The Trauma of Travel

Well, perhaps my title of this first in series, “Back to Ireland”, might be a bit severe, but getting from Toronto to the beautiful Rosapenna was so long and tedious, however not without incident……..but we made it in one piece, and that is the all that matters. Having an evening overnight flight (8:30pm), you, or at least we, tend to spend the day flitting about the house finding yet another item or piece of clothing (or six or seven) that we think would come in handy on the trip………but will they fit in the suitcase?……….they can always fit in the golf bags (now weighing 200kg each)………and at the end of it all, we sit there looking at ourselves and finally say, “Well let’s just go to the airport”. Arriving four hours early is not unheard of is it?……..It is an international flight after all!

We chose the Air Canada flight over to Dublin as it arrived there at a more reasonable time (7:30am), and thankfully we had a nice fairly new plane, an A38054223maxturboprop, sitting in Premium E, which worked well, and even though the BC was available at $1,000 extra per seat, we figured that could be our bar tab for this whole junket, so let’s suck it up……..those reclining bed things just don’t fit me worth a crap anyway.

“WARNING”………..when you rent a car in Ireland, be sure you read the fine print……..you know, that part after thinking you have just booked the best/cheapest rental in the World, and they have a box that says “do you agree to the terms and conditions”……well of course I do, I love you guys, YES, click…..well in there, is a condition that you must have a letter……..not something on your phone, an actual piece of paper letter (who does that anymore)…….from your insurer, stating that you have coverage for rental cars in The Republic of Ireland. If you don’t happen to have that………and a copy of your policy will not do………it will cost an extra million euros per day for insurance on the car that you are renting for 10/day. I though about giving Sudsy (our agent) a call and waking him up at 2am on Sunday morning, but I pretty much know what he would have said anyway. OK, you have been warned, and just for the record, I wouldn’t want to be the person at Europcar that I get a hold of once safely back in Canada………at the end of the day, we are almost on the road, with just one more thing to do…………

“WARNING”………SIM card………..we decided that after our $20,000,000,000.00 Roam Like Home bill from ROGERS following the Portugal trip, that we should just pick up a Euro SIM card………pop it in our owned/paid for iPhones, and get about the business of being Euro………turns out that just won’t work cowboy. Somehow ROGERS has restricted other networks from becoming primary on my phone, and I have to go through an unlocking debacle with some guy in Ottawa on a text connection, which eventually does the trick, and I am hooked up…….I am Euro……..I am Vodafone……..BTW my new # in case you want to make a long distance call 353874925679……….

OK…….that is it for travel tips and bitching……..everything else was smooth as glass. The rental agent at Europcar upgraded me to a Skoda Slaboda or some damn thing………brand new…….nice car……..and we are on the road. It looks like at least three and a half hours to Rosapenna (working on maybe two hours sleep max), but most of the way is good highway, and given that I haven’t had a head on collision navigating my way out of the terminal complex sitting in the wrong side of the car, we feel lucky, hit the highway and get that pedal to the metal.

It doesn’t take long, and my trusty co-pilot/navigator is snoring like a banshee……..I am hanging on for dear life also, so we decide to make a stop in the next town and take a break. Jutta exclaims, “It’s Elmvale”……wrong but close……turns out to be “Emyvale”……….just what the kids used to call Elmvale on the way to the cottage on Friday nights. Iced coffee, carrot cake at a pop up truck, charged up, and back on the road. A wrong turn, which was a wright turn according to the GPS, takes us up and over the hills bordering Sheephaven Bay (home to Rosapenna) and on a single track road, past Lough Salt, and down into the flatlands. What a great detour…….spectacular, and fun driving……….F1 training came in handy.

We arrive at Rosapenna Hotel & Golf Resort mid-afternoon, and are shown to our room/suite, complete with a full dining room set, just in case the fam decides to come over for dinner, living room, and a balcony with dead on views of the bay/beach. Living large baby, but I think all the rooms are like this…….what a great place. We notice there are numerous cars parked on the beach up closer to town (that’s a thing over here), but there is one guy who appears to have taken his hot rod a little too close to the water, and is now stuck…….like really stuck. Every time he tries to drive it out, even with the local youth soccer team pushing from behind, he just gets deeper and deeper………….and the tide is coming IN. It takes a good half hour for the tractor to arrive, and by that time he is up above the wheels, but saved nonetheless. Gorgeous sunny day in the high teens……..people/cars on the beach everywhere……..what a gas.

Napping is just not going to happen, and even when SOLO GOAT goes out for a walk, she is back in no time with a Guinness thirst on her lips. To the bar we go……….our first of the trip……..and it was wonderful. We hung in the bar for the 7:00pm opening time for the dinner menu………..ordered our meals……..fantastic……..can’t wait to get back to our waiting bed. I flip on the TV and find the golf. Jutta is unconscious in minutes, even though Scottie is on the tube, Sky Sports Golf, wiping up the competition at the Heritage Classic in Hilton Head. Get this…….Jutta is lights out at 8:00pm………..at 8:30pm, she pops out of bed and says…….OMG, its 8:30, what were we going to do this morning?……..grabs a sports bra, golf shirt, and pair of pants, and is off into the bathroom……water running, teeth brushed, and arrives back in the living room minutes later to find out it is 8:30PM……..not AM…………Classic. It is sure to be a restless night, but we are so happy to be here at Rosapenna. Golf at St.Patricks tomorrow…….Jutta is dressed and ready to go!