In retrospect, I guess I was foolish to take things at face value. You're going to say that we are babies, and it's true! We lack the hard-headedness necessary for this particular set of circumstances. I have friends, and, honestly, children, who would not have gotten themselves in a predicament like this. I cringe to think that they are reading this, but I tell you for your own amusement.
It's just that when you are basically being given something, you hate to look in its mouth for problems. And I'd say that certain…expectations…were created, what with “first-class tickets” (traded in for coach for the three of us with a little left over towards the car) and that whole “countryside home in a scenic area” thing. I admit it: I just assumed that things would work out fine.
And on the whole, they did. It's just, at first, it was a little odd.
It was disconcerting, to be sure, when my queries about directions, contact info, and what was available at the house were met with silence, and then terse answers. I realize now that the (also perhaps naive but well meaning) veteran's group in question had taken a lot for granted when they offered this prize…I'm not sure how much they themselves knew.
I think it was their first raffle of this kind. They have a good group that seems to help people wonderfully well. I think it's a good cause and I wouldn't bother them for the world. And in fact, I tried not to bother them….
But what to do about the vagueness? What is my standing here?
If you try to make me pay too much, I'll balk, but if I'm getting a freebie, I feel at a disadvantage.
So we set out from the airport, urged on not very competently by “Jane” (the UK voice on our Irish GPS, loaned to us by Irish friends), aiming for the town, which was not too far.
This was the address I had been given:
“Name” of house.
Street.
Town.
And that is all.
And mind, while I found that at intersections in Ireland signs were pretty good about how to get to another town or even point of interest, they were silent as the grave regarding street names. And often, the street name changes each block.
And “Jane” wasn't dishing.
It was after 8 on a Monday morning. We went up and down the main thoroughfare of the town several times, encountering not a soul, few cars, and no open shops or post office.
By 8:45, still nothing.
For all purposes, this town was dead. Maybe it was one of those Bank Holidays…I never found out.
We were getting a little panicky as we realized the enormity of our predicament. When I called the number we had been provided, the phone was answered by a man who then hung up. (I had given my number to the owner (in America). Had she forwarded it to her aunt, who was supposed to be meeting us? My phone certainly did not ring.)
It was as if you were put down in my town and told to find a house somewhere on Main St, a couple of miles!
Of course none of the houses had names, that I could see. The defining characteristic of this house, supposedly — the Abbey — was nowhere to be seen and indeed remained defiantly hidden for the duration.
There was no one to ask. There was no one to call. We were truly exhausted and a little hysterical every time we had to turn around, since reversing direction caused our addled brains to forget where our left was. We were waking up to the thought that we just did not know where to find our house.
At last I said, “Guys, we have to pray to our Guardian Angels to help us.”
In the distance I saw a man. “Phil — there's a man! Get him!”
My dear husband felt the iron enter his soul. That man was the only man in town, as far as we could tell. He was turning the corner and walking down a side street, but he wasn't getting away.
We careened, slowly and with due care not to mistakenly drive on the right, around the bend and I leaped out of the car, trying not to project too much crazed desperation.
Reader, I know you will not be surprised when the man told me he knew the family name (not the name of the house) and directed me a couple of miles down the road. He told me landmarks and sure enough, there it was.
It looked overgrown…slightly decrepit…and by the way one of the very, very few non-cinder-block-and-stucco houses we saw anywhere, and hence not all that difficult to describe, had anyone made the choice to do so.
I didn't have much hope that it was the house of the lady who was to meet us, although it did look like it could contain a man who would hang up on lost travelers. We knocked.
Two women opened the door, greeting us as if they expected us, as indeed they did. That was a relief…but, “This is it!”…the house itself…our “country home.”
“It has everything,” the owner had told us. Well, not really.
Oven not working. |
I kind of like a seat on my toilet. This is the downstairs bathroom. |
I only show you this in case the photos are making you wonder what my problem is.This was the feeling throughout. |
The oven didn't work, the stove worked all right with two small burners (plenty of pots, but no frying pans), but tripped the circuit with three. No dryer, which is a problem in a country with daily rain. If I had known, I would have prepared.
