About a year ago, after a weekend in Dublin, I confessed my secret crush on Ireland to all of you. I promised myself I would get back there, only this time, I'd get out of Dublin and into the countryside. I was armed with the names of towns I had pictured in my mind during a book group read of Colm Toibin's Nora Webster: Enniscorthy, Bunclody, Ballyconnigar, Curracloe. Truth be told, most of the book group members didn't like the book at all. I loved it. To me, it was pure Ireland: the family drama and trauma, the melancholy draped over every moment, the beautiful writing. And those place names.

But what's behind my fascination with this small country? I'm not even sure. It has just always been my thing. Or, as the Isley Brothers sing so perfectly below, it's my thang. And how different could it be from the small country I'm currently living in? Very different, I'd say. Let's take a look at some of the reasons for the crush and the ways I count in which Ireland is a different kind of place from the Netherlands.

We can start with color. The greens of Ireland, especially in the spring, are like the varied green shades in the big Crayola Crayon box. The country's nickname, The Emerald Island, is well-deserved, but doesn't begin to do justice to what you actually see when you are there. It's not as if the Netherlands isn't green, but because it's so flat, you don't get the rolling hills and valleys that hold the shade or reflect the sun. Those hills make for the family of greens you see from the window of the train, or - if you aren't closing your eyes to ward off panic (more on that later) - from the car windows.

After the green, you can't help but notice the gift of gab. Again, this is another familiar stereotype about the Irish, but it's one that rang (and rang and rang) true on our trip. We didn't make it to the Blarney Stone, but legend has it that if you kiss the Blarney Stone - as so many tourists line up to do - you will acquire the gift of gab. This gift is not easily bestowed on you. First you have to walk up to the top of the castle. Then you have to lay down and lean your head backwards, gripping onto an iron bar, and kiss the stone while your head hangs upside down. When my parents went to Ireland many years ago, my mother, despite her propensity to get dizzy, insisted on kissing the stone. If there is a person in the world who didn't need that stone in order to gab, it's my mom. But the story reminds me of her indomitable travel spirit, in which she channels her adventuresome, fearless inner-doppelgänger as soon as she hits a different country. We are still listening to the effects of that gift all these years later.

Back to Ireland. The gift of gab greeted us on the first leg of the journey, a train ride from Dublin to Galway. I now know everything about the woman across the aisle from us and then some: everything from her battles with high blood pressure, to her favorite flavor of yogurt (vanilla). She was full of advice - all of it unsolicited, of course - and frequent explanations about Ireland and the Irish. As the train cut through the green hills, she explained how the yellow bushes we saw everywhere served as natural fences between fields and were "pie-zin" for the cows. After a few requests for her to repeat this insight, we realized she was saying "poison". I knew when it came time to write this blog, I would have to confirm her facts. It turns out that the bush is called furze, and it's definitely not poison. It can be used in salads, and to make tea. In fairness to our train companion, you (or your cow friends) can find yourselves in intestinal trouble if you overeat it. Maybe that's what she meant. But this fact-checking called into question every piece of long-winded advice we got on the trip. It did occur to me: the long Irish tales might just be for the benefit of the gullible Americans, who come expecting the gift of gab, and that's exactly what we get. Who said anything about accuracy? Honestly, this fits squarely with my definition of a story. If you have to bend the truth a little to tell a good story, where's the harm in that?

Throughout the trip, these words from the musical Hamilton kept coming back to me, "While we're talking, let me offer you some free advice: Talk less. Smile more." -from the song Aaron Burr, Sir.

At the fabulous Black Pig restaurant in the lovely seaside town of Kinsale, Peter chatted up our servers about the wine. When in Ireland....

I've written before about the difficulty of maintaining expat friendships once someone flies the coop (returns to the motherland). So when our former Amsterdam (now Boston) friends Deb and Marc suggested we meet them in Ireland, we knew we had to say yes. "Whenever you call me, I'll be there" has to be the motto, or your once-solid expat friendships will quickly melt away. I was re-introduced to this song during a recent flight back to the U.S. If you haven't already, see the film Roman J. Israel, Esq. It's memorable mostly for the soundtrack, but also for the chance to watch Denzel Washington disappear into the character. Getting to watch a lot of movies is the silver lining to the cloud of an expat's endless long flights across the oceans.

