Tiere hier, Tiere dort

Hello,

Here in Ireland, the restrictions have been loosened to the point where we can move more freely again. And we took advantage of that right away:

In early May, we had a long weekend.

On a Saturday, I met another exchange student from school in Cork at short notice. This time we weren't in the main shopping streets, but wandered around the smaller alleys. That was also nice. So we found our way to a little hill with many colorful houses and a view over Cork City.

And I just organized a meeting with a friend from school and a few of her friends. The plan was a picnic in Blarney. And I won't forget that quickly... In between, we sat with umbrellas on the playground on our picnic blanket ;D But later it cleared up and it became sunny.

Last weekend, I went to FOTA, a wildlife park, with my host family and a friend of my host mother and her son. We were really lucky with the weather! Not too hot; not too cold. It was a really beautiful day. And my camera finally got some use again :)

The animals all had plenty of space and weren't locked up in any small cages - that was nice.

We were able to sit outside at a café, which unfortunately was still closed, to take a lunch break. We had brought our own food. And after a while, I just wanted to go to the toilet, but unfortunately I didn't consider the kids. They didn't want to.

A few days later, I met a friend and we took the bus and train to Kinsale together. I had been there before when I was here for 2 weeks in September, but why not go again?! One thing I noticed throughout the year is that public transport here in Ireland is not the best... Expensive and it took ages to get there. And on the way back, we had problems with our bus, which apparently we weren't supposed to book at all.

But it was worth it. We had a really nice day in Kinsale! It was raining a lot at the beginning, but why not use umbrellas?! And after about 30 minutes it got better and in the end, the weather was perfect.

I can cross something off my bucket list: Dino's. That's a well-known, popular fish & chips chain here in Co Cork. My host father has often talked about it and a classmate said I absolutely have to go there. If you know me, you know that I'm not the biggest fan of fish. So it wasn't that special for me. But the chips were really good.

Last Saturday I was out again with my host family. We went to Leahy's Open Farm. I expected something completely different... It was so cool. I thought there would just be a few animals that we could pet and maybe a playground. But it was almost an amusement park :D

My host mother always says that my friend and I had more fun than the little ones.

But really; you could drive or control excavators. My host sister and I did that together and we had to knock down cones. Then there was like a little train. I also rode that with my host sister.

And the best part was the go-karts. The two of us had a blast.

Of course, the animals were also cute 😍

So as you can see, I was able to do a few things in the last two weeks and partly catch up on what I couldn't do during lockdown.

See you soon,

Your Davina