Sparsely furnished…smelled like old cigarette smoke. It had been, the ladies informed us, vacant for a long time. It wasn't dirty, but it wasn't nice.
Yeah, my laundry was there as a permanent fixture. When she said the house had everything, I didn't bring 2 weeks' worth of clothing. Bridget doesn't look too deprived, does she? |
It was livable when we opened the windows, but obviously not a dreamy romantic cottage.
Now, the whole mess was a blessing in disguise for at least two reasons. First, it got us to go out and see the country, which my next posts will recount.
A fun spot, if you like shops, which Phil doesn't. |
The nearby large (by West-country standards) town was pretty, with enjoyable, family-friendly pubs with great music in the evenings– Bridget even played and danced (no pictures of that, sorry — pubs are dark places!). Phil fell in love with hurling. We toured.
Second, we received an unexpected invitation from friends whose whereabouts in Ireland I wasn't sure of. I hadn't emailed them about our trip for that reason and because I had no idea what was in store for us.
On the ferry to Dingle, crossing the River Shannon. |
A ferry rider. |
The River Shannon. This is near where my Irish ancestors came from in 1830. |
They knew through Phil's website that we were going to be in Dublin at some point for Phil to give a talk, but they didn't know where we were, either. A sweet email rescued us at just the right moment. (By the way, there was no internet in the house either, although my friend who actually does live way out in the country has internet.)
A rare sight of true-blue sky! |
Phil desperately wanted a real vacation where he could think his thoughts. Poor man, he got a tourist's outing, the kind he least likes, much alleviated by a warm, happy visit to the truly charming and romantic country home of our friends, which I'll tell you about in the next installment.
Listowel. |
Why there's a windmill here, I could not say, but it was a pretty sight. |
I don't know what the other blessings might be, though I have no doubt there were many. Everything that happens to us is a blessing! And even as bad things go, this one does not register at all on the world-wide disappointment scale of life.
But I won't conceal from you that we were disappointed.
Bridget and I are super-sensitive to the way things smell, and we just hated being in that house. It was quite a chore to cook anything palatable, although we at least could get through a bunch of meals in a higgeldy-piggeldy, well, we're-not-actually-hungry sort of way. We ended up spending more money than we had hoped to on that account. Phil missed out on two weeks of peace and quiet (other than our visit to our friends' house). And Bridget missed tramping around the countryside.
As for me, mostly I just felt that dumb feeling, “Why would something like this happen?”
It was a little pointless. If I have to live through a flood or an ice storm, I will make the best of it. But this seemed a little like one of those not-nice practical jokes you teach your children not to play, like pulling the chair out from under someone, or breaking their favorite toy.
Here everyone thought we were so lucky to go to such a wonderful place, and we were. We could have been happy camping in a ruin or staying in a palace. With this house, it was a little harder to not just wish you were home; that you hadn't had such “good luck.”
Yet, nothing is luck! It's all for a reason…but don't ask me to tie it all up in a package for you. It was just one of those things! I will say this — it made me love my own home!
Charlotte (Matilda) says
Loving these installments and your refreshing honesty! Can't wait for the next one!
Mary Jo says
Odd they did not give you much information when you asked. Sounds like a typical village and self catering cottage . Dryers are very rare in Europe, I have lived in the UK for 5 years, the only reason I have a dryer now is because I have a washer dryer combo that is almost useless for doing laundry for a family, trying to find a house even here with a large American population, that has a dryer hook up is very hard and the ones that do tend to go quickly.
Leila says
Mary Jo, it just wasn't that nice. And the woman who owns it lives in New York. She knows what she's saying when she says “It has everything” to another American.
So yes, I understand all that, but still…
Pippajo says
This is the kind of thing that always happens to me, it never fails. My sister is one of those people who can fly off to Europe without making reservations, breeze into a new city, roam around finding the most delightful out-of-the-way shops and restaurants and THEN, and only then, find herself a place to sleep that night that invariably turns out to be dripping with charm and comfort. We tried that once in England and I'll NEVER do it again!
