Ireland on a Working Visa – Killarney

Killin’ Time in Killarney, Part I

May 13th
At work from noon to 3 on this Saturday afternoon, I am glad that my flat is only across the street (even though, I must admit, this doesn’t ever help me get to work on-time): I have 15 minutes to go home, change shirts, grab my daypack and a ham-and-cheese sandwich that I made earlier, then get to the bus station for the 3:15 service to Killarney, in Co. Kerry.

Wendi called me on Thursday to say that she was in Killarney, so I’m taking off for the remainder of the weekend. What are we going to do? No idea. All I know about Killarney is that it’s southeast of Limerick, where I change buses.

No sooner do I sit down on the Galway bus – in the last seat, no less – does the driver pull off (like I said, good thing I live close by!). Sandwich finished, a slow day at work has made me sleepy, and we’ve hardly left Eyre Square before my head is drooping. By the time the bus reaches the first roundabout outside of Galway (’Limerick – thaddaway,’ the sign says, pointing somewhat to the south), my eyes are closing…

Waking up and looking out the window, for a moment I think I am in Tennessee. This is not because I have been dreaming of my uni days, at Tusculum College in the Smoky Mountain town of Greeneville, an hour east of Knoxville; my memories upon waking are far more vivid than any dream, and they all reflect the landscape rolling past my window.

‘Forty shades of green’: a phrase often used to describe Ireland. I’ll hear it on a tour of Dingle and Slea Head tomorrow, but perhaps that phrase could describe some of Tennessee as well. The undulation of the hills, the small farmhouses and the patch-squares of green fields and yellow-green yields, copses of trees, the rush of blue-green streams that flow through the landscape like streaks through marble, the roads that wind snake-like just like the state roads all through Tennessee’s Smokies; anyone who has ever lived in the Appalachians, not just in Tennessee, can go to Ireland or Scotland, and see a landscape similar to the one he or she left in the U.S.

The comparison – at the risk of a boring but quick lesson in geology and geography – is a valid one. About 100 million years ago, a theory says that two super-continents, Gondwonaland and Laurasia, began to split into today’s land masses. North America, Asia and Europe would form from the splintering of Laurasia, but before this Britain and Ireland were connected to North America roughly around Newfoundland, Canada. The Appalachians, the Irish mountain chains and the Scottish Highlands are, in fact, all originally the same chain of mountains (who says a university education can’t teach you anything?), so when I wake up and feel that though in Ireland I’m actually back in Tennessee, it’s understandable. (Especially when you remember that many Irishmen and Scots emigrated – read that as ‘were forced’ – from their native lands and settled in the Appalachians, from Canada all the way to Alabama.)

When I look at the hills again, though, the memories become again all that they really only are: reflections of the past, not perceptions of the present. The giveaway? Tennessee’s mountains are forested, Ireland’s hills are not.

The bus jolts over a long series of bumps.

Besides, even Tennessee’s backest of back roads aren’t quite this bouncy, but at the same time, I’m starting to think that, as many bus journeys as I’ll take by the time my visa expires (the working holiday, not the credit card), I’ll be ready to ride wild bulls.

No matter, though. The bus passes through Ennis, about 45 minutes north of Limerick; I change buses in Limerick and, a grant total of 4½ hours and 128 miles later, I step off the bus just outside Killarney (which is only a couple of minutes walk away).

“When you get off the bus, “Wendi explained, “start walking towards the buildings.” As I walked into town, however, I remembered that since I didn’t even have a local map, I had no idea of where I was going, and although Wendi had already reserved me a place at Neptune’s House Hostel, she hadn’t actually told me how to get there. A couple of minutes later, I realized why: Killarney’s too small to bother with directions.

Killarney is one of those towns that, whatever its role in Irish life of previous generations, lives on today mainly as a tourist town. The shop- and building-fronts are all primarily bright primary colors – reds and yellows – which, I have decided, is usually a pretty good indicator of how touristy a place is. (This theory is substantiated further in Dingle; and now that I think about it, have you ever been to Pigeon Forge or Gatlinburg, Tennessee?).

Neptune’s turns up easily and soon enough – from the station, literally, down one street, a right, a left a block later, onto New Street then down a much-signed alley (’Neptune’s House Hostel – thaddaway).

Wendi is just waking from a nap; she spent the day on a tour of the Ring of Kerry. In search of food, we settle for Mac’s Restaurant & Ice Cream Parlour, on Main Street, which is decent, but only if you aren’t wanting anything other than mediocre averageness at a slightly too-high price (stay away from the pasta, though). After dinner we go to The Danny Man, a pub across from Neptune’s. As Wendi and I walk in, the 4-man band is just starting to play “Flower of Scotland,” the Scottish National Anthem. Wendi and I smile – we’ve both lived in Edinburgh, and love Scotland – and stay until the band finishes at 11:30.

And then, tired, we sleep.

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