Our first stop after the gab-infused train ride from Dublin was Galway, a charming small city on the West coast of Ireland. We just missed the English singer Ed Sheeran's swing through town, which from the looks of things was a very big deal. Did he bring Saorise Ronan up on stage with him during the concert? Now that would have made it worth staying up past my bedtime for.

The winds in Galway reminded me of the Netherlands. I was afraid Deb would be picked up and thrown out to sea at one point.

As you may have noticed by now, I like to pick out my apartment wherever we go. I liked this restored stone building along the River Corrib, which also rushed right outside our hotel window. It was loud, but beautiful.

From Galway, we took a bus and then a ferry out to the Aran Islands. After all, when Rick Steves tells you to do something, and you're American, you obey. The long and fairly choppy haul out there all became worth it when we first heard and then saw the waves crashing through the rocks on the island of Inishmore. If you like sheep and cows, and green, of course, you will also love this outing. The islands are more than 350 million years old and are known for their Christian and Celtic monuments. We hiked out to the Black Fort (Dún Dúchathair) named for the black rocks you see, and practically had the place to ourselves. Luckily, the army of middle-school-aged boys on the ferry - who seemed to be accompanied by a single tired-looking young teacher ready to toss them overboard - did not choose this area to explore. Regrettably, we left the island without visiting one of the local cafes and tasting a slice of the Guinness chocolate cake. It came highly recommended by our friend Danielle. When you travel as an expat, you come armed with many, many recommendations from friends who have just been where you find yourself. You can't possibly follow-up on all their leads and still have time to find some on your own. First-world problems.

Photo credit to Peter. His lack of fear when it came to getting close to the edge for this shot paid off.

Many thanks to all of the Irish cows for all of the delicious butter we were served.

And many thanks to all of the Irish sheep for the sweaters we all bought to remind us of the trip and to stay warm.

One thing about traveling with friends is you do things you wouldn't ordinarily do. And that's good. So when Deb suggested we rent a car, something we usually don't do on our trips, we said yes. And then came the time for driving. It was pouring and foggy when Peter and Marc ventured out to pick up the car. When the rental car guy in Ireland tells you he wouldn't dare drive to the Cliffs of Moher in that weather, you listen. Or we did. Which brings me to another important thing about traveling. You always have to have a Plan B. We decided to skip the coastline drive and head inland to our next stop. Time to get this party started on the wrong side of the road and drive. Here's Shirley Bassey making this pop hit into a Bond-like anthem.

When your driver looks down at the dashboard as if it’s a foreign language he’s unfamiliar with, you worry just a little.

But Marc was soon a pro, and knew to stop frequently both so we could get out and enjoy the green, and also so our heart rates could return to normal.

Nothing like a little laughter during my immature photo-bombing escapades to make the drive more relaxing.

In our American-centric way, we tend to wonder why the Brits insist on driving on the "wrong" side of the road. Of course, the real question is why we came up with a different system after breaking away from them. It seems this left side of the road idea actually makes some sense. Apparently, it started hundreds of years ago, way before the invention of cars. Knights needed to have their dominate hand free to swing their swords at oncoming attackers. Because the majority of people are right-handed, they "rode" on the left, leaving their right hand free to maim and kill. It seems things changed when Americans became the kings of car manufacturing and we made cars the "right" way. It's a wonder they agree to rent cars to Americans when we come to visit their neck of the woods.

Another nice thing about traveling in Ireland is you don't feel pressured to see this or that. We ambled along the narrow roads and decided to stop for lunch in a town called Ballylanders. It was the only restaurant in town. We felt like locals, until the folks next to us opened their mouths and we heard their Texan accents loud and clear.

I love all the church towers or small castles that dot the towns. This one was no longer in use, except as a photo opportunity after lunch.

Next stop: Kinsale. We were attracted by it's reputation as the food capital of Ireland, but we didn't know it would be beautiful, too. For those of you who think Irish food is a lot of potatoes and fried fish, you need to visit Kinsale. We ate like kings there. The town used to be an important shipping port, but that ship has long ago sailed. A few decades ago, the town reinvented itself as a food destination, with restaurants cooperating with each other by planning different vacation schedules and sharing advice. It seems good food has popped up all over Ireland these days, with other towns now proclaiming themselves "The Foodie Capital" of Ireland. I loved the stone boards with food-related quotes outside some of the restaurants in Kinsale. And at Poet's Corner, combining two of the loves of my life (books and coffee) there was this: "Food is meant to be read, books are meant to be eaten." Wise words, indeed.

