An American found love at an Irish matchmaking festival - and hopes others do too

"It was very serendipitous" - Mary and Jason on finding love in Ireland

Mary Timby was fed up with dating apps when she booked a trip to Ireland on a whim last summer - from the comfort of her Colorado couch.

The spur-of-the-moment trip was unlike her: Timby, 39, is a self-described "total planner".

But she'd always wanted to visit Ireland, and she found herself exhausted by the local dating scene while navigating a career transition. And then she remembered a few throwaway lines from a comedy series about a matchmaking festival in Ireland.

So she looked it up - and not only was the Lisdoonvarna Matchmaking Festival real, it was also taking place during the entire month of September, when she was scheduled to visit.

Now, a little more than a year later, Timby is reaping the benefits of that uncharacteristic last-minute decision: She's become a viral star. She's found love with an Irishman she met at a pub called The Matchmaker. And she's even started a new business venture - bringing others to Lisdoonvarna who hope to follow in her footsteps.

Timby and Jason Mangan, 38, from County Clare, Ireland, are pursuing a transatlantic romance

"It's really about enjoying County Clare, enjoying the festival, and, if you meet someone, you do - and that's what happened with us," says Timby, smiling at her partner, Jason Mangan, sitting beside her.

They're speaking from the windswept coastal cottage they rented together for the summer in his native County Clare - about 20 miles (32 km) southwest of Lisdoonvarna, the site of their first fortuitous meeting.

'Mary, your video is going viral'

From the outset, Timby's inaugural Ireland trip seemed to take on a life of its own.

She filmed a short video on the plane before her flight took off, telling her approximately 300 TikTok followers that she was heading on an off-the-cuff trip to an Irish matchmaking festival - and didn't "know what's going to happen".

Timby then "turned my phone on airplane mode, then spent about eight hours on the flight (and) woke up at Shannon Airport," she says.

When she turned on her phone, "it was blowing up".

A group of friends had texted her. "They said, 'Mary, your video is going viral,'" she says. "I didn't even have notifications on for social media."

She rented a manual transmission car - horrified to find the gear stick on the left side of the driver's seat - and set off through County Clare to her accommodation at an Irish family's home.

Then she headed to Lisdoonvarna, where she saw firsthand that the festival is a whole-town, month-long celebration of conversation and dancing, rather than a line of singles waiting to be set up by a sage local matchmaker.

Colorado woman Mary Timby, 39, visited Ireland's Aran Islands with her new beau

That's changed since the festival's origins 170 years ago, when bachelor farmers and moneyed visitors would flock to the spa town of Lisdoonvarna to bathe in its mineral-rich waters and socialise. Generations of matchmakers would ply their trade to set up successful marriages, and word spread. Now, while the town's year-round residents number fewer than 1,000, up to 80,000 visitors descend upon Lisdoonvarna from around the world each September.

Third-generation matchmaker Willie Daly still holds court at his nearby home and at festival events, and Timby even visited him during her trip - when he put her on the phone to random men whose accents she struggled to understand.

But the real magic of contemporary Lisdoonvarna lies in the town's overflowing streets and pubs - as Timby soon found out.

Her first night in town was "a little slow," she admits - and Timby was tired and jet-lagged. She retired to her room and spent the next day sightseeing, but the Irish woman running her accommodation convinced her to try Lisdoonvarna again that night.

"My AirBnB host said, 'You should go back tonight, because I heard that the younger folks come out at night,'" laughs Timby.

So she did - and found herself dancing and drinking pints at The Matchmaker Bar in the centre of town. That's when a "handsome Irishman" approached her.

'Conversation just flowed'

"I went over and introduced myself, and... conversation just flowed," says Mangan, 38, from Ennis, County Clare, about 22 miles southeast of Lisdoonvarna. He'd been to the festival before and was well-acquainted with its cultural significance, remembering his grandparents making the journey decades earlier for the dancing.