June 7 - Dublin to Tralee (or the pains of travel without a connection or a printed map)

By car oh what a nerve wracking hassle of a day... all packed ready to go check out is 11:00 and i pick up the car at 10:00 sharp, well, no it wasn't ready, they are getting returns, washing and cleaning them turning them around as quick as they can... but... my reservation had a problem their computers were messed up it took over 45 minutes finally i said look i don't care if the car is dirty i'm waiting 45 minutes here i have to check out and my wf is waiting... so then well no connectivity no map and coming out of the shopping center

oh geez the rental is on the roof 8 (thats EIGHT) levels up with 2 ramps each level and i get behind a goober first time in a right hand drive he's inching around every corner so slow, of course ecerything is very tight close here... ... luckily finally get to the bottom there are 2 exits i got through and got out in front of him, but, it's a one way street to a one way street all the way around St Stephens greet traffic on a Saturday morning wait wait for long lights trams... ugh... l uckily i had walked a bit far afield from the apartment i came across a side street i had walked so i could find my way back to the place from there... so with wifi I texted the host 11:15 sorry we'll be out by 11:25 and we were, (good old Mint Mobile Minternational plan not worth a hoot, won't do that anymore, buy a good local sim card whatever it costs). tho then, how do you get from Raymond street and out of Dublin to Tralee? All we had was a map of Ireland and that is no help with rivers, canals, dead end developments, cirle roundabouts... you cannot tell what direction you are going at any time... I had previewed it on my ipad the night before thought oh i should take some screen shots in case i have no service... but no i didn't (painful lesson learned there) and the rental car navigation was shut down, and my iphone wouldn't connect... so ok we tried ended up finally on a big road but going the wrong direction so after an hour of this nonsense we are both at wits end i got enough gps on my phone to show a shopping center we went there got a Three3 sim card and a charging cable and a cigarette lighter plug in ... and we were finally in business going the right direction and we could get here about 5pm, then we had rain rain... off and on and anyway we made it here and its a nice little town lots of tourista stuff lucky for us we got a nice apartment walking distance to most everything here in town so a quick online order to a thai/chinese take away 7 minute walk away and dinner was great, now all set for 4 nights getting to bed kind of early, lucky it's a 3 bedroom 2 bath so i'm upstairs we both have plenty of space our own bathrooms lol 16 days on the road together and some of the places have been very tight quarters so nice to have plenty of room and quiet enough i can have the windows open M can have the heat cranked up... sorry no pics today it was some beautiful green scenery all the way here and some big green mountains in the distance so we will have plenty of pics tomorrow from the Ring of Kerry!!!