Lettercraic with the OPC - Oct. 3rd-5th

“On the 28th of July 1914 the first world war began. On the 29th of May 1953 Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay first climbed Mount Everest. On the 20th of July 1969 man first landed on the moon. Then nothing happened for a while. Then in 1995 the OPC went to Letterfrack for the first time. 19 years later we are still going back and the Letterfrack weekend trip is one of the highlights in the OPC calendar.”

 This is how the weekend hiking trip to Letterfrack was introduced to us. Obviously, I had to go. The demand was insane and the crowd at the sign up was a mad house! Fortunately I convinced Hannah to come with me and we both got a spot.

“That weekend was amazing!!!” We met so many new people who are so fun to hang out with! Right from the beginning it was like we were all a close group of friends who have known each other for years… and there were about 50 people so that was cool. Everyone was so friendly and inviting! I loved it!

We stayed in the coolest hostel ever up on a little hill over the town of Letterfrack. The owner had the most random items decorating the building which made it so unique. There was a common room with a fire place with was probably my favorite part! There was such a homing feel to the place.

  

Saturday morning we all got up and went for our first of two hikes that weekend. I mentioned earlier how low the elevation is here and that it is nothing compared to living at 10,000 feet and going hiking there, well don’t let that fool you… the hike was actually quite tough, definitely more difficult than I expected! Even with that though, it was an amazing day and I will never forget it.

They told us to bring layers and waterproof everything because you never know what the weather will do, again an understatement. Literally every hour, we had a taste of all types of weather: hot and sunny, cold and rainy, monsoon rain and wind… you name it, we got it… except snow but the cold rain shooting at you was enough.

We all survived the hike and got to see some amazing views of Ireland over the Connemara National Park, all well worth it!

Saturday evening we all hung out at the hostel then went down into town to one of the pubs. It was a nice little pub with a couple people playing some Irish tunes. As the Irish say, it was a load of craic (fun)!

Sunday morning we went on another hike, much shorter than the day before, but after staying up until about three in the morning, I believe this one was more difficult than the first. This was another fun hike, again with all types of weather and WIND… oh my gosh was there wind!!! I could lean off the side of the mountain and not fall.

Here is a little video of the windiness we had fun in!