The Journey Day 2

September 4th, 2016 Dublin Ireland

The Cliffs of Moher

We woke up at 5:30 and were out the door by 6:00. We needed to grab coffee and a breakfast on our way to the meet up for our tour to the Cliffs of Moher. At 6 in the morning there aren't very many places that are open, but there was convenient store. We picked up coffee and pastries. The meet up point, had a statue in it, but I found out later that the statue is there temporarily because of road work.  We sometimes oriented our position when we came across the statue and spot in the following days.

We arrived about five minutes ahead of schedule. We followed the guide to the bus. We were split into at least two groups. I think there was another tour with the same company that also goes to the cliffs, but we didn't see them at every stop, so they must take a different route.

Cliffs of Moher

Aswe headed out of the city the tour guide gave us some information on places we passed in the city, and a bit in the country, though he tried to let people rest until the first stop. The first stop was more of a comfort stop. It was at The Barack Obama Plaza. The guide explained that the plaza was named for Barack Obama because his ancestors came from the area. He also visited the area before. While there we decided to pick up donuts. Which meant we had two breakfasts! A thing that I noticed with donuts and pastries in the UK and Ireland is that the majority of the time they are served cold. Which is a bit surprising, but they still taste fresh, so I can't complain. 

Selfie from O'Brien's Tower, at the Cliffs

We arrived at the cliffs around 10. We walked up the path to the benches, the cliffs were so pretty. From the benches we walked to O'Brien tower. The view was even better from there! The Cliffs are such that there are hills and bumps. So we kept seeing areas of the cliff that we wanted to walk to. We would get to that area, and want to keep walking. Every spot had a great view and I could have walked them for much longer, but we eventually had to turn around. We even walked through the unofficial area. It wasn't completely barricaded so people were allowed to walk there, but there was no wall between you and the cliff face! It was also muddy in thar section, but the views were worth it. Beside the cliffs, there were cows and sheep in the field, which was interesting to see too. There are cows and sheep in Arizona, but these were Irish cows and Irish sheep and therefore special!

O'Brien,

After walking the cliffs we went to info Center which is build into the hill. There was interesting information about the cliffs there. How they formed, information on the caves that were near by, the animals that make a home of the cliffs, and families from the area. I saw a name that I recognized, so I took pictures of the shield. I don't knoe what county the O'Brien come from. I know Thomas Fitzpatrick and Bernard Fitzsimmons are supposed to have come from Clare County, but I didn't see shields for them at the center. A little more on family history we did drive through Port Laoise, Laois County, which isn't actually near the ocean at all, and is in fact one of the most landlocked counties in the country. This is because the counties that surround it do not board the ocean. I believe the tour guide said Port comes about because there are major rivers around it.

Stoney Outcrop

We lunched at in Doolin. There were a few choices, so we walked up the street to a little cafe. I had a delicious ham sandwich with sweet BBQ sauce, a brownie and a Galway beer. Kelsi had turkey and brie, sea salt and Irish vinegar crisps (chips) and a brownie. She also bought some popcorn that was marshmallow flavored. Which she saved for an afternoon snake. I think she liked her sandwich and the crisps, but she said the popcorn wasn't good. 

After lunch we drove to the Stoney Outcrop. This was created when the area was a seabed, it was revealed during the carnivorous period. Such an interesting features. It's very hard to describe, so I will just post some pictures!

Plaque

Then we drove to an old Abbey called St. Maria's. It houses the bones of residence in the area from the distant past until the present. Since I love family histories, I appreciate places like this. I took a picture of a plaque that said the Abbey was founded in 1182 CE. Ascribed to Donnel Mor O'Brien and that his grandson was one of the people buried there. As I don't know much about the O'Brien's in my family, especially outside of the United States. I'm just going cross my fingers and think that perhaps they came from Clare Co. I looked at so many headstones, but most of them were too new or too old to be ancestors of mine. 

Abbey!

Once the Abbey was finished we stopped in a small seaside town for a pint or shopping. I picked the pint, but only a little one. We sat at the window facing the ocean which was great view! It was also fun to watch the people inside the bar.

That was the last stop of the trip. The rest of the ride was through the beautiful landscape of Ireland back to Dublin. I tried to catch some zzz, but the view was too pretty. Kelsi may have managed some. The bus played a film on the way back. It was called The Field. It was about a dispute over an area of land, and ended with a scene at the Cliffs of Moher. It wasn't a bad film, but I'm not sure I understand all of it. 

