APRIL 17 - Rained all night, from what I could tell, continuing through the morning. It is Easter Sunday (April 17) so a lot of activity at the cathedral. Janet stays in the room in the morning to try and recover from the flu, while Odette and I walk to the nearest access to the Killarney NP. This side of the lake is swampy forest and lake shore with walking paths throughout. We see some deer, and Odette remains cheerful through the bouts of rain.
Today was slower than normal, partly due to the weather. It has given me a few hours to reflect. This trip was a result of about two years of thought and planning, much of that dealing with how to leave our home, jobs, and school in Long Beach. It is such a relief to be in this stage of the trip, early enough that the experience is still new, but past all the boring pre-travel issues that made our last few months in Long Beach a nightmare. It still feels like this is just a simple vacation, that soon we will fly out and back to the normal routine. In other words, the immensity of the road ahead does not yet feel real.
Checking ahead, I don’t see any big showstoppers on the planned itinerary. As for how well we are prepared, it is clear that we need to reduce weight. Its too easy to do this in a rental car, which we won’t have much more of in the months ahead. In about one week I need to do an assessment of costs, I fully expect it to be more than projected due to the car situation mentioned in Day 7. I have also received new info on estimated costs down the road that exceed what I’ve budgeted.
Republic of Ireland