Don't take my word for it

I always thought I was really good with directions. After all, I navigated Michael and I halfway around Ireland and we only got lost once, but signage in this country is in a poor state so i'm forgiven for that one. Well when our cousins Billy and Bill came to visit i resigned my self from map reading! We took them to the Aran Islands for Michael's birthday, the 28th, for the day that was meant to be the nicer of the 2 weekend days. They suggested that we go a different way from how we went the first time Mike and I went so we could see a new part of the island as well. Checking the map i noted a clearly marked yellow oval appearing to go past major sites of the island and then an equally clear white mark connecting to the outter skirts of the island. We never checked out that white line last time, i thought to myself. Confident as i was following the map we started off in the opposite direction than we did last time. The map showed the white road following the coast and jutting inwards up over a hill and eventually connecting with our destined yellow brick road. We biked about 10 minutes until we saw what looked a small road headed over a hill. This MUST be it. We started out ascent until the road got rockier and grass was growing beneath our tire wheels, narrower and narrower it became until it stopped at a gated path leading to a field of cows, the chickens were keeping watch over the gate and there was no where else to go. I looked back and noticed that Bill clearly was skeptical and never even bothered making the trek, but waiting about 1/2 way up for us to figure out for ourselves that this definitely wasn't our little white road. Thankfully there were workers i could ask to point us in the right directions. They said "Go right, and after the steepest downhill, make your second right." No street signs, no landmarks, just a quick look to his friend to make sure those were good enough directions. Off we were... "does this seem like a steeper hill than the last one"... "no that one ahead looks worse"... "its gotta be this one we just took, but where's the road". We found the "right" road somehow and up we went... and up, and higher, and steeper and did i mention up? it was ALL loose rock, ALL up, and this was considered a road. There weren't even COWS around here!! We went about 20 minutes when Bill asked, are you sure this is the right way... i didn't know what to say but "no". So on we went since going down this on our bikes would surely cause some major injury. Just when we thought we were going level, around the corner it went up again, i hated that direction after about 30 minutes! At last from the top we could see that somewhere off in the distance that little speck could be another person- hope at last. We hopped on the bikes and were never so glad to see a paved road as we were that day, ah, the yellow path... and that is why it is so clearly marked and encouraged to take. We again took them to ancient fort of Dun Aengus in the rain, and road back in the rain for some sweater buying and fresh fish and chips eatting, trying to dry off as the wet seemed to penetrate through our rain gear! I think they had a nice time dispite it all...

We came back for some key lime birthday cheesecake for Michael and then Mike's birthday dinner was the highlight of the day i'd say. Delicious Thai food (i think Bill and Billy's only meal without 3 huge mounds of potatos) finished off by a chorus of "HAPPY BIRTHDAY" by the whole restaraunt, he was thorougly embarassed, excellent.

Sunday, supposedly the ugly weather day was blue and bright and actually WARM. We drove all through Connemara and i mean ALL through it. We intended to just go to Killery Harbor (irelands only fjord) but again... with the map in my hand we saw WAY more of the coast line than we were hoping too. After about 2 hours in the car and passing only 1 town and perhaps 3 signs i couldn't even find our whereabouts on our map! Oh NO! So we pulled over so mike and i could study the next huge collaboration of signs posted and figure out which way to go, we must have looked just as we were.... completely lost, because the next car stopped, rolled down the window and offered his help immediately. He was our hero, he lead us to the next town that we could actually buy lunch in! We finally made it to the Connemara National Park and walked around on a path that started off much like our Aran Islands uphill path did- not funny. But the view from the top was of course gorgeous and worth it. We finished the drive home with the most phenomenal views of the green of Co. Mayo. Field upon field, steep hills with tiny streams of fresh water rolling down, determined stone walls reaching the tops of each tall hill. The area is amazing. Anyway, after all that driving Billy actually finished the 7th Harry Potter book! Well you know, not EVERYONE can be engrossed by the unbelievable natural beauty surrounding us each moment.

However, dispite all that, i'd have to say the most fun was the darts we played the first night we were there. Billy and I play against each other in a game that truly could have lasted weeks by the rate we were going... we were terrible (sorry Billy). Neither of us could get our last bulls eye and it must have been an hour at that point. So we moved on to Rinehimer's v Sickles in a game of 300- after 4 games the tournament was tied 2-2, but we decided that billy really won our first game since he was the first to get a bulls eye in our 300 games. So the Sickles happily left the champions. We had a great visit with them... who's next? Just don't let me get near the map!