Charlotte to Dublin and on to Glenbeigh

This blog back on the air. Believe it or not, there are still places in the world that don't have internet service. The last two nights were two examples. OK, in one of them they had internet, but it wasn't working. So, thanks for your patience. We are having a blast. Updates follow in this post and others....


People who can sleep on overnight flights miss out on a lot. On our flight to Dublin, those people who were asleep missed out on a meal of chicken pieces on rice, free Diet Coke, and two third run movies. While they slept, the rest of us got to read and do crossword puzzles until our eyes got blurry.

That’s right. I can’t sleep on an overnight flight. And, as it turns out, neither can John or Marty.

Other than that, our flight from CLT to DUB was uneventful. And we arrived 45 minutes early, at around 6:00 am. From there, we cruised through customs, picked up the car, and were on the road by 7:00. Four hours later, we were on the other side of the country, in Killarney. We stopped in Killarney to find an ATM and lunch. Then we were on to Glenbeigh, a small village on the north side of the Iveragh peninsula, and where our hike will start tomorrow.

When we got to our B&B the innkeeper told us that she couldn’t have us stay there tonight, since the night before a guest broke off a  handle in the shower and she’d had to turn the water off until a plumber could fix it. But, no problem for us. She had already made arrangements for us to stay at another B&B two doors down.

John, the Innkeeper at Oak Tree Lodge, greeted us, and showed us to our rooms. He made a point of showing each of us how to turn on the electric blankets.  It was either Marty or John that pointed out the significance of this. Sure enough, the heat wasn’t turned on in our rooms.

But lack of heat didn’t matter, in spite of 50 degree temperatures outside. After an early dinner at the Tower Hotel and Pub in town, and our first Guinesses of the trip, we were back in our rooms, ready to fall in bed for our first sleep in more than a day and a half.