Brown Eyes in Texas: Musings about Ireland

Friday, November 5, 2010

Musings about Ireland - Roads

The roads... well I like the North American roads better! But these have character. Unless you are on the 4 lane motorway, the roads are hurting.  And narrow. Most rural roads are only fit for 1 car, but are considered a 2 lane road.
People park where ever, even if it now blocks a lane of traffic, you just drive around when you can!
Bridges tend to be one lane when not in the city.
Roundabouts seem to be preferred over traffic lights.  Galway is a city of roundabouts. It's especially fun when there are super big roundabouts with traffics lights in them! I think we can say we concurred the roundabouts, they even became fun! Keeps you alert.
No texting or talking on a mobile while driving. On the main roads, they have a side lane to pull over if you get a call. I loved this. Cause really, how attentive are we when texting and driving? Not very. And with the roads there that are windy and narrow, it's just plain not safe!
The roads are bumpy and windy! I know it has to do with economy, not able to fix the roads, but even the roads that get fixed, the big tour buses come along in drooves and you get a bumpy new road!
The boys threw up a few times!  We soon becamed prepared in the car with bags and paper towels just in case! The boys became very careful to not look down when driving now, it was cute :) but I think that was one of the main reasons why Mason wanted to go back to Texas!  We definately do not eat while moving in the car!
Very common to share the road with a tractor, be it a rural road or motorway. We don't get to see this much living in the city so the boys thought that was great!
I wish we got a picture of one sign. It said "temporary dip ahead" but it was a permanent style sign! So temporary may mean quite a few years!
On the topic of roads, the absense of trucks hit us at first! I think we saw 5 trucks total that have a "nose"! Like our typical trucks. They have flat nosed ones out on farms, but otherwise it's cars, SUV's and people movers (vans).
I guess the last big thing about the roads is the side they drive on!! We did ok, it was just in parking lots that I had the biggest problem remembering!