courtown

Hello all, I'm sitting in an internet cafe in Gorey, which is 5kms away from Courtown, which is where I will be living for the next two weeks.

I left my hostel yesterday and had a chance to look around Wexford in the daylight. I decided I was going to hike outside of town to the Wexford Wildfoul Reserve - this was about 5 or 6kms outside of Wexford. As I was making this walk, I began to question my decision to hike to a place where 1,000s of birds go to spend the winter. As I was walking down the country road that led to the reserve, I passed cottages which had names like, 'Raven Ridge' and 'Raven Lodge.' Some of you reading this may realize that I'm not a huge bird fan - in fact, I'm somewhat freaked out by the creatures and their potentially deadly beaks.

I was pleasantly surprised. The bird reserve is right next to Wexford Harbor and actually sits 4 or 5 feet below sea level. It was a cool, cloudy, day and the reserve was nearly empty with the exception of myself, a couple small groups of visitors, and thousands of birds. Thousands of Greenland White Fronted Geese - nearly a third of the world's population - fly to Wexford to spend the winter. I was shocked to read that an occasional Canadian goose somehow ends up at the Reserve as well. It was a peaceful place to spend the afternoon.

I walked from the Reserve to the highway which leads into Courtown. Within five minutes of putting my thumb out, I was picked up and given a lift. Courtown is a nice enough little village - during summer months, Dubliners make the drive to spend weekends here. Yesterday afternoon, the town was nearly empty. I spent the afternoon in a cozy pub and enjoyed a lunch of a traditional loin of Irish bacon, potatoes, and cabbage - and, of course, a Guinesss.

I met my team late yesterday evening and we attempted to check into our accommodation. For whatever reason, the manager of the holiday home complex had no record of our reservation. After an hour of phone calls, we were able to check in and spend the night. The only stipulation was that we get the problem ironed out in the morning. This headache lasted until about 11am today. I wasn't worried, I only imagined this would potentially shorten my workday. I was elated when I found out that we wouldn't be working today - and, shortly thereafter, frustrated when I found out we would be making today up on Saturday.

This, is when we decided we would drive to Gorey to eat and get some groceries. As I was writing this blog post, not five minutes ago, my team leader received a phone call from his boss. It turns out that a fundraiser on the team in Dundalk (my friend Lyndon from last week) decided he no longer wished to fundraise for face2face. Guess who now gets to hop a bus and head to Dundalk?

Yes, one Matthew Kyhnn.

cheers, and I'll keep you updated,

mk