What can I say? Lanes lined with fuschia in full bloom, along with roses, rhododendrum, gorse, and holly trees in full berry. The country is so beautiful, and the people unfailing friendly and helpful. One of the few dowsides is that I had to fly the new Airbus 330-200 now being used for transatlantic flights. It is hard to believe that in 2010 new planes are being made that are actually less disability friendly than the planes they are replacing. The arms do not go up all the way, instead stopping at something like 60 degrees, making it impossible to get below them, and nearly impossible to get over them. They are more steamlined too, meaning in actuality a more dangerous pointy end that runs the risk of making sure guys might never father children and women could be impaled. Fortunately for me when I arrive in Shannon two wonderful Aer Lingus guys simply grabbed me under the armpits and skillfully lifted me above them while turning into the aisle chair. The weather was amazing, with only one day of real rain, but even rain is to be enjoyed because within an hour great waterfalls were cascading down the mountains, and the streams swelled and developed white rushing water. The rain rarely lasts more than a bit of time, so it is followed by rainbows the likes of which we never see in my area. One day there were two double rainbows in the sky, and because of the lack of pollution the entire color range was there and well defined at that. I lucked out tremendously in the house that I rented. In an interesting twist of fate it turned out that the sister of one of the homeowner's has MS and had an extra shower chair to lend me. The separate shower was large and only had a lip high enough to prevent the water from flooding the bathroom. The house had glass French doors, with only a threshold to get over for full access to the house. The food was amazing, often coming off the boat at the end of the pier. Seafood chowder in Ireland is more like a stew, crammed with mussles, salmon, haddock, clams, potato and scallions. That and a couple of slices of the great Irish brown bread is more than sufficient for a good lunch. It has gotten quite expensive there now though, and the exchange rate was basically one Euro costing about $1.40 US dollars. It was not uncommon to be spending about $30 to $40 dollars just for lunch of something like fish and chips. The food was terrific though, and always served piping hot instead of some of the lukewarm stuff that passes for food in the US. Most of the larger towns have accomodations for the disabled, and one of my "go to" towns has installed curb cuts since I was there last. Instead of parking meters they use parking discs in the larger towns, which must be purchased from a machine somewhere on the row of parking spaces. Here, of course, I can just ignore meters, but with no HP plate equivalent on a rental car it was necessary to find the dispensing machine for the discs. In the smaller towns, which includes most in the Connemara, Co. Galway area I was in there is free parking always, and if it is more convienent to park in the "wrong direction" no one cares as they all do it themselves. For anyone thinking of going to Ireland I would say "GO" as you will have a great time. I went to bed each night with no other sound beyond the wind, and stars that went on forever. During the daylight the play of the clouds on the top of the moutains constantly was changing, and with it the color of the sea from the reflection. The fog sometimes embraced the moutain peaks until the wind came along and in the meterological equivalent to "enough of that now, move along, move along" was blown to the next peak. Roaring turf fires in the pubs, easy conversation, and some of the most spectacular scenery to be found anywhere on the planet!
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