Also, I just wanted to thank you for making reference to the Cliffs of Insanity. Every time I see “Cliffs of…” my mind automatically fills in the word “Insanity” and I have no recollection of what the cliffs are actually of.
Melanie B says
From what I understand the Cliffs of Insanity in The Princess Bride actually were the Cliffs of Moher.
womanofthehouse says
The house was a disappointment, but it seems you survived it with good humor. Looking forward to the next installment!
Camille says
To make you feel a bit better: we had a similar thing happen this summer. A friend “loaned” us their house in San Diego for 12 days in July. We were so excited and planned to spend little money because we could go to the beach every day and do lots of other outdoorsy “free” stuff. The house was gorgeous, but the weather was AWFUL! It was cold and rainy and overcast and most definitely NOT beach weather. We ended up spending a lot more money than we anticipated just to keep ourselves from going stir crazy. Worse, we couldn't just leave and go home because we were taking care of their pets and picking them up from the airport upon their return. I hate telling people how disappointed we were with our “free” or “inexpensive” vacation!!
Suki says
Camille–yes! I was in San Diego for those 12 days! I was staying with Rosie and her husband, so I still had a lot of fun and was thrilled to be able to spend that time with them. But I only went to the beach (which was a mile away) twice in two weeks!
I'm so sorry for your disappointing vacation. As a New Englander, I thought the weather was the whole point of Southern California!!
Gail says
My family was in San Diego in July too, and while I didn't terribly mind that it was cool (I was sooo glad to be out of the East Coast heat wave), I did feel bad that it was too cold to enjoy the beach when that was what I had been building up for the children for several weeks ahead of time. We went once, and froze, and the kids didn't want to go back. Oh well.
M.A. says
Leila,
My husband and I laughed because we are going through a very similar experience with our “fabulous raffle prize”! We recently won a classic car in a raffle for a local Catholic private girls school. It is such a cool car and looks so retro, so dare I say sexy. We were given the option of the car, or a cash prize. We decided to take the car, enjoy it for the summer, and sell it at the end of our summer of classic corvette fun. I had expectations of driving that car in the PA countryside. Don't you know that car made it for the 20 minute drive home (to the storage unit we had to rent), and petered out the next time we tried to start it? I cringed as I wrote the check to the mechanic last night. This was not in my summer budget. The car… is an enormous expense.
Does anyone want to buy a car?
Leila says
Okay, that makes me feel a little less foolish.
polly says
OH DEAR!!!!!! what a place. I can't believe the stove/oven were not working properly. And as for the lack of dryer–YIKES! My relatives who live in the UK all have dryers–odd that this place did not. I can see why you'd feel a bit disappointed. Charming it is not. But…the countryside looks gorgeous!
Jill F. says
Oh my word….nothing worse than a dingy place to stay that smells of stale cigarette smoke. Sounds creepy. And the experience with the rip-off car agency must have been a very rude beginning to your trip. I'm so sorry Leila (and am cured of coveting a “free” trip …at least for a while).
And were the cliffs of insanity really filmed at the cliffs of Moher? Maybe the Lord who made Baboon bottoms was trying to help you see the humor of the situation by decorating your “cottage” with those cliffs. Sometimes it helps me to process a bad experience by relating it to something in literature or film; so( for example) your trip to Ireland could forever be remembered as “Climbing the cliffs of Insanity” :)….maybe, maybe not.
Jill F.
Betty says
“Maybe the Lord who made Baboon bottoms was trying to help you see the humor of the situation by decorating your “cottage” with those cliffs. ”
Thank you for my laugh for today!