O.K. I know I agreed books are meant to be eaten, but this dessert at Kai Cafe and Restaurant in Galway - where the head chef just earned the best chef in Ireland award - was pretty as a picture and just as delish. This was just one of the masterpieces we were treated to during our visit to Ireland.

The bright-verging-on-garish colors that greeted us on the houses in Ireland were a surprise. Maybe it's their way of cheering things up during those drab grey days, of which there are no doubt many in Ireland. In the Netherlands, you rarely see this kind of color splash on houses. The colors in Kinsale were especially cheerful. We had great weather there, but I imagine in the winter, this eye candy is a really welcome sight.

There was a vintage car show in town, so there was even more color than usual in the Kinsale hood.

Just as stunning as the food and colors was the friendly, gracious service we found everywhere we ate. It wasn't just the gift of gab in the restaurants which seemed so very different from the Netherlands, although there were quite a lot of words served along with the delicious food. There was laughter at our humor, and plenty of funny banter sent right back at us throughout the evenings. The most outstanding example of the intersection of service, food, and sheer number of words you are greeted with in Ireland came when we stopped for ice cream in Kilkenny. At Murphy's Ice Cream, a few minutes before closing time, I thought the young man in charge might hustle us out and say we were too late to order. Instead, he plied us with samples of 3 or 4 varieties, chatting nonstop all the while. I think he would have continued along that route had we not ordered some Dingle Sea Salt and Irish Coffee and interrupted the flow of free samples. I know many people talk about the magic of Ireland (Celtic ruins etc.) but this was my idea of magic. Let's just say I have never experienced this type of friendly ice cream nirvana in the U.S. and certainly not in Amsterdam.

You can't write about Ireland without touching on the role of pubs in the country. You might think the friendliness I've just written about has something to do with the social lubrication caused by a few pints. On the other hand, would the local-ness of the pubs cause the Irish to ignore outsiders coming in to wreck their insider vibe? Since we were traveling with one of the world's foremost beerophiles (Marc), we had the chance to test these possibilities. In search of some authentic Irish music, we walked into a pub in Kinsale that looked about as local as they come. That was after we passed up the chance to hear a Billy Joel-wannabe delight the crowd at our hotel's bar. We poked our heads into the pub, feeling like Americans-out-of-water, mentally prepared to be ignored. Instead, we were greeted at the door by a man we first thought was a customer who had had a few pints too many. It turns out he was in charge of the place. He found an empty table for us and sent the waitress right over. Soon, we were pretending to sing along with the rest of the crowd. We were part of the family.

Marc is known for his frequent FB postings of the dark beer he adores. Here is a peek into the delicate behind-the-scenes work that goes into all those posts.

It wasn't all candy-colored houses and Guinness in Ireland during our visit. The upcoming vote to repeal (a "yes" vote) or keep (a "no" vote) the abortion amendment to their constitution was hard to ignore. There was something so jarring about seeing the pro and con posters everywhere we went. The further out of the cities of Dublin, Galway, and Kilkenny we got, the more frequent the often graphically disturbing anti-abortion posters seem to get. In an effort to support the repeal, many young people scattered around the world returned to Ireland to vote. They took to Twitter in droves to document their trip and spread the word about the need to vote. I guess they learned from the mistakes of Brexit.

Because I took so long to finish this post, the vote is now in. The Irish voted to end the ban on abortion. With a gay prime minister, and previous votes to allow same-sex marriage and divorce, Ireland showed it is not the same place it was even a decade ago. The rest of the world paid attention to this vote, and I probably would have followed it even without the recent trip. But having just been to a place makes news that much more meaningful. Knowing about the debate made me also realize Ireland isn't a perfect place for everyone, by any means. It's easy to romanticize a place when you are only there for a few days. It's quite another to live there. I know. So does everyone living in the U.S.

Now back to the politics of expat travel: I've written before about the joys and sorrows of traveling in groups, something expats seem to do more than the average traveler. One of the advantages of group travel is those little travel mishaps we all experience become fodder for ongoing laughs (rather than arguments) when you are with friends. So when a carry-on bag is almost left behind in Dublin, nearly causing one traveler to miss the train...laughter; when a raincoat is almost left behind in a hotel closet, nearly causing one traveler to experience the catastrophe of Ireland sans raincoat)...laughter; and when the hedges on the left side of road are all neatly clipped by the car as we hurl past and you see the scratches on the car to prove it...laughter. A couple traveling on their own would have come to blows over any one of those events. Instead, they quickly became the travel stories we often repeated and won't soon forget.