Upon returning we stopped by the room for a little bit. Then we went to The Brazen Head the oldest bar in Dublin and had a pint. The bar was kind of interesting, it had a bunch of different rooms on different levels and it was very crowded! The table we sat at was reserved, but the staff said it was reserved for later. I think we sat there until after the reserved time, but the group had not shown up. Perhaps they never did. 

Jameson's

We left because we wanted to go to a to dinner, the restaurant was recommended by our host, but it was closed! The restaurant was near the Jameson's Distillery. We found out earlier that Jameson's was closed until 2017. They are doing updates to it. Since it was closed we were not planning to visit, but because we were close to it, I had to get a picture! 

Then, we different bar, called McGillan's. It was a lounge. Which meant that there wasn't food, only drinks. Of course we had one! It helped us forgot our hunger, at least for a little while. 

In the end we went back to a pizza place that we had past. It was nearly closing, but they allowed us to take away. We took the pizza away, and it was probably the best pizza. Although, we were very hungry. 

The Journey Day 1

The Journey, Day 1 - Dublin, Ireland

Early morning after long night on plane. I managed to catch some zzz, but not enough! Cloudy, rainy, cool. Just like I pictured. Made it through customs and airport fine. Had to buy a leap card. Took bus to meet airbnb host. Arrived 50 minutes early and had to wait. A bit more waiting at airbnb before we could put our stuff down. Our airbnb apartment is right on the river at Usher's Quay. Our room doesn't face the river, but it has it's own bathroom!

The host, recommended that we eat at Wuff for brunch. We only managed to get a bit lost. There was a wait for a table, but it was worth it. Wuff is a cafe that is average sized. They fit in a lot of chairs and tables. It was packed tight. I had my first Irish breakfast!!! So yummy! I am not too sure about the pudding yet, but I will give it ago later. The baked beans tasted very sweet. I don't usually eat baked beans, so I'm not sure how sweet they should be, but I thought they were sweeter than normal. Overall it was a great breakfast!

Came back to room for a cat nap, I only allowed a one hour nap. A short nap can help with jet lag, but a long one will make it take longer to adjust. 

After that we walked down towards The Duke, because when I researched things to do in Dublin, the Dublin Literary Pub Crawl was listed. I was of course interested in both the literary history of Dublin and also the pubs. So doing a literary pub crawl seemed perfect. 

First Guinness in Ireland

We decided to take a little longer route in order to have a look at some sites. We passed St. Augustine church. We went inside. It has beautiful arches and stain glass windows. Loved it! Then, we kept walking passing Christ's Church and other sites, that we will visit on another day. 

After that we got a little turned around on Grafton Street, but a nice girl saw us turning in circles and stopped to help! At least we had a good tour of the area. 

When we arrived at The Duke we found out that the literary pub crawl was full. The problem was that there was a college football game in town between Boston College and Georgia Tech. So there were many students and parents in town for the game. So not only were they booked Saturday, but Sunday as well so  we called booked for Monday, then we booked the The Cliffs for Sunday. After that we stayed at The Duke for our first Guiness in Ireland.

The Duke is a bar that dates back to 1820s. Many literary writes like Joyce and Kavanagah visited. There are two floors, we went up stairs to the second floor. There was college football games on there, but not the Boston College and Georgia Tech game. 

We took our time with our first Guiness, but eventually we wandered out and made our way towards Trinity college. On the way we scoped out where we needed to meet the next day, for the cliffs tour. It was kind of on the way. Because of this, we past by not only the entrance to Trinity College, but we went down the Pearse Street. From that side it doesn't look like there is a good way to get inside the college, though in the following days we did exit the Science Gallery onto that street. So we probably could have gone in from the Science Gallery, we just didn't know it. We ended up walking around the college, towards the sea until we reached the Grand Canal. It was almost night by that time, and with the cloudy sky it was pretty much dark. Growing up in Arizona, any sort of water, looks quite pretty so of course we liked the view. 

Picture from our table at H Bar, before we went inside.

We had dinner at the H Bar. We wanted to eat outside, however we sat out there for a while without getting service. It was much faster inside. I had fish and chips while Kelsi had pizza, we both had another Guiness of course. The Fish and chips were good, but the fish is plainer than the fish fry in Arizona. I think the fish is saltier in Arizona. Nonetheless, it was a good dinner. I am not sure how Kelsi liked her pizza, but later in the trip she says that certain pizza's are her favorite so far. So I'm not sure this one was all that good. 

Afterwards dinner, we walked to the river because we determined that once we were at the river we could just walk down it, and eventually we would get back to our room. The walk along the river was beautiful. The bridges are cute, and there were many restaurants and bars along the way. We took our time, but we wanted to get back to our room. We were tried from traveling, and we had to be up early in the morning. Tomorrow the Cliffs!