16th to 17th of May, 2017
The roads in North Ireland and Ireland can be real tricky. Even that people are very nice and always stop for you, be careful about where you are going to try hitchhiking. I went out of town by the road in direction of Derry, passing through the airport and I ended up in a motorway again. The police came again! They were not pretty nice this time. They did not arrest me but the only solution they gave to me, it was drive me to the airport where I could take a bus to Derry. I do not remember how and if I argued with them about the money problem. I should! If it was nowadays I would ask for a better solution because I would affirm do not have the money for the bus. But at that time I just took the bus. Which the timetable, by the way, it is horrible! Just two buses per day going to Derry: one in the morning and another near to seven o’clock in the night! I had to wait a couple of hours until the next one and the whole travel would take around six hours.
I planed spend the night in the Hostel where Georgina was doing Workaway because then I could see her. Could I have just passed to say ‘hi’ maybe, find a place to make camping and come back next day to leave my stuff while I went to see the town? Maybe. But you see, buy that time I was still not concerned to much about money. So dumb…
The receptionist from the Hostel was such a nice guy also (it might to be a rule in North Ireland and Ireland) and told me everything I need to know. When I first saw Georgina again we both screamed of happiness! It was so nice! I bought some very good rice in a Chinese restaurant nearby for £7 and I could even keep half for my lunch next day. I went to sleep after we talked for a while.
Derry is a beautiful and cute city. I regret now had not spent one more day over there. Walking around it makes you really feel the history of the town and everything fits when you start to visit the monuments and pass through the beautiful and huge street paintings in honor of the Bloody Sunday. There is also the Museum of Free Derry to tell what happened but since you have to pay I decided not going to. There were some people with guides, which I never get by the way, for me you can just read the story before and then you go by your own. St Eugene’s Cathedral is very beautiful and there are a lot of beautiful old buildings around, of course. Do not miss walking inside of the old wall fort and take a look of all the amazing views of town and the landscape you can get from different points of there. There is also The Guildhall, incredible beautiful from outside, with a “water show” in front, and very charming from inside. You can pay to visit the exhibition but I decided do not. Maybe one last thing to do is walking all the way of the Foyle river and do not miss the Peace Bridge, of course.
I came back to the Hostel to have my lunch and leave the town. I would finally started my adventure, hiking by myself, around the plantations and landscape, looking for a place to make camping, maybe near to a mountain and watching the starry sky before going to sleep. I was so excited and the other girls travelers from the Hostel were too.
Sometimes you learn not in a very good way that the movies that you love so much and make you dream about doing the same thing are quite far from the reality. At least my reality. You see, I have this huge plan of travelling for ten years, right? But I have such little money so I cannot simply get rid of my winter clothes when I am travelling in hot places or vice-versa because I have to keep everything that I can with me, as much as I can. And at the end is not even a meter of clothes because they do not weight to much. Is all about the tent, the computer and the camera. So my bag is so heavy that I cannot actually enjoy a hiking or walk for a long time. I got huge blisters in my heels, not because of the boots but because of the weight I have been carrying.
After walking for a couple of hours, sometimes in such big hills (you definitely should check the altitude of the places you are planing to go once you use Google Maps, OK?), I already had crossed from North Ireland to Ireland and almost died, I totally could not find a “good” place to make my camping. There were plenty of good places, now I see. But back at that time I was afraid and concerned about the fences and farms. When I finally decided take my chances, it was in a small forest beside a farm house and crossing a plantation. I made my first camping, unfortunately very worried that someone would find me and get mad. I cooked, I ate and I try to sleep. In your first camping alone, especially in a forest, you discovery a lot about fear and about how much you can handle. There are so many noises in a forest at night that you can not even imagine. And you will never know what all of them really were, so that is just with your imagination. To someone who passed three years sleeping with a night light, a night like that changes everything.
I wish I could just walk and walk and walk, all alone, crossing the landscapes, enjoying the view, sitting down to take some rest, stopping to eat time by time and make camping at the end of the day without no big concerns. Unfortunately it could not be like that. I learned that I would have to adapt my plans to my reality as much as I wanted to keep travelling. It was not that bad after all and I had some good moments of learning and overcoming. I was already a more positive person, really happy for doing what I was doing. Travelling alone, crossing the countries without no big perspectives apart of my wishes, do not worrying enough about something, to gave up even when I got very scary. I was being very brave and I was pride of myself.
I walked to the next small town, where I could prepare my coffee and eat some biscuits under a tree. Next thing to do would try to hitchhiking to Donegal Town.