Joy says
Oh dear. A sense of humor is indispensable in times like that. Oh, I agree with dryers being rare. I remember when my sister-in-law finally bought one for her house in London. It was a huge deal (and it was really tiny). When I stayed in my brother's flat last fall just outside London, there was a washer but no dryer. The drying rack had lots of use. 🙂
freckledhen says
I have been loving these posts! I'm sorry about your tribulations, but it looks as though you held your head up and made the most of it. I love the picture of you and your husband–you are so pretty, Leila!
glenda childers says
While I have been to and LOVE Ireland, I too, have a killer nose that smells everything. Mouldy, smelly, smoking homes make me want to cry. Hope you got outside and enjoyed an amazing country.
fondly,
Glenda
Debbie says
I am so sorry, Leila. Is it too late to research “Irish Country Cottages” online, and to find yourself a real one for the last few days, out in some beautiful, lonely, windswept place?
I think you two three should, if at all possible, give yourselves a consolation prize of the same (videlicet, “beautiful, lonely, windswept cottage”) after high season is over, say in Siasconset on Nantucket, or perhaps Wellfleet or Truro…
Love and sympathy,
Debbie
mom, again says
was there an airing cupboard? this would be the closet with the hot water tank for the radiators in it, and open shelves. that's where you dry clothes.
what? of course you had the radiators on!
Leila says
Nope. We did turn the heat on, though…I needed some undies!!
claire says
I think that cultural difference affected your interpretation of the house. I think if looks well kept from the outside – the top hedges have clearly been trimmed in a straight line for example! And a brick wall and gate are so common in UK, you wouldn't think to mention them! The house looks really really big for the UK too! Britain just doesn't do pristine particularly!
Leila says
Well, Claire, this house isn't in the UK, it's in Ireland. In the West country where we were, brick houses are few and far between, with few brick walls.
This was not a nice house, trust me.
Mary says
Welcome to Ireland! When my parents liv ed there they found that the house they bought had no dryer, they bought one and the door kept falling off. The stove had 2 burners and their cottage was cold and clammy- that's what stone cottages are actually. It's these things that make me wonder when people say (or believe they think) that they prefer Europe! Not me.
Johnny Mc says
Where shall I start. My dear woman, you wrote for a very long time and I found it difficult to understand what you were trying to get at. I thought that if you spent the time cleaning the house instead of writing to complain about it, the place would be spotless. At the moment, the country is going through a mad depression, there are wars going on all over the place (so that we in the west can remain rich), Pakistan is sinking into the sea and millions of people all over the world are starving with the hunger. And the only thing that you can on about is that the oven doesn't work and there is no frying pan. Frying pans are unhealthy and can be a very dangerous weapon in the hands of an irate husband. He might want to give you a slap of it. Please get off the cross. From a Listowel reader
Suki says
Did you just suggest that my dad hit my mom with a frying pan? Good solution to world hunger.
_Leila says
Ha ha! Actually, the house was clean. It just wasn't nice.
Lori McKenna says
When in Ireland, all gets dried on the radiator. Comes out nice and warm too! Your “cottage” sounded dreadful, and not the dream you had of it. Nobody likes stale cigarette smoke and everybody likes a seat on their toilet. Sorry for your bad luck. Ireland is a wondrous place at least and usually very lucky! Sorry about your experience, but keep trying, you won't regret!
Sue says
I have read your blog for a long time, and am just catching up after making myself take an internet break and I oh so love that post, because being a long time low budget UK holidaymaker I recognise that kind of house LOL…..nothing actually wrong with it, but no lifts to the soul! We usually then put on our cheap plastic macs ( bought at a local supermarket because we thought we were in the middle of a heatwave) and spent far too much on petrol exploring the local countryside :0)
It's interesting what you say about dryers, because especially in the West and North, the UK and Ireland are pretty damp places, yet dryers are not commonplace. My sister whose husband is a merchant banker has one, and I know younger people who buy them, but people in my age group tend to regard them as luxury items. I would love to have one, but it would for me be a luxury expenditure, and because we live in a smallish house ( 800 square feet) it would take some major re-jigging to fit one in…so I have washing draped on a big clothes horse for large parts of the year!