Unable to workout, the brunt of being unemployed and inactive inject a poisonous potion of negativity in my head, an emotional meltdown becoming almost too impossible to avoid.
I am advised to leave the city yet I cannot go abroad. Nights are spent awake and days asleep, the thoughts of Qatar still cutting through my brain like a hot knife of nostalgia.

As I decide to leave the country for good, I book a bus ticket to the West. My last good-bye to the Republic before taking the flight back to the Southern hemisphere.
Money being an issue, I open a ‘Couchsurfing’ profile, I upload a few pictures and I start messaging people in the area.

     ‘This particular girl from the Czech Republic caught my attention as she described herself as very friendly, outgoing and very outdoorsy so I immediately messaged her requesting for a spot in her house. She replied straight away saying that no problem, but I would have to sleep on the couch as she was also hosting another person and the bed was ‘booked’.

It is indeed written in the cold Irish sky. In the morning, I leave the gloom of Busaras in North Dublin and soon the bus briefly enters a half-built motorway, detouring at the first town and cruising through narrow roads that cut through the flat farmlands of the Irish midlands, the haystacks orderly piled up in rows of dry grass fields sentinelled by lonely mansions.
The bus pulls into the bus depot at Limerick. The third largest city in Ireland, which is also known as ‘Stab City’, looks gloomy under the grey sky, the housing estates around the beaten train station sinking into avenues of pure despair whilst blue bags of rubbish pile next to old cars.
My second bus of the day darts South and the narrow road winds through soft hills of houses and thatched cottages in Adare, whilst in Farranfore, road signs point to every cardinal point in the county.

Travel time to Killarney accounts for a total of six hours, this time the cheaper option proving to be the worst one.
With very little time to spend in town, I walk up the road towards the Railway Hostel, where I am offered a bed by a friendly local girl. The small red-painted windows of the main lounge, which is covered in souvenirs and wooden toys, lets a weak sunlight through, whilst the weather outside grows more unsettled.
A Polish assistant looks at the weather showing signs of moodiness and advises against cycling too far when I rent a bike. I do not listen.
I leave the placid streets of town and follow the road South whilst the housing estates are left behind and open widely to a backdrop of lakes and rocky hills. The road becomes narrower and a battle with tourist coaches and cars begin. The sweat starts dripping through my woolen jumper and mixes with the constant drizzle now falling.

My heart sinks and I cry. I am broken both outside and inside and the drizzle growing stronger works as a powerful cleanser. Let it all out, nobody is watching.

Killarney National Park in its full glory. The panorama from Ladies’ View as breathtaking as the hills now just conquered with the heavy bike. I sip on an apple juice and munch on some crackers whilst I spot a series of dash lines on my black and white map which I decide to follow.
The dirt road detaches from the main road and, at the first steep uphill my chain snaps. With nobody around, I try not to panic and place the chain back into the gears, for the rest of the cycle constantly minding the gears versus effort logic.

     ‘Once the road cleared, I bumped into this beautiful open space where all the lakes could be seen at once and I realized that I was alone. Alone in Killarney, alone in Ireland.  I sobbed under the merciless rain, whilst my legs kept pushing so I could make it back before darkness.’

The dashed road on the wet map took me right into the centre of the park. A Garda looks at me and agrees that, despite the steep ascent, the shortest way into town is through the Gap of Dunloe.
Hairpin turns hug the highest mountain range in Ireland and climb as high as 241 meters in a two-kilometres ascent that crowns one of the prettiest landscape yet seen.

Indeed, at the Gap of Dunloe, my knees are shivering from the cold mountain draft yet my eyes are in a trance of awe. Standing in front of me, a road of constant twists snakes along a deep valley carved in tall walls of stone. The stones however, are covered in green must which glows in tones of shiny vegetation at the touch of drizzle and sunshine.
Constantly hitting the brakes, my wheels screech against gravel shifting into puddles of cold brown mud. At the bottom of the gap, the first signs of tourists are for the first time a relief, the possibility of assistance now making me feel more at ease.

The last twelve kilometers into Killarney are cycled through farms of dry hay at a time of the day in which the sunshine make its last appearance just before Aghadoe and the streets pack with traffic near the Golf Club. I return the bike before the chain snaps and walk to the hostel for a dinner of noodle soup and a well-deserved rest.

