The Day I Thought I Was an Irish Rally Car Driver
We were cruising through western Ireland in our fancy-schmancy Nissan Micra rental car, which you may not be familiar with as they don’t sell them in the US. Sized somewhere in between a Mini Cooper and a Smart Car, it is built for economy and convenience more than for sheer performance. But you know we got a good bit of pep out of that little thing. Sure it may have had a small motor, but that’s not such a big deal when there isn’t much car to move.
Also, being Ireland, I was still getting used to driving on the opposite side of the road (I’ll never call it the “wrong” side). It was a fun adventure for sure, and while I got the hang of it pretty well it still handed me some challenges. Ingrained instincts and reflexes had to be adapted, and I had to watch my mental autopilot so I didn’t drift into my normal driving side and oncoming traffic.
Not that there really was much traffic honestly. The N59 was the main road through Connemara, and by that I do mean the main road. All other drivable paths were small country offshoots of the N59, most barely large enough for a single car. I was thankful on more than a few occasions that our Micra was as small as it was! The one thing I actually did find more intimidating than driving on the left was the speed limit. Even the N59 was a small road by American standards; and the amount of twists, turns, and hills packed into even a short distance would keep you on your toes. But the speed limit is fast. I remember how our hearts would seem to stop in our chests as we flew around a downgrading curve on the N59 at night only to see small glowing sets of eyes from the sheep that were standing right along the roadside. I would constantly catch myself worrying that I was going way too fast and would get in trouble for speeding, only to look down at the gauges and find I was under the speed limit.
We were checking out the town of Clifden along the western coast, the heart of Connemara. We drove out the Sky Road, took pictures of Clifden Castle, stopped for a quick lunch in town… and even the weather was pleasant. Before our trip, we had read a bit on the town of Roundstone – its pretty waterside homes, small fishing town vibe, and the music center known for handmade bodhran – and decided it was worth a quick run down as it was fairly close by to Clifden. There were a couple of main road options on our old pre-Google paper maps, either back down N59 to the R341 coastal road, or south along the R341 all the way around the coast and up to Roundstone. As we were driving however, we stumbled upon a small, unnamed road that passed directly through the middle of both these routes that a sign said would take us right into Roundstone. We decided to follow the sign, take the road, and find an adventure!
The road cut through fields and bog lands, wound around tight turns and bounced over small hills, all the while being a bit of a rough pavement. The crazy part though- the speed limit on this road was 80 kph! That is about 50 mph over tiny hills that nearly sent us airborne, around tight curves that would often have those small hills in mid-turn. Filled with the excitement of a race car driver, I pushed that little Nissan to the extreme. We felt our stomachs rise in our chests and the wheels nearly leave the ground as the road quickly dropped out from below us. We bumped our shoulders against the doors as we swerved back and forth with the tight curves. We saw absolutely nobody for the entire length of the road, giving us more freedom to push the boundaries. We hit a bit of a straightaway, yet just as we gained a comfort level the road dipped on a sharp hill then immediately curved hard to the right. The unmistakable bump of airborne tires landing on the road was followed instantly by the momentum pull of a quick turn, and we almost pulled ourselves straight into the bog ahead of us! Hearts racing, adrenaline surging, we flew over dip and bump the whole way to Roundstone, which greeted us as a sailor in rough seas would be greeted by the relief of a safe harbor.
After we nearly flew off the road, I had looked down at my speedometer… 70 kph, still under the speed limit!
Absolutely crazy for sure, but not crazy enough to keep us from our Rally Car driver fantasy as we again challenged the same road a few days later…
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