One nice side effect of group travel is you have someone to take a photo of the two of you every now and again. Some of my favorite greens from the trip, at Fort Charles in Kinsale. And my favorite traveling companion, of course.

And who better to share these travel stories with than ex-Amsterdammers? It's difficult work knowing how to maintain expat friendships. You used to spend a lot of time together. Now, what with the time difference, your time spent trying to stay in touch with family and U.S. friends, and your increasingly timid attempts at forging new friendships with expats, you have little time and energy left over for expats who have crossed over to the dark side, i.e. repatriated. Staying connected with re-pats requires a lot of emailing, messaging, and FBing to try to keep some semblance of a friendship patched together until you can see each other in person. We seem to have coopted the kind of screen contact with friends which our kids take for granted. The difficulty of keeping the expat friendship intact explains why so many of them fray after a short time. Traveling together gives you a lot of bang for your buck, and a chance to recreate the old days. You really hope those ex-expats are just the way they were. Or as the Irish Billy Joel at our hotel in Kinsale sang, "The same old someone that I knew." And Marc and Deb were. In a good way, of course. By the way, there's so much to love about this clip of Billy Joel, but my favorite is the hmhmhmhmhm humming. I just wish he had a towel with him up on stage.

The last stop on our Ireland trip was Kilkenny, because you have to see at least one castle while in Ireland, don't you? Kilkenny Castle - built by the Normans in the 12th century - is the main attraction in town, but it's also known for it's design center with lots of Irish-inspired crafts. We happened upon the town in the throes of some important rugby match on T.V., so there were a lot of drunk men stuffed into pubs, drinking and shouting. With all of them occupied inside, we had plenty of room on the streets, and time to stroll around and see the castle, enjoy the gorgeous grounds surrounding it, and take in all we could on our last night.

The type of hurling pictured here is an ancient Gaelic game which is still incredibly popular in Ireland. I’m sure there was some of the other sort after the rugby match ended, but by then we were safely tucked away in our hotel rooms.

This truly is the land of redheads. This little girl was celebrating something, I think. There were many more folks dressed up for church on Sunday morning than we see in seemingly god-forsaken Amsterdam.

The church is getting in on the coffee business, it seems. This sign was posted on the walls of the grand cathedral in Kilkenny. Maybe they realize they need something to lure the new generation into church these days.

After these few days in Ireland, I was already mentally preparing a return visit soon. The green really does do the trick for your soul. I love museums and must-see places as much as the next gal, but a trip to Ireland gives you the chance to leave that kind of travel behind. Instead, you wander and look and take your time getting from here to there. For example, with a few hours to spare before we had to get back to the airport in Dublin, we stopped in a village called Glendalough at the Wicklow Mountains National Park based only on the last minute say-so of the hotel receptionist; we were so glad we followed her advice. We were greeted by mountains (unexpected by me in Ireland) in lovely shades of green (of course). I've waited long enough, but it's time to include this song by Joni Mitchell. I was obsessed with her music when I was in my early teens and fancied myself a musician. Thanks to the wonders of the Internet, I now know the song's about the child Mitchell gave up for adoption when she was only 22.

In Wicklow Mountains National Park, Marc (bottom right corner) paid me back for my earlier immature photo-bombing.

Let's get back to the Irish writer Colm Tóibín before I say goodbye to Ireland. I mentioned him at the start of this post. He's just one of the Irish writers who instilled this love of Ireland in me. In response to a question about the "quiet" style of his novel Nora Webster he said the following: "It’s all to do with landscape. The Irish light, the weather and the slow seasons lend themselves to a quietness of style." So true. In Ireland, it is "all to do" with landscape. Everyone could use a little green, and a little quiet (in between the gab), now and again.

Maybe my love of the Irish started way before I could handle Irish literature. I yearned for this box on the supermarket shelves. Mom, did you have to insist on healthy cereal? I would have given anything for a bowl of this before school.

A toast to Ireland, to friends willing to travel with you, and, of course, to Irish butter. The best.

Photo credit to Peter. He really captured the magic of Ireland in this shot of Galway, didn't he?