International House Hunting!

Once we settled into our temporary home with our dear friends Curtis and Sarah, it was time to start thinking about where we were going to live when we moved over. Here are some pictures from our all too brief time on the Schaak-Pritzl farm.

Sarah's horses Bob and Hope :-)

My horse Bailey was initally curious about the goats. Here he was checking out Evian the goat I milked almost every morning. LOVED doing this on the farm!

Evil Persephone the cat who we still love

The herd

Meet Pipin the spastic boarder collie. Such a sweetie!

Marble didn't always agree with that sentiment...

All of Sarah's animals have so much personality! This is Dove the pony. Such a lovely sweet girl when she's not running away from you

This is Kabab the goat. So named because if he wasn't adopted by Curtis and Sarah, that is what he would have become.

We were told to check out a site called Daft.ie and so I had a big list of houses I was interested in. We were told that we can't even really look into the houses until the middle to end of May. This was one very different thing between house hunting in the US versus house hunting in Ireland. In the US, we'd start looking for next year’s house/apartment 3 months before moving. Over here it's more like 2-3 weeks before you want to move in! As a serious planner, this panicked me to no end! I had visions of arriving in Ireland homeless with 2 dogs and a bunch of suitcases. None the less I still delighted in looking at houses on Daft.ie in the meantime, hoping the ones I liked best stayed on the market until we could secure them. The other issue is we had NO idea about locations over here, so ICBF was kind enough to put us into contact with a guy named Denis who acted as a guide/realtor to make sure we didn't' get into a bad location or that we'd be too far away from the highway or work. I’d look at a house and see that according to Google maps, it was 30 minutes away and think, “Eh, no big deal! Sometimes it took me an hour to get to work in Baltimore!” After talking to either a future co-worker or Denis, they assured me that we would be driving closer to an hour if we lived there. This gave me my first inkling that Google Maps is a liar, at least when it comes to Ireland. We’ll get into this later during my post to future visitors.

Our original plan was that Matt and I would spend a month with our dear friends Curtis and Sarah before moving over. Unfortunately the Visa God’s prevailed and it turned into nearly 2 months. God bless our friends for allowing us to live with them over that time. I will forever be grateful for their hospitality, and I tell you I could have lived there forever as the farm hand/cook! I loved getting up every morning and doing the chores, feeding the horses, chickens, ponies, and goats, milking Evian and processing the milk. For me there was nothing better than walking out the door and greeting all the animals first thing in the morning. I honestly have never felt more relaxed and in my skin as I did while we were with Curtis, Sarah, and Miqdad, their adopted roomie/friend extraordinaire from India. Miqdad is not only a great friend and a brilliant scientist, but he’s also a fantastic cook! The man has a way with food I had no idea could exist because my experience with India food is so limited. I now LOVE Indian food but he’s turned me into an Indian food snob! One of my very few complaints about Ireland is they don’t do ethnic foods very well. Guess that means Miqdad is just going to have to come over and cook for us a couple times while he’s here and teach me!
 

Curtis, Miqdad, & Sarah

 During our time in Missouri, Matt was working as a contractor for ICBF and I would start as soon as we moved over. Leaving my last lab was a bit traumatic at the end due to one unfortunate individual who tended to make many people miserable,  so I was relishing a bit of time off before starting our new adventure. Since Matt was already working for ICBF he was technically not allowed to come over and do anything work related while his work visa was going through. That left us with 2 choices, show up homeless (PANIC! PANIC!!!!!) or I go house hunting (Whew! Much better idea). Luckily Sarah was able to arrange her schedule so that I would have a partner in crime in this and also to keep me from renting a house because of completely impractical reasons. For example, I was all set to rent a house on a nature preserve because it had a stream full of fish and peacocks behind it, never mind it was over an hour commute to work. Who doesn’t want to have access to fishing any day they want?!?! Plus there were Peacocks! Driving schmiving, right? VETOED!
 

How I imagined mornings....

How it probably would have gone.

 Since Matt couldn’t make it, Sarah came to keep me grounded, and for a bit of sightseeing while we were here. One of the greatest things about Curtis and Sarah is they share many similar characteristics as Matt and me, but in the inverse. Sarah and Matt have similar personalities, and Curtis and I have similar personalities which seem to have worked out very well but also means I miss them like crazy when we’re away.  Thank goodness Sarah was coming with me because she’ll know exactly what to expect when they come over and stay with us and we won’t end up with a ridiculously impractical house.

Plenty of room, reasonable rent, sucks when it rains, But it's PRETTY!

 It was a whirl wind tour with us only being in the country for 4 days. We were very lucky and managed to fly on the United Airlines inaugural flight to Shannon Airport which meant we had free food free drinks and cake before we took off. 8 hours later we landed and were jet lagged as heck because neither of us slept much. So we loaded up our suitcases into our little red clown car, ah I mean Nissan Micra and off we went to Cork with me at the helm. Good news is that we brought a GPS with us, so even jet lagged we should have been able to find our way... SHOULD have.

Our first destination was the Rochestown Park Hotel .

All was going well until I tried to plug in the actual hotel and it wasn't in the GPS. No problem, I'll just put Douglas, the town into it. No dice. Ok... Maybe we could call the hotel.
Them: Rochestown Park Hotel
Me: Hi! Could I have your address so I can put it into my GPS, ah I mean Sat nav.
Them: We don't have an address
Me: What? You don't have an address... Ok, well I'm supposed to be staying there and we don't know where you are.
Them: Ok, so you know where the fingers round about is?
Me: The What round about?
Them: Fingers
Me: I just got off a plane and have no idea what you're talking about
Them: Well, you just go to the fingers round about and we're just past there.
Me: Ok, are there roads near you
Them: Yes we're off the Rochestown road.
Me: Ok, any other roads?
Them: Nope just that one
Me: Ooookkkk. Thanks for your help.
Don't get me wrong, the hotel is lovely and they weren't lying they don't have an address! Most places don't actually have a proper address. No street number, no zip code. Just a road in a town. 

