When I turned the corner into Doolin harbor, the ocean was turning itself over and over, the crashes consistent, each one just as strong as the last. My teenage son and co-pilot gasped. The sound of the waves crashing echoed along the pier. The waves, unrelenting, made it difficult for the crew to steady the small vessel to get everyone aboard. The previous day, from atop the Cliffs of Moher, the water had looked like glass, the tour boats gliding along the cliffs.
Seasickness strikes me in the most innocuous of places, like the giant swings at a carnival, the back seat of a car, and every flight, unless I take Dramamine. I grabbed for motion sickness pills. You’re supposed to take them 30-60 minutes before the activity, I was cutting it close. Given how the water had looked the day before, it never crossed my mind that seasickness would be an issue.
The crew announced adverse weather and told us to expect rough seas, the least surprising announcement. They weren’t cancelling the trip, so I wondered how bad it could be. Before we undocked, I started to feel dizzy, sweaty, clammy, my mouth watering.
The crew looked hurried, walking up and down the aisles as people took their seats. I was unsure if they were assessing who was on board or making sure everyone was seated before we pushed off from the dock. Their intensity gave me pause.
The sensations and signals my body was giving me could no longer be ignored. My temperature was rising. I wanted to open a window for fresh air. There was no circulation, the air was humid and stagnant. The dizziness was growing worse. The crew had started handing out seasickness bags. The quintessential barf bag that I am too familiar with. I raised my hand. I wanted, no, I needed to have one.
Once the boat left the pier, one particular crew member was pointing at people, and if they indicated they felt sick, he walked them outside. As if he knew what was going to happen and didn’t want the cleanup job.
Becoming vocal about my illness. I remember repeatedly saying “I don’t like this.” My kids’ faces were worried. A lady sitting in the row ahead of me told me to focus on the horizon. It didn’t work for me, it actually made it worse. The crew looked at me and asked if I was alright. I said no, I was not. He took me outside and I sat on the deck of the ship. The fresh air instantly helped, but it was short lived. My temperature was no longer rising by the minute, but I was still so dizzy and nauseous.
I closed my eyes. There were about a dozen of us out there, all clinging to the deck. I began to get sick. How much longer was this boat going to take?
At one point, the crew came over to me. “What did you drink last night, did you have a Guinness?” No, I replied. I had not had a Guinness last night. “That’s your problem, you would have been better off.” Spoken in the most authentic Irish accent. I couldn’t help but muster up a little chuckle and think to myself, I would have been in worse shape if I had a Guinness last night.
Finally, after what felt like days, we were about to dock on the smallest of the Aran Islands, Inis Oírr. My seasickness subsided as quickly as it came on. Once I disembarked, I was no longer nauseous. I did feel a little unsteady on my feet. Perhaps it was the sea legs.
I waited ashore for my kids to join me. We were ready to explore the island. Visitors are not allowed private cars on the island. The choices for transportation were walking, biking, or a horse-drawn carriage, I decided we would walk. My kids, teenagers, were less than pleased with that decision. The island was tiny, roughly 1.2 square miles, we should have enough time to walk the island to visit the points of interest.
The first thing we wanted to see was the Plassey shipwreck. A large rusted shipwreck turned tourist attraction. The ship wrecked in the 1960s and washed ashore after a second storm. It was carrying a cargo of whiskey and a few other goods. Now visitors come to the island to get a glimpse for themselves.
Inis Oírr had colors of green from moss to jade, complementing the grey stone walls. The idyllic landscape guidebooks try to showcase. Walking through the Irish countryside is the only way to understand the true beauty. This was a day trip, so we had only a few hours to see the island. We marched through the roads. The stones were stacked on top of one another, each looking a little jostled, with tiny holes letting light beam through, leaving me to wonder how this method of stacking held up over time. Yet, they held up fine and kept the sheep and cows where they belonged, on the other side, in their hills of green.
When the ship came into sight, from this distance, it looked small, cracked in half, resting among the rocks, the Cliffs of Moher a striking backdrop. Closer, the ship’s size came into focus. Large, rusted, crumbling in spots, The Plassey towered over us, it caught me off guard. The rocks were more like boulders we had to gingerly traverse to not break an ankle. The perspective in size of the ship and these boulders made me feel like a grain of sand at the beach. The wind was strong as we made our way around the ship. Some tourists were brave enough to go inside. I wasn’t. We peered in and skirted the entire ship.
Plassey Shipwreck, Inisheer, Aran Islands
The weather had shifted. The wind was fiercer than before, and rain was expected soon. We finished our time at the shipwreck and headed for the lighthouse.
At first a few drops of rain fell, I held out hope it would be light. Realizing the rain would not let up, we decided to walk back to the port. We would not make it to the far northwest end of the island.
The rain was pouring, cold and sideways. My kids were less than happy, they wanted a more leisurely vacation, not this walk and hike every day, exposed to all the elements. They hadn’t yet learned that I was a traveler, not a vacationer. We finally made it to the port. A bike rental shop was open and let several of us take cover.
Across from the building we were sheltering in was a crepe stand. The kids and I ran over to get some crepes, Nutella crepes. Running through the rain back to our slice of shelter, we inhaled them. After a morning of walking, and just one quick stop to eat some light snacks we’d brought with us, we were all hungry. Soaked from head to toe, standing there waiting for our return boat, I could not think of anywhere else I wanted to be.