Well, I’m here! Yay yay yay! My mom and I flew into Dublin this morning, and we are now staying at a B&B in Glendalough, which is near Wicklow Mountains National Park. It was a very long day of traveling yesterday, but after sleeping for a solid 6 hours, I think we’re both feeling a little better.
Probably the funniest part of today has been getting used to driving on the left side of the road and having the steering wheel on the right. My mom’s been the one driving, so thankfully I haven’t been in the hot seat. However, it’s been quite an adventure. First off, since the steering wheel’s on the right, that means that the passenger seat is on the left. So when I’ve gotten into our cute little diesel rental car, it’s been strange to not have the steering wheel in front of me on the left side. At first, when my mom and I left the airport in Dublin, it didn’t seem that weird because in the beginning all the cars where going the same direction. More often than not though, I had to remind my mom to stay in the middle of our lane because she’d start drifting to the left. Thankfully, since my mom has had to get used to not driving like an American in Ireland, she’s been driving slower than usual. However, that isn’t to say that I haven’t gotten nervous. There were a few moments today when my breath would catch, but we’re still here.
Truthfully though, it hasn’t been that hard for me to remember that we’ve got to drive on the left. I just keep thinking…..opposite, opposite, opposite. However, we’ve had our share of scary moments. See, the thing about Ireland is the roads are really narrow and many of the lines separating the lanes are pretty faded. Therefore, relying on the line in the middle of the road isn’t too smart. We’ve just been hugging the left shoulder of the road. However, on the super narrow roads, especially when a car is coming from the opposite direction, it seriously looks like the other car is just going to plow right into us. We can only hope that there aren’t a set of Americans coming from either direction, because then we might be in a bit of trouble!
lifeintheblueridges 