Thursday, June 10, 2010

I really want to be On The Road.

I recently finished reading Jack Kerouac's On The Road on the flight home Spain a few weeks ago. Ever since finishing it I've practically thought about nothing but road trips and travelling around with just a rucksack and an enthusiasm for the unknown.

A few days after I got home from Spain, I was to go to a good friend of mine's 21st birthday on Clare Island, off the west coast of Ireland. I was so excited. Myself, Jon and Conor set off on a Glen Coco Experience roadtrip from Dublin, with Jon driving. As I had only ever gone to Clare Island from Cavan before with Mum driving, we weren't too sure on which roads to take so of course we consulted the source of all knowledge, Google. Google told us which roads to take and how long it would take to get there. I was suspect of the 3.5 hours it told us it'd take to drive west across the country seeing as it takes that long to get from Cavan to Mayo. Regardless, I knew it would be closer to 3.5 hours (in the region of 5 I predicted) than to the few weeks it took Mr. Kerouac and Co. to get across the USA. This just reminded me of how depressingly small Ireland is.