The Importance of Getting Away

When life gets crazy, sometimes all you can do is run away. Which is exactly what I did this week; with the help of my best friend, a Groupon voucher and a bottle of Jack Daniels. The trip had been planned (if you can call deciding that the deal for a hotel in Donegal was too good to pass up, and we therefore needed to call to Donegal planned), but happened to coincide with a need to get away from everyone and my various dramas.

Getting away from where you're used to is one of the most important things you can do, in my opinion. Wondering around a village where no one knows you and shamelessly taking photo after photo and being away from everyone you know and just reveling in being somewhere unfamiliar is a drug to someone with such a severe case of wanderlust as me. Part of it is to do with the fact that all the people you meet can define you by is the fact you are not from there, giving you a certain sense of freedom to be completely yourself.

Rural Ireland is like nowhere else. The fact that everyone says hello is disconcerting. The air really is cleaner. You find yourself squealing over sheep and cottages and imagining that you're in a Discover Ireland ad. Your resentment at American tourists and their image of Ireland as a tiny backward country dissipates because you are standing in postcard scenery. You love being here where there's no cinema or pressures for fashion or night clubs, but you know you could never live here. You're getting drunk in your hotel room, but you know anyone else your age who lives here is just waiting to get out. 

Turns out we were in the gluten-free haven of the world

Casual shrine.

I am a shameless tourist, yes.

The point of the bus journey where I had no idea where in the world we were.

I was really excited to be near sheep.

Donegal is fierce pretty.

I couldn't resist the photo op this cottage presented.