The Bad Day

We were up early again, even though we had nowhere to be. This was to be the day that we winged it. We'd stop somewhere inland after traveling as long as felt like it. The breakfasts at this point were basically me eating around the edges of weird Irish bacon, taking in as much brown bread, and toast with jam as we could manage, and foraging for citrus fruit that didn't taste weird. And tea. Oh the tea. At this point, both Lindsay and I were turning into tea fiends. Taking it whenever offered, finishing with sugar and whole milk, and appreciating it greatly.

Our only business left in Donegal was to visit the Donegal Castle, which we somehow didn't notice the day previous. This is odd because the castle is directly situated next to the town centre, where we'd spent a good deal of time. Just like at the Rock of Cashel, we just missed the start of the tour, and ran to catch up. Unlike the Rock of Cashel, and of course no offense to the young lady giving the tour there, Donegal Castle's tour was hosted by perhaps the best castle tour guide ever. It's a small field, but one of greatly varied talent. As we caught up with the group, he was explaining how they'd keep their cloaks hanging just over the area where they dumped the chamber pots, as it was believed that the fumes from the urine would keep pests from taking root in the clothing. After that, we got a good explanation of how the narrow, and winding staircase was built to favor the swordsman on the high ground, rather than those invading from below. Now, other tour guides had this sort of information, but few of them presented it with such practiced enthusiasm. The man would pause dramatically quite often, and look the crown in the eyes. He was smooth alright, and full of local aphorisms and charm. Sure, if you were from there, you might roll your eyes, but despite my best attempts at ironic detachment, I could hardly help but be entranced. A little over-the-topness is what any tour group really needs, which is why I'm clearly never going to lead tours. Unfortunately, my list of possible careers keeps growing ever shorter.

The first goal we had was Roscommon, thinking we'd travel inland for a while, since we'd been on the coast for a week. So for the first time, our scenery took a downhill turn. This is not to say that it wasn't beautiful, because it certainly was. There were green hills, dotted with sheep and cows, and most ridiculously blue skies and fluffy clouds you could imagine. But let's be honest; we've seen that, and often paired next to breathtaking cliffs and an ocean. There also wasn't as much to do inland as along the coast. Sure there were more castles, but we already did one castle today, and honestly how many castles can one do in one day? Well, surely more than one, but either way, we didn't want to.

We ended up in Roscommon must sooner than we thought, so it was just after noon, and we'd hit our destination for the day. But there wasn't a lot going on in Roscommon, and we didn't want to waste the day, so after an "italian" lunch, we pressed on. Oddly, it was nearing 80 degrees farenheit, and the sweaters we'd started the day wearing were becoming too warm. I got the sense that people there weren't really used to these temperatures, since there was still a lot of wool being paired with red faces everywhere. That might be just what they look like though. We noticed the heat when taking a little walk to look at the ruins of Castle Roscommon. The temperatures made me grimace.

Moving on south, we went towards Athlone, which the book described using such buzzwords as "artsy" and "youthful," which usually sound better on paper than in practice. One of the Bed and Breakfasts listed in Athlone was supposed to be the best thing to hit Ireland since St. Patrick, so we made a shot for that. Then we hit, for the first time since leaving Dublin, actual traffic. We found ourselves crawling through Athlone, which was, for some reason, completely packed. Of course, that meant that the B&B was all booked up, and the others they checked on were booked as well. Our perfect streak was starting to come to an end, and in the middle of the afternoon, both Lindsay and myself secretly wondered to ourselves if this would be the night where we finally would be forced to sleep in the car for lack of accommodation. And if that was in fact the case, where do you park a car for such things when in Ireland. The answers to these questions would elude us, but we decided that Athlone just had bad vibes, and we should move along to Ennis, which was basically the last town before our destination for the next day.

As it turns out, Ennis was kind of a shithole. We checked with the Bed and Breakfasts around town, and they were either booked, or just didn't answer the door. They say you can't really get a B&B after 5-6PM, and it was about 5:30. So we decided to eat the cost of a hotel, so we'd have somewhere to sleep. There was a main street running through the place with a couple of hotels that were well reviewed in our book, but as luck would have it, they were booked up. Weddings are truly the scourge of the improvisational vacationer. The last option was a hotel located just outside of town that was recommended as being "recently renovated" and "modern." We called the West County Hotel, and asked if they had rooms. They did (hurray!), and it would cost about twice as much as a B&B (boo!). But that wasn't a big deal, because it's fun to stay in hotels, and it wasn't going to break the bank. Then again, at this point in the trip, I think we were both starting to think about what could be accomplished with surplus vacation money on our return home, where everything doesn't cost twice as much as it should. Regardless of all that, we were pretty much out of options, so off to the Hotel it was. The book wasn't wrong that it was just out of town, but upon pulling in, we were surprised that the West County Hotel had become the Best Western West County Hotel, which we weren't expecting.

You'll remember that it was a very hot day, and our room was situated, apparently on the sun, with only a clanking pre-war desk fan to provide any solace. The room smelled of something...other, and we weren't all that happy about it. But with no other options, we decided to make the best of it, and ignore the fact that there were plumbing parts on the counter of the bathroom; a bathroom where you could either shut the door or use the toilet, but not both. Clearly it was time to get out and go back to town for some dinner.

