After an enjoyable long weekend in London, I returned to Cork for my last week of classes, and a week-long visit with my family who flew over from Pittsburgh for the Easter holiday.
My entire family including my parents, and two sisters, Katie and Maura, were able to visit which was a wonderful experience. I remember leaving for Cork at the beginning of January and anticipating their arrival in the upcoming months. I can’t believe that time has already come. Time really does fly by so fast here.
After two days spent trying to act as a tour guide for my family in the monsoon-like weather in Cork, we hopped into our rental car and set off for the Dingle peninsula on the west coast. This is probably my favorite place that I have been since I have been in Ireland.
Located in County Kerry, the town of Dingle is a small harbor town, bustling with fishing boats, lots of traditional music sessions, beautiful mountains and ocean scenery and especially sheep…lots of sheep. The entire peninsula alone has over 500,000 of them.
One of my favorite things that we did in Dingle was drive around the peninsula coast on the scenic Sleahead drive. I have never seen more spectacular views in my life. Although it was bitter cold and windy, the views were simply breathtaking. I love the fact that there is such beautiful rolling farmland situated right next to the beach and the ocean. It is a contrast I am not used to seeing in the States. Sleahead drive was a really neat experience because you were able to drive along the coast, through tiny villages that mainly speak Gaelic only alongside the tallest mountain in Ireland-Mount Brandon.
After our few days in Dingle, we made the five hour car ride across the country to County Meath, to visit our family on their farm. While I had already seen them in January shortly after arriving in Ireland, it was so nice to see them again. We stayed at my mom’s cousin Moya’s house, with her husband Paul and their two kids James and Edward.
I love going to their house as their farm is beautiful and it is such a peaceful environment. Moya comes from a family of 9 children, while Paul comes from a family of 12, so there are always people coming in and out of their house, or just stopping by for a cup of tea.
We were able to have a get together with some of Moya’s sisters and their kids. I love being able to reconnect with my family in Ireland and hear stories of days gone by. Having these little get-togethers also always involves lots of food and plenty of drink and banter—which might just be my favorite part.
I feel so lucky to be able to have shared my study abroad experience with my parents and sisters for a week and cannot believe they are already back in America. After trying to describe to them all that I have experienced while I have been here (usually over a poorly connected skype call) they can finally put faces to names and locations to places I have described.
While I am sad that my time with them here is over, I am busy getting ready for my next adventure which begins on April 3rd. UCC’s Easter break is an entire month long, so my friends and I will be traveling for three weeks to multiple places in Europe, before returning to study for our finals. We will be going from Dublin to Amsterdam, then Brussels to Paris, then Valencia Spain to Barcelona and finally ending up in Scotland to tour the Highlands.
