My first indication that my trip to Ireland would be unusual was at customs. My sister and I waited together and when we stepped up we answered the usual questions. When the younger custom agent asked us what we were doing we explained we were going on a tour.
Curious he asked us which tour company and we said CIE. He then just started laughing at us. “You certainly are screwing with their demographics aren’t you?” He said still laughing. Confused we tried to find out what he meant, but he only replied “You’ll find out soon enough!”
And boy did we find out! It seemed that the main demographic that uses CIE tours are Americans in their late 70’s/80’s. We were the youngest people on the trip by about at least 40 years (and that was including my parents!)
Now we had done a bus tour before in Italy, and had really enjoyed it. Which was strange because before then we were very very anti “group tours” as we had previously thought it didn’t give you enough freedom or time in places. But if you have a short timeframe and a lot of ground to cover, group tours can be very helpful. That was the reasoning why we decided to do another bus tour, since Italy was so great and easy. CIE on the other hand…made us realize that the destination also needs to be factored into weather you’ll be doing a vacation on your own or with a group.
Ireland is pretty small when you compare it against travel in Colorado. I believe in Ireland from East to West it can take 4 hours of driving and from North to South its upwards of 6 hours of driving. That makes it a very small country indeed. Ireland speaks English, and there isn’t a whole lot of culture shock. We should have considered that information before going on our CIE trip.
You see, Ireland is full of some great natural wonders, amazing ancient things, lots of ruined castles, wonderful churches, tons of pubs, and many many sheep. It is a country where you don’t really need to rush through it, as quite frankly, a lot of it is generally pretty similar. Which is not a bad thing…but when you are trapped on a bus for prolonged periods of time, and the scenery doesn’t change, it gets quite boring. Add in short stops because the elderly don’t want to walk that much, meant we spent a lot of time in the bus.
View of the Rock of Cashel from the road.
So our days were pretty much spent on the bus, stopping shortly to visit some small town to see their ruined castle/church/pub and then get back on the bus. Then while on the bus just watch as sheep/castles/farmland rolls by. It made me slightly dislike Ireland for being so boring, but I realize that is just because of the group we went with. (Next time, I would have advised to rent a car…or wait till you are a 80 and still want an easy vacation.)
As you can imagine, when traveling with a lot of senior citizens, you are a bit beholden to their own lifestyle. Cheaper not so great food. Stops at souvenir tourist traps. Less stops to see interesting sites along the way, as stops were reserved for bathroom breaks. Late starts and early nights so they can get their beauty sleep. And a lot of general complaints about things.
Our guide/driver coined two phrases in response to this phenomenon. “Quit Your Bitchin!” and “You can sleep when you’re dead!” (I think he meant the latter one as inspirational, as in “they had paid good money for the trip and were here to see things on their vacation, so sleeping was not an option and would have to wait till later.” At least I hope that’s what he meant!) And would frequently switch between the two while he herded the group along the stops.
All in all, Ireland was beautiful but will not be on my favorite travel memories list. In my memory Ireland was simplified down to Sheep, Pubs, & Churches. But then again maybe I should just “Quit My Bitchin”.
You can sleep when you’re dead…unless you’re the tour guide. In that case, take a nap in between stops.
Travel Missteps is an every-other week series on how sometimes part of the journey is making mistakes and getting lost.
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