Three planeloads of Irish holiday-makers returned to Dublin airport from Turkey yesterday and spoke of their horror at what had happened in Kusadasi.
Some vowed never to go back. Others were defiant in the face of what they felt was their close encounter with terrorism. Others still were critical of how the situation was handled by their hoteliers and travel company.
"There was a total news blackout," said John Duffy from Co Wicklow. "They turned the news off on the televisions in the rooms, and there was total chaos. It was very distressing." He added that the Irish girl, Tara Whelan, who died in the bomb attack was in the same group that went out to Kusadasi.
Jane Dunphy from Ballyfermot in Dublin said she was sitting in front of Ms Whelan during the outward plane journey and would normally have been on the bus at around the time in the morning that the bomb went off.
"It was just by chance that we weren't on the bus that morning," said Ms Dunphy. "We were having a lie-in because it was our last day. One [ Irish] man I was talking to had just got off the bus to go into a barbers just before the bomb went off ... It's very, very sad," she said.
"We heard the bang. It wasn't very far away - just a few minutes from the hotel, on the Dolmus [ local public minibus]," said Orla Kelly from Newbridge, Co Kildare. "We would never go back there again. It was very frightening," she said.
"There was no information coming through to us," said Ian Donnelly from Kildare town. "They wouldn't even turn on the news for us. They didn't seem to care about us at all, the holiday reps, the hotel. There was no organisation as far as I could see . . . It's not their fault, I suppose, they just wanted to keep people calm," he said.
"We used that bus all the time to go into town. It could have been any of us that was killed," said Mr Donnelly.
Not everyone was critical of how they were treated once the bomb had gone off, however.
"Everything was very well-organised, I thought," said Kathleen Patchell from Ballyfermot. "They blocked the news channel so as not to cause panic."
"We had a great holiday and I would definitely go back again," said Mrs Patchell's husband, Joe. "It doesn't really bother us. When the bombers were in Belfast, we still went to Belfast. It won't stop us going back. I'd recommend Turkey for a holiday, big time."
Serkan Erke, originally from Istanbul but now living in Dublin, had been on holiday in Kusadasi and feels tourism in Turkey is now under threat.
"This sort of thing happens all over the world. It happened in London last week, it happens in Spain all the time and people still go there . . . What happened in Turkey will probably affect tourism for the worse. People are already cancelling their holidays," said Mr Erke.
Olive Collins, from Thurles, Co Tipperary, said she would go back but not until the situation calmed down.
"I would not like to be going there this week. Last night there was talk that maybe there could be more bombs in that region. People were very upset and nervous about staying there another week," she said.