Ireland has always been on my list of places I wanted to visit, but it seemed out of the way and hard to get to.  However, once we decided that we would need more time in the US to get everything together for our Italian visa application (just turned everything in yesterday) our itinerary opened up.

For those of you that have been following along with this journey, you will remember that we met a delightful couple from Dublin in May and had a wonderful night of conversation and pizza on the steps of a 17th century church in Lecce.  Cooleen and Padraig encouraged us to stop through Dublin if ever our wanderings allowed.  This seemed the perfect opportunity and I am not sure I can express how delighted I was with this choice.  Whatever you have heard about how beautiful Ireland is and how friendly the people are, it was probably understated.

Cliff walk from Greystones to Bray

Our first outing was to take the commuter train south from Dublin along the coast to Greystones.  There is a cliff walk from there north to the village of Bray.  The day was cool, a little overcast, and a great day for a walk.  There were great views of a storm on the Irish Sea, what appeared to be a seal in distress and the coast as a whole.  With the seal, after scratching his back on a rock, he swam off.  Who would have the seal-in-distress hotline on their quick dial list?  The lady next to us and she used it to call in the incident.  They do that here.

Outing along the Dublin harbor jetty

Our hosts, Cooleen, Padraig,  and their wonder dog, Harvey, took us for a walk on one of the jetties for the Dublin Harbor.  The day ended with a family dinner of the best burgers I have ever eaten.

They actually do swim in these waters on these cool days. We went swimming with Padraig in the Bay of Dublin (Holly went once and I went twice).  He actually swam as he does almost everyday and we jumped in and back out about as fast as we could.  The waters are cold.

Belfast

Next on our Irish adventure, we took a day trip on the train to Belfast in Northern Ireland.  The scenery out the train window was worth the trip.  Not too long ago I probably would not have made this trip.  I grew up hearing nothing about Belfast but the conflict between the Protestant Unionists and the Catholic Nationalists, “The Troubles”, as the Irish so understatedly call it.  There were constant bombings and terrorist attacks.  However, a few years back it was realized by both sides that they were only doing damage to themselves and their economy.  No businesses or tourists want to put themselves in that much peril.  With a somewhat uneasy peace, they are getting back on track and it was a pleasant place to visit.

With not much time available to us on the ground, we walked through the town to the Titanic Experience.  A museum right next to the site where the Titanic was built and launched.  If you are in Belfast and have an interest in that ill-fated ship, it is worth the effort.

Trip to Galway, the Aran Islands and the Cliffs of Moher

At Cooleen’s urging (thank you Cooleen for pushing us out of the nest), we decided to get away from Dublin for a few days and see more of the country.  We took the train to Galway on the west coast facing the North Atlantic and the next day (this maybe the only time you will hear this from me) we took a guided tour to the first of the Aran Islands, Inisheer, and the Cliffs of Moher.

The Aran Islands take the brunt of the weather coming in from the Atlantic and they are rugged and spare.  I am told the crossing can be very rough and they cancel the trips several times a month.  Our crossing was calm.  We rented bikes and went around to the four attractions on the island: the cemetery, the castle, the shipwreck and the light house.

The Cliffs of Moher are where the Irish mainland is melting into the ocean.  The water always wins.  With the changeable weather we had and the natural drama of the place, it was a spectacular afternoon.

Drive back across the country to Dublin

We then rented a car and started off across the country driving on the wrong side of the road.  Once you are on the road, driving on the left is pretty easy.  Getting out of parking lots and looking the correct direction at intersections is the hard part.  I drove and Holly only had one or two heart attacks.  Again, I was in awe of the lush green we saw in all directions.

The war that won independence for Ireland got off to a rather inauspicious beginning with the Easter Rising in 1916 and the centennial of that event was being celebrated everywhere we went.  We stopped for lunch at an inn in the small town of Granard.  We noticed what seemed to be several seeming alters to the Irish revolutionary, Michael Collins.  The town was the birthplace of his fiance, and our choice of eating establishments had at one time belonged to her family.  Although there is still some controversy about who and the exact reasons why, Collins was later assassinated while on an inspection tour following the signing of the treaty establishing the  Irish Republic and leaving Northern Ireland with Great Britain.  The conflict over the treaty led to the Irish Civil War and later to “The Troubles”.

One last stop on our journey back to Dublin was the Hill of Tara, the ancient spot used to invest the High King of Ireland.  On top of a windswept moor, you could easily believe that an ancient society felt it was an appropriate place of power to crown their leader.  The mounds there date back to the 5th millennia BC, making them the oldest site of human activity I have visited.