Ireland Part 1

I finally fell asleep around 7 pm but woke up around 1 am and couldn’t get back to sleep. I’ve noticed that whenever I travel, I often can’t sleep the first or second night because I wake up with anxiety about being so far from home. Ironic right? I wake up in this spectacular hotel in Ireland and feel spoiled and then guilty and like I don’t deserve it. I guess because I am a person who is normally frivolous and I rely heavily on routine, stuff like this throws me off balance and it freaks me out. I don’t worry about it as much anymore because I know it will pass; it’s just the jitters I guess. 

I tried for hours to get back to sleep and finally fell asleep on the couch in our room around 4 am. I slept like a rock there until about 9:20 am when I heard our hotel door slam shut. David had just come back from a drive around town, he had been up since 6 am. I felt like hell and wanted a million more hours of sleep, but I managed to get up and get ready and we went down for a beautiful little breakfast at the hotel restaurant. 

Then we decided to take another drive and get a feel for the area we are in. We are kind of winging it this week while we are here, which is very unusual because I am always very organized and plan things to a T. I don’t know why I didn’t do that this time…
We drove through a very crowded little area in town with tons of shops and pubs. It’s heritage week here in Ireland so everyone is out on holiday. We found our way over by the mountains a bit and decided to take a detour and try to get some good photos. We found a nice little spot in this valley with a nice open field and a good view of the mountains. It was wet and gray and rainy, which we actually didn’t experience last time we were here. We lucked out and had sunny skies all week then, except for one day but we had already planned on staying in and relaxing that day anyway. 
Still, I enjoyed the drizzles and the fog that danced around the mountains, and the high 50s weather. We trekked through wet mud and tall grass and I was just so thankful to be able to do that and not worry about what creepy crawly is going to come out and attack me first like I do back home in Florida. Did you know there are no snakes in Ireland? This makes for a very happy Sam.

After we got some good shots and did a little more exploring, we drove back towards town to look for some lunch. I set my sights on a pub we drove passed earlier called The Shire and knew that's where we had to go. (I love Lord of the Rings and consider myself a hobbit if you couldn’t already tell by the blog name.) The little tiny Irish roads were super crowded and it probably took an hour to go through two full parking lots and one parking garage before we finally found a place to park. But lunch was worth it! David got the “Fires of Mordor” burger which had jalapenos on it, and a pint of “Gandalf’s Ale” while I got the “Bunless Shire Burger” and a “Smeagol on the Beach” cocktail. I could not get over the names on the menu and all of the themes and decorations, and the food was amazing. Oh, by the way, this is the only Lord of the Rings-themed pub in Ireland! 

After lunch, we went back to the hotel because my camera battery and his phone were dying so we wanted to let them charge for a while. We ended up falling asleep waiting while watching Judge Judy. I guess we’re still getting used to the time change!

I probably woke up from that nap about an hour and a half later, about 6 pm. My husband was still passed out (he actually slept through the rest of the night). I did some writing, some work on Instagram, face timed my sister who is watching my house so I could talk to my fur kids, ate some chips for dinner (or 'crisps' as the Irish call them), and by 9:30, I was nowhere near ready for bed. So I decided to take advantage of my misplaced energy and step out of my comfort zone. I grabbed my camera, tripod, and jacket, and went out to practice some of my night photography. I got lost on my way to the Lookout over the mountains because it was so dark. I stumbled my way to what I guessed was a good spot. It was so cold, so windy, and so dark, I had no idea what I was doing. I wasn't prepared. A flashlight would have been handy. Anyway, it ended up being so windy that even with a tripod, my images were coming out pretty blurry. But I was happy at least happy to have given it a try and proud of myself for venturing out into the cold darkness by myself. After that, I walked around the hotel for a bit and headed back to our room. I laid in bed unable to sleep for a while longer and passed out sometime around 1 am? Needless to say, my hopes of waking up to the sunset did not happen.