CARLY AND BEN!!!

I had a little group back in Colorado.  Emily, my best friend since college, and her husband, Josh, befriended one of Emily’s coworkers, Ben and his wife, Carly.  One Halloween I met Ben and Carly.  Carly and I bonded over a shared love of show tunes and just a general unexplained liking of each other.  By the time I was planning my birthday party (a weekend away at Josh’s dad’s cabin in the mountains) I asked Emily if it would be weird if I wanted Ben and Carly to come.  We had a great time.  Two Thanksgivings later, we were all crying as we made toasts to our desperately appreciated friendship.  I had just been laid off and had plans to get out of town in a big way, and Ben and Carly had decided to teach abroad the following school year. We didn’t have much time left to all be together.  We vowed to spend the next Thanksgiving together at the location of whoever was farthest away, completely aware that the likely-hood of being able to follow through with this promise may not be achievable.

The following spring, we were all together on one of the first warm Saturdays at a Colorado brewery and I was filling everyone in on my plans that were forming.  Ireland and Scotland?  Carly asked. We’re going there!  Ben had signed up to chaperone a group of middle school students for a trip to Ireland, Scotland, Wales and London.  Carly was his plus one with no chaperone responsibilities.  She suggested I do my traveling there in mid June when they would be there!  That sounded like so much fun.  I was a little nervous about traveling alone. Not because of safety.  Because of loneliness.  In the past, sometimes I had travelled alone to spectacular places and felt like it wasn’t complete without being able to share it. I asked them to send me their itinerary and I’d see if I could make it work.  It turned out that ‘mid June’ started on June 26th.  But wait!  What else did I have to do?  Was I in a hurry to return to…  I didn’t have anything to return to!

And that’s how my trip became 2 whole months.  Two months seemed like such a long and luxurious amount of time.  Now it feels like a diet sized meal– That’s it?  And then you realize you’re satisfied, but not full.

I started planning this trip by figuring out how to stalk Ben and Carly on their field trip and then worked backwards to my audition.  Their first stop was Killarney.  What is there to do in Killarney?  It’s a great base to do day trips like the Ring of Kerry.  That wasn’t going to work.  I’d meet them in Galway.  While I was on the bus coming back from Inishmore, Ben and Carly had one free hour in Galway.  I missed them.  But good news!  They would be in Galway from 9am until 2pm the next day!

I laughed at whoever was planning this trip.  Didn’t they know that Ireland and Scotland work on Spanish time?  9am is equivalent to 6am US time– nothing is open! I packed my bag, put my stuff in the luggage room and checked out of my hostel.  Carly and I were texting meet up arrangements.  They were on the shopping street right around the corner from my hostel.  Of course! That is THE place to hang out in Galway! During business hours the open street is covered with buskers (street musicians) and pedestrians.  At 9am it was covered with delivery trucks.  I wove around the trucks wondering how I was going to find my friends.  I asked the angels for help thinking of all the times I’d found the friends and power adapters that I thought I would never find.  I was sure I would miss them as I went around one side of the truck and they went arou   THERE’S CARLY!! She popped out from behind a truck I reacted loudly and we jumped and hugged.  Carly took me to Ben who was still with the other chaperones.  Oh I was traveling?  What was I up to?  I was going to Dublin this afternoon.  Dublin?  WE’RE going to Dublin this afternoon too!  What an unplanned totally serendipitous coincidence!

We visited the church beneath this clock tower.  Most clock towers have clocks on both sides.  This one was only on one side because the Protestants or the Catholics (whoever built the church) didn’t want to share the time with the other religion.

We caught up as we wandered through a shopping mall and a really pretty promenade by the river.

And then we found ourselves in the the thick of SeaFest set up!

I even remembered to take a picture!

We had lunch in an Irish pub, fondly remembering how much we looked forward to going to a real Irish pub when we had been in Irish pubs in the US.

I was so happy to sneak in some extra time with these guys before they move to Qatar for 2 years.  I walked them back to their group and followed the group to the beach before I turned back to catch my bus to Dublin.  I saw this awesome garden on the way.

Right!  I had been meaning to take a picture of this Irish phone booth in the hostel since I arrived.  Here it is

On to Dublin!