Day Seven
"And In Conclusion..."
Up with the dawn patrol, we checked out and took the very brief drive to the airport. Russ dropped me off with the bags while he returned the rental car. As I was going in the entrance, I watched as a guy stepped out of the airport, into the entryway, leaned over and vomited all over the floor. Nice. A couple of porters took all our stuff for me to where we were headed--the Continental ticket line. Nice thing about the baggage guys with the carts in Ireland...no wondering if you're tipping the right amount. The price for the service is right there on the side of the cart (5 euros, which was fine, because I was trying to get rid of the last of my euros). Russ met up with me, and it was out with the passports, and the start of the customs process. Once that was done, we found our gate (though it took quite a while to find someone who had the key required to let us use the lift (elevator) to get downstairs), and took some time checking out the duty free shops. Nothing too thrilling there. Besides, if we really wanted anything, we knew they'd be trying to push it on us during the flight over the Atlantic again anyway. So it was on to our plane, and goodbye to Ireland.
Not really wanting to watch "Good Will Hunting" a second time, I mostly stuck to music and reading for the six-hour flight back over the Atlantic. Ah, we got lucky this time, by the way, on both legs of the journey. I got the right side aisle seat I wanted, Russ got the window seat, and no one sat between us. We'd gotten screwed on the Jersey to Dublin flight when a pretty large woman ended up between us. And because we sat on the bulkhead, there was plenty of legroom. Nice. We landed in Jersey again and got through customs much faster than I thought, which meant the five-plus hours of layover didn't get eaten up at all. We headed back to the same bar we'd been in on the previous layover, got some sandwiches and stuff, and watched a lot of war news. We did a little bit of looking around at shops for a while, and I got a couple of shotglasses some people wanted. Thankfully, our return flight finally came. Another six hours of flying. And since I didn't want to watch "Spy Kids 2", Mr. Stephen King hooked up me again. I think I dozed off for a couple of minutes as we hopped over time zones, but that was it. Long flight, and man, were we getting tired. We'd been up for a long time. We got home on time...a bit after 9 p.m. pacific time, got our luggage, and headed outside to wait for Aaron to pull up in Russ's car. As much as I'd enjoyed Ireland, there's really nothing like coming home from a trip and stepping out of the airport into the San Diego air. Coming home always puts a smile on my face. Aaron showed straight away, we took Russ home and dropped him off, and we took Aaron's Hyundai back to our place after I had Aaron hit a drive-up for me on the way (I turned down the airline food). Between dinner and catching up on a little TV with Aaron, I finally got to sleep around 1:30 a.m. By this time, I'd been awake for 28 hours. So I figured I was just going to sleep Friday away.
6:30 a.m., my eyes popped open. Nuts.
At least that gave me the morning to finally watch the Kings/Lakers game that happened the week before while I was over the Atlantic, which I'd successfully avoided finding out the results of. So, a week after the fact, I was happily cheering as the Kings held on and took them out, 107-99.
Now if I just hadn't somehow picked up pink eye somewhere along the way...
So, my Ireland adventure was behind me, and I actually got to take out my life list and check #1 off the list. A lot of people never end up doing that. I highly recommend it. Ireland was everything I'd wanted and more. I was so glad that we didn't confine ourselves to any set schedule and just took it day by day. We got to see a lot without constantly feeling rushed or pressured. There was plenty of time, like at Inch, to just sit back and enjoy it all. I'll always remember that beach and that day. As I'll remember the cove discovery. The sea birds with little or no fear that would just land next to us and stare at us as we took our cliff photos. The banjo player from The Barn Boys who reminded me way too much of Mr. Scott. Looking down O'Connell Street and savoring the feeling of a lifelong dream realized. Being referred to as "lad" for the first time (by that group of drunk girls in Killarney...). Sitting in the cemetery at Cashel and looking out over miles of green. And meeting so many Irish that proved everything I'd ever been told about the land and its people by anyone who'd ever traveled there. It is a magical place, as we found during our week there. And we both discovered that a week is not enough. I'll have to return there someday soon, perhaps with my sister and my niece this time, and experience it all again. Ireland. My homeland.
So long, Ireland. We'll miss ye!
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