This was by far the best program I could have chosen to participate in. Though beginning in the midst of a pandemic, the experience I had I would trade for no other - between surfing near daily, spending nights having wild fun with people my own age and taking some of the hardest hikes I've ever been on, there's nothing that could compare.
Being stuck in level 5 had little bearing on my enjoyment of my time here, as the leaders successfully created an itinerary that kept us all engaged for the whole time. We had input on the schedule too, and though it was difficult to coordinate making what we wanted to happen under level 5, we were successful enough. Some highlights included near daily walks, hikes, and leadership workshops, and occasional kayaking, swimming, cliff jumping, and biking outings, not to mention all of the memories that were created with the people I met.
However, this is not the place for people looking for a seriously outdoors experience. While having a home base of sorts in Bundrowes was nice, it meant that we were living in Ireland as students with outdoors education experiences as opposed to students on an outdoors based program. It is a comfortable and loosely planned experience with room for feedback, your own activities and relationships to grow.
What was your funniest moment?
Near the end of the program, we were supposed to create a short speech to express out loud to the other students how we had changed, what caused it, and how it would affect us going forward. In my mind, it was a fairly easy task. As a proficient public speaker, I can enjoy it when prepared, but even when I'm not I can improvise effectively. What I didn't expect was that this group of students and leaders would have created such an environment that brought out the honesty that it did. Suddenly I was having real trouble continuing, and if I had been the type to cry I would have. I would also like to answer another from the list of questions provided, about what advice I would give. My advice would be: be self sufficient. While living in a house with peers, even if you're used to cleaning your own mess and taking care of yourself, you will have to take on other people's messes too. From physical mess to emotional mess to timing mess, being able to keep your schedule and mind organized will help tremendously, and even if you can't do it perfectly, just making an effort will help. As someone who struggles with food security, my biggest struggle was timing my meals and making sure I had everything I needed to create my food - I had to do a lot of my own shopping.
