the supermarket. Ten minutes later we were on our way to our house with Nutella, bread, and chips to last a while!  Cleona, our host, welcomed us and showed us around her cute house. She was soooo sweet! Downstairs she has a Living room, bathroom, and kitchen. Upstairs we had the room and she had hers.  There was a cat... So I quickly popped a Benadryl and hopes for the best. Cleona went out and told us to enjoy the house, Tv, etc. Soooo after she left, we showered, used the wifi, had some Nutella sandwiches for dinner, and watched friends on tv. I hadn't watched tv in almost 5 months!!! Soon after we were ready to go to bed!! 

This morning we got up at 8, got dressed, packed up and headed to the bus station.  After getting waters, we boarded our bus to Killarney. Cleona told us the town kind of sucks but we are ok with it because of the tours we are Doing!  The ride is amazing. We are still on it. Two seats from us is a guy from Georgia who has been talking the entire time about all of his travels. Poor Canadian girl next to him has nooo chance of shutting him up. He has been everywhere, is just sooo wordly, can convert Celsius to Fahrenheit, likes to talk about logging and building capital, just graduated nursing school, and could pick up the phone and get any job he wanted with a 20,000 signing bonus. Gag. 

On the other hand, the view is unbelievable. Everything we thought of and more. Rolling green hills, trees, perfect lakes, perfect houses, cute bridges, stones, and everything beautiful we imagined we would find in Ireland. And a clear blue sky!!!!!!  It really is perfect and beautiful! 

After arriving in Killarney at 11:30, we headed to the hostel. After a 20 minute walk, we reached our destination, paid, stored our heavy backpacks and headed to the Killarney national park and did the river walk.  It was beautiful! Water, mountains, rolling hills, and cows. Pretty perfect. 

After our walk we headed to the tourist office to find our tour company's office. We have a bus tour booked for tomorrow and Monday going to Dingle Peninsula and Ring of Kerry. We are super excited to have someone show us around!!  With address in hand, we headed to the bus office. Since  katerin was not around, we were told to come back later. 

Lunch was our next stop. We settled for one restaurant on the Main Street and I had a delicious cottage pie (equivalent to shepherd's pie?? or pastel de carne). After that we headed back to the hostel and got our room.....

And.... Let me just say it is the first I have stayed in outside the US and Maia's first. Our room is private an fine. Problem 1: no towel Problem 2: hairs on our bed and not so clean sheets.... No thank you. Problem 3: screaming Chinese outside our window. Problem 4: bathrooms are not clean.  Soooo we have changed our Galway arrangements and will be staying at another airbnb place! Call us spoiled... Whatever... With long days of walking in the HOT sun for 17 days... You need a good place to rest so you won't kill each other the next day.  

After that... We left and headed back to the park for a 2 hour walk to the Ross Castle !! Beautiful!! We left gray from the dust and dying out laughing. Out of water, we headed to a store and stocked up on water! Then.... Back to the park to lay and picnic (Nutella bread chips and water) for dinner! 

On our walk home we stopped at a huge store to look at stuff and ended up looking at every aisle. We got picnic food for our bus tour tomorrow and enjoyed browsing through the aisles of clothes. 

Now it is 7:44pm and we are beat. We might be the most boring 22 and 19 year olds, but we are soooo tired and walk sooo much!! And Rick and Cleona were right... Not much to see in Killarney, but it is soooooooooooo cute! I love it and lots of trails to hike!!