 After driving around for an extra 30 minutes we stumbled across the hotel, partially because Matt and I had stayed there once before and all the sudden I realized where we were. An hour later we were ready to see some houses!

Most of the houses/apartments we saw looked like they were decorated exclusively by IKEA. This is not a bad thing, it just made them all feel very sterile and boring and just a little bit sad. They also looked like they wouldn’t survive with 2 dogs and people who love to entertain. It would have felt like we were living in a hotel and that was far from what I wanted. There were some lovely places online I asked Denis about but was told they were either too far away, or in a "rough area," as hard as that is to believe after working in Baltimore. The one that wasn’t IKEA perfect, I described to Matt as trashy. Not USA trailer park trashy, but Irish trashy with a blow up swimming pool complete with screaming children in the front lawn, all parked next to couple of cars up on blocks, the lawns were not mowed, and it was a duplex or what they called a semi-detached house. I was crushed and was going to be homeless! None of the houses were working out and we were running out of options. 

Denis suggested a house I had vetoed originally because he told us it only had one bathroom. In Ireland a bathroom is exactly that, where you go to have a bath. I assumed it meant a room with a toilet and sink as it does in the states. The house he brought up had 1.5 bathrooms in American house talk. I am a firm believer that you need to have at least 2 toilets in every house if more than one person is living there. This requirement came up one year when Matt and I were simultaneously struck with the stomach flu in our home that only had 1 bathroom. Not only do you feel awful, but you have another half dead individual constantly groaning and banging on the bathroom door  not so patiently waiting for their turn. I was never going to do that again if I could help it! So after learning the house had 1.5 baths I said I’d love to see it. This was Dierdra’s house. It was purple on the outside, big enough for visitors on the inside and had an adorable kitchen! SOLD! It was a bit more expensive than we wanted to pay for rent, but it felt like a home with all the quirks of a real home. This is what got Matt to agree, I said I found us a home. Plus it was the only purple house on the block and has a REAL address which means it will be easy for visitors to spot no matter how jet lagged they are when they arrive. 

Our house!!!

The front door, isn't it adorable?

The livingroom

The office/dining room

The "Back Garden" or what we would call the backyard. Sadly as it is November and has become a puppy play pen it doesn't look like this anymore, but I'm planning on a full re-do in the spring! I'm super excited about re-designing the lay out to make it a fun spot for entertaining.

The kitchen/breakfast room

The other side of the kitchen. This is what sold me on the house. A double oven? Yes please!

After finding our home, Sarah and I visited Fota Wildlife park and Kinsale before heading back to the USA.
 

To give you an idea of where we're going today.

Oh, Hello random castle!

 FOTA WILDLIFE PARK:
Fota is unique experience and is something between a zoo and a wildlife park. Many of the animals are allowed to roam free and those that do not are afforded fairly large area to roam with enrichment objects to keep them occupied. I love this place because it's like going to the zoo without the cages, only a bit of fencing between you and the animals. The only animals that have a complete enclosure are the cheetahs and to make up for it, they rigged a zip-line so they have to chase their food like they would in the wild. Fota is also committed to helping endangered animals and have an excellent breeding program to help with this endeavor.  Enjoy the pictures of some of the animals we saw that day, and visit www.fotawildlife.ie if you want to learn more.

A handy map that gives ideas for running or walking around the park and the gardens.

European Buffalo!

Zebra's! There is a nice herd of Zebras on the property. These guys share a very large paddock with the giraffes and some ostriches

There are a large number of primates at the facility. Most of these guys live on islands so that they can be as free as possible without fear of them getting out of the park

Penguins! These guys have their very own enclosure to swim and play in.

Mama and baby Kangaroo that ran right in front of us to get a drink. Many of the loose animals have keepers that follow them around so that no one bothers them while they're out and about. That is one thing that I was a bit sad about. I thought I would be able to pet them, but the keepers ask that you keep your distance and just let the animals do their thing.

The lemurs are EVERYWHERE. This guy was so funny! He came sauntering over really close to me and then decided he needed to take a seat and rest for a while. He was so pensive!

Giraffes! I have never seen so many giraffes in one spot. They have a nice herd with a few babies!

KINSALE BOAT TOUR:
Kinsale is a great town on the southern coast of Ireland. It is considered the culinary capital of Ireland and has lots of interesting attractions and some serious history. Since we didn't have a lot of time we decided to take a cruise around the harbor and catch as much as we could. We ate dinner at Dino's Fish and Chips, which was lovely. Although Sarah LOVES chips, she's not a big fan of fish so she got Chicken Maryland (pronounced Mary-land, not Mare-ah-lin as I do in the US) which came out with a big rasher of bacon on it. Many of the non-seafood options come with random pieces of pork attached to them. I am personally a big fan of this, but it still surprises me on occasionally.

The salty dog! Kidding, this is a adorable lab that is owned by the boat captain. He kept me entertained during the trip. Again, best places seem to involve dogs over here! I love it!

Looking out to James' fort.

One view of Kinsale on our way out

Better view of adorable Kinsale

James' fort.

Around the harbor

 I'd say this was a very successful trip which would not have been possible without Denis Barret (our guide/realtor), Andrew Cromie (our future ICBF boss), and Sarah for helping me find our home.