We were pretty excited for our first time experiencing first class lay down seats on American for the overnight flight. I still didn’t sleep all that great, but it seemed to work nicely for Megan. If you have a first class ticket for an international flight on American, it does give you access to their lounges which worked out nicely since our flight was delayed by an hour or so. We also invented and played an epic luggage rolling game down the long stretch to Terminal A.
We lucked out with a good amount of sun and less rain than we expected during our 9-day adventure to Ireland in October 2025. There was no sign of sun for the first 24 hours, but then the sun came out. I forgot to post about the travel part, but here are some of our food highlights from the trip.
We spent the first few days in Dublin. I can’t imagine going during the busy season because it still felt pretty crowded while we were in the Trinity College and other touristy areas. We walked around a lot and hit up all the vegan spots as per usual. I enjoyed the Guiness tour and the beer in their sky bar. We did the ‘learn to pour a proper Guiness’ session and while you could do that at the Irish bar in your own town like my brother pointed out, we enjoyed it.
The real adventure started once we picked up the rental car and headed out toward the Ring of Kerry. Fortunately for me, Megan enjoys driving and easily handled the challenges of driving on the wrong side of the road and navigating roads designed for barely one car at a time.
We spent a few nights in Killarney and did some hiking around Ross Castle and the Muckross House and drove the Ring of Kerry. Our most epic stop was at Derrynane Beach. It was a beautiful sandy beach with stunning views of the surrounding hills. I don’t know that we took the best road to get there, but it was one of the scarier one lane bits of driving with less than ideal room to pull off the road that we encountered. Totally worth it in the end.
Our next stop was a cute little BnB style AirBNB on the coast in Doolin. They would refill our little baby sized fridge with fresh chia pudding and other vegan treats and take away the dishes. It was a little walk to town, close to a walking path along the cliffs. and had fantastic views of the ocean.
We visited the Cliffs of Moher which was very windy, but nice to see, although Megan said it felt a bit like the ocean cliffs near San Diego and wasn’t terribly impressed. Book ahead online to save some money.
On our return drive back to Dublin, we stopped and had an exciting vegan meal at McDonalds. It had been probably 15 years since we’ve eaten McDonald’s fries due to the added fat in American McD’s fries.
On our final approach to Dublin, we came upon a truck that was just sprinkling rocks out the back and of course we got a tiny crack in the front windshield. This was our second time in a row this happened on our way back to return a car at Hertz. They probably think we don’t know how to drive. Yet in our combined 50+ years of driving, these were the first for us. This is why going forward, I will only use a good credit card to book our rentals. After sending in the paperwork through my Chase Sapphire Preferred, Chase took care of the bill.
Overall, I enjoyed our time in Ireland and would not be opposed to going back and meandering the countryside a bit more. I have always had a mild fascination with moss and there is plenty of moss and other greenery to be found.
