Irish beachy wild women

Happy Friday! The weekend is just around the corner! Are you taking time to check-in with yourself and give yourself the care, love, and attention you need? If not, it’s perfectly okay to set aside time for yourself to do whatever you want/need to do during ‘me time.’ Maybe your thing is yoga, meditation, running, paddle boarding, reading, tending to a pallet garden you built, sewing some pillowcases for your home decor, making a dress to match your homemade mask, paddle boarding, refurbishing furniture, or even playing animal crossing with family and friends, but whatever you want to do during your assigned ‘me time,’ make sure you’re doing it and giving yourself a break.

If you didn’t get a chance to read yesterday’s post - “maxim and Belfast Chinese food” - you can click here to read about craving something other than Irish food and following through on those cravings at Red Panda in Belfast, Northern Ireland. I also posted a video in yesterday’s blog about my Maxim Cover Girl journey, which might be of interest to you, as well! Otherwise, let’s buckle back in and continue our adventures!

Before we made our journey together to see Shane Lowry win The 148th Open Championship, we spent some time going through some of the highlights of a road trip I did around Ireland with some of my best college girlfriends from Villanova. I posted about our time at the Blasket Island Centre in Dingle, and there’s another awesome memory from that trip I just have to share.

As I’ve posted before, we have been known to spontaneously drive off-road to the nearest beach, and doing so in Dingle was no exception. Since we had the upgraded BMW SUV courtesy of our car rental spot in Dublin, we decided we were going to drive that puppy right out onto the sand.

From there, the three of us essentially went through some stages of grief. We denied what we were about to do, we bargained with some greater power about having tolerable and favorable conditions, and we finally assigned some roles and accepted our fates. My one friend assumed camera duties as the other two of us ran like wild women across the sandy beach and into the ocean.

It was early June in Ireland, and the water was freezing -- okay, maybe it wasn’t literally 32 degrees (or 0 degrees for my Irish friends), but boy was it chilly. I stopped when I made it in just above my knees while my other mermaid friend charged headfirst, diving into the waves in front of her. I then (with a little help from my friends *cue the Beatles* - and my wonderful delaying skills of 'look over there' and 'isn't the scenery beautiful') followed suit and plopped under, as well. As soon as I made it under the waves, I immediately popped back up. My form was not unlike that of a duck bobbing in and out of the sea or that of a jack-in-the-box springing back up in surprise. The two of us in the water enjoyed and embraced the moment and then immediately ran back to the car for some much-needed warming up (giggling all along the way).

Isn’t that what makes close friendships great - the crazy stuff you do together when no one else is around or watching? We were just a few wild women storming the beach and crashing into the Irish waves. Do you have any similar stories from your travels - or even just a crazy story shared among you and your close friends?Let me know! Subscribe in the e-mail submission box below and reach out, follow me on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, and reach out to me on the “contact” page. I’m so happy you're here and that I’ve been receiving a lot of really incredible stories, questions, and feedback from a community all over the globe! Other people’s stories that I’ve gotten to read via e-mail, text, tweet, DM, etc. recently bring me such smiles, and I am so grateful for all of it! I hope I get to hear all about whatever stories you’ve been thinking about as we’ve been on this virtual journey together! Also, I've said it before and I'll say it again, if you have any restaurants/eateries/pubs/coffee shops/ice cream joints/theatres/lookout spots you would recommend in other countries or even in your current home town or city, I'm absolutely 100% all ears!! I couldn’t do this without you! So THANK YOU! From the bottom of my heart, truly, thank you.

Sincerely,

Johny

P.S. - If you want to catch up from the beginning on this series of travel adventures, here's a cheat sheet to the posts (in order in which they were published):