In the morning, the Atlantic air refreshes the spirit and, as the bus enters Tralee, a solitary windmill stands against a dry estuary. The bus terminal has recently been refurbished and fellow tourists populate it with their backpacks. They all have one thing in mind: the Dingle Peninsula.
The rain falls heavily, at times the drops forming streams of water that drain through the bus windows like ballerinas in sync. The landscape around us grows greener and the engine roars in breaths of hard effort at Conor Pass. From Annascaul, the sandy banks of Inch Beach impose a break and seem to glow against a silver-coloured ocean whilst just before arriving into Dingle town, the hills raise in the most emerald colour I have ever seen.

Dingle immediately becomes as my favourite place in Ireland. Its streets running parallel to the bay soon rise towards round hills of stony terrain from where Valentia Island can be seen ghostly emerging amidst the drizzle.
I meet my host. Her small house entered through a musty wooden-floored corridor. The red kettle boils fresh tea and minutes later, another guest from Israel arrives.
We walk towards the bay amongst a field of wet grassland but our search for ‘Funghi the Dolphin’ is at this time unsuccessful. So is our dinner marathon, in which we end up having a scramble of eggs, tomatoes and mushrooms.

Golden rays of sunshine break through the red curtain in the morning. A rarity in Western Ireland, I pack my bag with supplies and grab the bike, destination unknown.

     ‘As I was cycling towards ‘the unknown’, scattered showers caught me by surprise and had me waiting for around ten minutes under the weak protection of the only skinny tree I could find.
Pretending my wrists were not sore, I kept cycling passing through beautiful fields of blackberries and cottages. A very dull and flat road led me to the little town of Ventry, where stinky seaweed lied scattered to the sun.
Not happy with it, I decided to cycle further and this is where the landscape dramatically changed. The road hugged a rocky Cliff and zigzagged through amazing views of the fierce Atlantic Ocean.

After some forty minutes I reached a steel cross: Slea Head. The road was still going somewhere and the name Dunquin echoed in my mind, so decided to at least reach this little town and turnaround to Dingle.
Some three kilometers down the road, a mirage: roaring waves of blue clear water crashing against a beach of white sand banks and perfectly framed within the walls of tall cliffs covered in green musk.’

My heart races faster. The excitement of both the physical activity and the landscape laying in front of me perhaps only making me think harder about the insignificance of our size as human beings. The Atlantic Ocean has fiercely shaped this coastline for millions of years and I stand at the edge of it, the next available shore some five thousands kilometers West in Gander.

I enjoy my snacks whilst I take photos and lay on the cold sand. The water is too cold for a dip but the ripples are a sight of pure hypnosis.

Once I effortlessly return to Dingle thanks to a powerful tailwind, I crash on the couch and nap whilst the weather outside turns dramatically rainy and the cold drops crash against the thin-glassed window.
My last night in Dingle is spent in a drunk tornado of cold ripples of wind. A beer garden, tiki lights, crying, pints of cider, curry chips and laughter. All at once.

Mild hangover follows. A feeling of sorrow that hits me right in the stomach and turns it into knots of both nostalgia and sadness. The weather grows grim at the small coach station where my new friend hugs me good bye. The bus once again winds through wet roads of mountainous villages, at times stopping to pick up children who, in their wet uniforms head for school in nearby Tralee.
From Tralee, another full bus departs to Limerick and takes me around villages that evoke bygone adventures and travel. At Foynes, the ‘Flying Boat’ museum makes me wonder about epic trans-Atlantic journeys and cold layovers around a cup of Irish coffee.

Limerick is no better on the return trip. However, refusing to suffer for another five hours on the dreaded ‘Bus Eireann Line 12’, I spend a few extra Euros on the comfort of a smooth train ride to Dublin Heuston station, where I finally arrive late in the afternoon.

     ‘So there. That was my first CouchSurfing experience, which was completely unexpected but very rewarding. I can now say that I have exploited every way of lodging: from five-star hotels to hostels, to staying with friends, to this. Travelling is indeed about leaving your comfort zone.’

At eleven at night, the memories of this extraordinary experience once again crash against my immediate reality, the sensible thoughts of leaving colliding ferociously with the guttural feels of staying.

Decisions are then made. I am staying.