What was the best car ride of 2009? What did you see? How did it smell? Did you eat anything as you drove there? Who were you with?
The best car ride of 2009 occurred during my trip through Ireland. I was with Jamie. I honestly can’t remember which one of us was driving. Our destination was Cork. The scent in the air through the rolled down windows was vibrant combination of earth, grass, salt, manure… the smell of life in the countryside.
We had configured the GPS to avoid all highways and disallow any U-turns. This meant our route was a meander down one lane lanes that served more as boundary markers between farm plots than actual roads. We rarely saw another car, but we encountered many tractors. And we had an adventure.
We were stopped by a herd of sheep and their stern shepherdess.
sheep in the road
We accidentally herded a half dozen cows until a cross old lady jumped out of her house to scold us for letting them eat the flowers on her fence and a frazzled farmer came tearing out of a nearby field to claim the wayward beasts as his own.
herding cows
We were told by GPS Lady countless times, “in 100 metres, turn ____.” And then, once, she said, “in 100 metres, board ferry.” Needless to say, we did not see that coming.
on the ferry
We hit many bushes. (We were driving on the opposite side of the road, after all.)
We lost a hub cap.
When we reached a town to grab a bite to eat at one of the pubs and realized parallel parking on the opposite side of the road is even more challenging than driving on it, we cornered a hapless worker on his lunch break to do it for us. We then tried not to laugh as he mumbled and cursed and inched the car into place, completely flummoxed by the lack of a stick shift.
roadside grave yard
We saw fields, hills, tombstones, churches – new, old and crumbled, farm houses, farm animals, wind turbines, unmarked ruins, ocean, and sky.
catching the wind
We drove. We sang at the top of our lungs. We talked about love, traveling, U2, Twitter, beer, family, life, religion, politics, and how fucking green Ireland really is.
We had a blast. And I will treasure the memory.
Where did you go?
TheWordWire
/ December 19, 2009What a great post! I love that you avoided highways and just kept going without turning around. I’ve never been to Ireland myself, but it sure looks like a glorious place to just get lost… on your route and in conversation. Thanks for sharing!
whollyjeanne
/ December 20, 2009this sounds like my kind of trip. i’ve wanted to go to ireland for a while, now it’s just moved up on The List. gosh, i especially love the tombstones – i keep scrolling back up to look at them. i have this thing about tombstones and cemeteries . . .
Alana
/ December 20, 2009So my internet went down last night just as I was about to read this post. I’ve been waiting all effing day to get it back so I could get here. I love you. I miss her. Don’t ever stop telling this story (especially the part about the cows).
emmajames
/ December 22, 2009WW: Thanks for reading and leaving your thoughts here. Get yourself to Ireland! And I recommend avoiding highways whenever you’re traveling – so much more to see!
Jeanne: You would LOVE it. Maybe 2010?
Alana: xoxoxo