AUPAIR IN IRELAND

I've been aupair in Ireland for three months during the summer (2004/5). This was a very good experience ! I visited spots of Ireland, it isn't possible to see everything in three months !!! as well as it is not in a whole life ! but i visited some interesting things !!
Connemara for example, a beautiful castle-hotel (the name of which I can't remember, but I may find it if someone needs it !) In the own park of the hotel, there was a salmon river, and Connemara is an area I really advise you to visit if you love calm, grey skies, green landscapes and lakes that are so huge you can't see the end of it !! this was a trip I made with the family I worked in, I couldn't have afforded it myself !
Then another hotel, in Clare county, in Lahinch, near the well-known Cliffs of Moher (THE sight that is on most of the postal cards you might have received from Ireland) , here again, if you want to face a splendid panorama ! were it not for all the tourists, it was really marvelous ! but again, the hotel wasn't one I could afford alone !
But please, do not despair, there are plenty of possibilities to find cheap hotels ! I went to Cork, for instance, capital of the culture 2005, and together with Italian and German friends, we found a really cheap hotel, clean and calm, and we spent a good time there ! from Cork, you can take a bus to go and visit the Blarney Castle, where you are meant to kiss the Blarney Stone, a stone situated at the top of the castle, so you bend and kiss it, and it gives you the gift of eloquence. I did kiss the stone, but I'm known to speak all the time, thus I've never seen quite a difference !! and from Cork you can also take the train to a town called Cobh (this is what is written on the map, but never, for your own sake, pronounce it "COB", or you'll never find it !! it's meant to be Cov, with a slight, very slight "v", or.... write it down !! I did it myself !!) this town has houses of every color, and the cathedral (well perhaps it's only a church, but it seemed so huge!) is standing up, right at the top of the town ! some streets are steep, but it's quite nice ! oh, something else, don't ever go there on a Sunday afternoon, you'd have missed mass (!) and have arrived in the middle of the music meeting in the park ! thus the only thing you can do is buying an ice cream, and going to visit the museum, very interesting, but the town must be far more charming when all the little shops are open ! I did also have a little sight of Limerick on my way by the bus (Galway/Cork is 4h00 to go, and not so expensive).
Then, the Aran Islands (there's a book by John M. Synge about it called: "The Aran Islands"... A very famous book that you can read in no time, interesting both at geographical and social level for you to know better the islanders). You have to take a bus from Galway, and then the boat, or if you want, just the boat, that's up to you !! the ticket is to be bought before the day of the trip, and it IS a trip you must do ! I went with some aupair friends and we decided not to go were all tourists go ! that's to say, the main Island ! Instead, we went to the smaller one, Inisheer, and what a good choice !!! we were welcomed by dolphins, no, I'm not joking !! It was the first time I had ever seen real ones !! and then we landed on the shore, after what seemed a great shower !!! (there had been some waves and we had been standing up the boat !!) and this Island was very cute ! there were some houses and hotels near the harbor, and then... nothing but fields and walls separating them ! you know, those walls made of rocks, and I absolutely don't know how they made it, but it's more resistant than time !! it seems so roughly made and at the same time it's so regular !! that'll always be a mystery for me ! we saw the castle of the Island, and we ate by it (our sandwiches were a different taste !! much better than usual !) oh !! and if, by any chance, you ever go to see this castle, please look up, there is a sculpted head on the wall, well, maybe it'll be covered by the flowers that roared up its top, I don't know ! but it'll be here, sure !!) and after our meal, we went around the Island, by foot... you can visit the whole Island by foot ! And what a sight !! the last ferry is around 4 pm usually, so you've got plenty of time for the adventure !!
And last, but not least, I went to Galway !! hey, that was obvious !!! I lived in a village called Oran More some 10 minutes from the town !! I couldn't help but to visit it !! It is, and I'm speaking seriously, a town I enjoyed very very much !! it's very young, there are quite an amount of people walking in the streets every day, many little shops to discover around every corner, colorful houses, many pubs, street shows (I played in one, and that was grand... weird but grand !! I had to throw burning sticks to a man who sat on a 2-metre-high monocycle !!) There are also beaches near Galway, you can go there walking along the ocean! well, the water is a bit cold and if you don't like water under 20°C, please, just forget it !! I swam there a handful of times, and I wasn't lucky, there was most often a storm, and big waves, but I enjoyed it !! after that, I used to eat an ice cream (....to heat myself I suppose !!).
And eventually (I was wrong when I said "last" in the paragraph before, sorry !!), my village ! Oran More !! It was nice in many ways !! much less noisy than the town, but there were animations and a library, where you could borrow books + have an internet connection for 2 €/year if you were student. The library was built in the old church, and this was a good idea, it was lovely ! The animations were mainly Irish dances in a pub, with helping for those who wanted to learn, and live bands in the pubs across the street !
Irish people were nice, very welcoming, and proud of their culture, I'm happy for that ! I've always loved Ireland !
So, if I can advise you to go somewhere in Ireland, go where I went, but if you can go elsewhere, please do it !!! there's so much to see !! and so many people to know !! (isn't that surprising?, I went there three months, and now I've got friends in Brazil, Italy, Germany, Austria, Poland, and... Ireland, of course !!) ah travelers, we're lucky !! we're mad lucky !!
I went there to be an aupair, it's a good way to be in a country without needing a lot of money, but it can be also an inconvenient, you have to find the good family home ! I did, and I thank them very much, even if it wasn't always as I expected it to be, it was a good living experience !!
next time, I'll try to do my "diario de viaje" to Argentina, that'll be long to do, but I'll do it !! I hope you enjoyed this page, it's quite long, and perhaps boring... I've never done that kind of things before !! and I may (well, I'm nearly sure of it!) have made some mistakes... I'm sorry about that ! anyway, if anybody requires some details (or see a big mistake!) and want to contact me, I'm giving you my mail address : blasersoch&voila.fr (please, put a @ instead of &). Thanks !