This was about when the cracks began to show. We walked around the lanes of Ennis, which was getting sketchier and scarier as the sun went down, in a way we had yet to experience in Ireland. It was something intangible, but we both noticed it, and for some reason, neither of us felt the carefree safety we'd been used to, and the familiar city instinct of keeping our guard up returned as we looked for somewhere to eat. And when the earlier part of the day was frustrating, other things can become frustrating much faster than they should. Neither of us wanted pub food, or more faux -italian, or really anything else we walked past. There was one restaurant that was pretty nice looking, but also very expensive, and as we'd already ponied up for the expensive room, that didn't sound like a great idea, but the only other option was Supermac's, which you may remember from the Aran Islands post. We then proceeded to settle, and choke down just of bit of food, before admitting defeat, and bringing candy bars back to the hotel room. We just needed the day to be over.

Our saving grace proved to an airing of X-Factor back in the room, which is the UK version of American Idol, a show I will not watch in the US, but quite enjoyed when swapping out Americans for rural Britons. At about the point when we wanted to go to sleep, the wedding really kicked in, and perpetual thumping reverberated throughout the establishment.

I'm not sure when we went to sleep, but it was not with ease, and it was not as early as I'd hoped.

The hotel had one more surprise for us in the morning, and you'll hear more about that soon.

Now, THAT is nice.

We started off with a fantastic breakfast in Sligo, at the Pearse Lodge. This may have been mostly because they gave us the most familiar tasting pancakes we'd managed to have since we we'd been in Ireland. It may have also been that we really liked the owners of the B&B, which is enough in some cases. We actually stopped and talked to Mary (87% of all Irish B&B proprietors are named Mary) to a good long while before taking a walk into town, and it was actually really nice. It was probably the first time I'd felt any of that Irish hospitality we'd heard about. But then, she was pretty familiar with America, and maybe it was just that familiarity. No matter the reason, she was really nice, and told us some good places to go shopping. We were looking for something to buy that we could put up in the house, but something that wasn't cheesy like all the tourist crap we'd been seeing everywhere. Mary made sure to tell us where we could go to pay "local prices" as opposed to "tourist prices."

We went and walked around a little, and went into some of the shops she'd pointed us to, and ended up buying some wooden thing you hand on the wall with a tree on it. As mentioned earlier, the Flanagan family seal is pretty much a tree, so it seemed like a good fit. What we didn't know is that from that point on, every time we stopped from then on, we would see the exact same display, with the exact same wooden "hand crafted" wall plaques. We didn't ever see the exact same one we bought, so I guess we did pretty good. I could probably walk over to it right now, and tell you what it says on the back about what it means, but it's way over there, and once you get going with this writing thing, it's probably best for me to move on.

We decided to take off because as nice as our lodgings were, Sligo was a little bit of a working town, in that, there wasn't much to really do outside of walking through the main area where we'd already done a lap or two. We had a short drive north to Donegal in front of us, so we got going. I think the most telling thing about Sligo was that we only took once picture the whole time, and it was of an orange Volkswagen Beetle. This is because I'm a fan of orange cars, and I'm a fan of Volkswagens, so it was sort of a must. This picture has no real significance however.

The plan was to stop at a place and go horseback riding between Sligo and Donegal. I've got this thing that when I go on vacation to someplace more rural, I like the idea of riding horses. It turns out that the Irish are wild about horse trekking. As such, it appears that you can't just show up, and you should have an appointment. Oh well, moving on. I did see a very tiny pony tied up outside of the place, supposedly to bring in passersby, which is odd, since they didn't take walk-ins. Either way, tiny ponies still poop plenty, so watch your feet.

Our evening's lodgings were procured and selected by myself. It was a little place outside of Donegal town, situated on a hill beside a lake. After a couple of wrong turns, we started up a much longer and more windy road than we'd anticipated. The loch (lake) was stunning, and the day was again totally clear and beautiful. We finally found the place, and as luck would have it, she had no idea who we were. A moment of confusion, and some checking of the book revealed that she had written us down for the next night, and she was totally booked tonight. But it was still early, about noon, and she was nice enough to call a whole lot of places before finding one that had an opening just outside of town in Donegal. We were told to scoot down there as they were tentatively holding the room for us. This was a little bit of challenge, because, as you know, all directions in Ireland are not really based on roads and exact distances, rather by approximations and vague generalities. It's part charming and part annoying, but mostly it worked out.

The B&B was called the Lake View house, or something like that, which was funny, since you could really only see the lake from one specific angle through a long corridor of trees. From that specific vantage point, it was a nice view, but you really had to lean oddly against the window to see it. The guy who checked us in was a middle aged man who was very gentle and quiet, which according to every creepy movie ever, made us think he was probably a killer, so we left for lunch as soon as we could.

Donegal Town is basically a big roundabout with a bunch of shops around it. It's a bigger roundabout than most, so it's a bigger town centre than most. But it's never as big as you'd think it would be. We used our book to find a little place called The Blueberry, with the hope of eating some of their blueberry pie, which looked fantastic after the lunch. For some reason, I decided to order an asian stir fry, which wasn't bad so much as A) not at all Asian, and B) it came on top of spaghetti, which threw me off. But it was actually normal enough that I enjoyed it. It was a neat place, and if you were looking for lunch, and you happened to be in Donegal, I'd tell you to go there. The unfortunate postscript to the story is that they sold their last piece of blueberry pie just before we tried to order it. Sweet irony!

I was still without Irish Sweater, and as Donegal was famous for their Irish sweaters, so we went into a sweater shop, which turned out to be perhaps the biggest mistake of the trip. We ended up in a place with a man who spent a great deal of time telling us that Aran Island sweaters were in fact a load of "codswallop" and nothing ever really gets made there, and people who buy sweaters there are in fact fools. Then he proceeded to make me try on a bunch of sweaters that, were I an actual fisherman concerned solely with warmth, I might have liked. Yet as a someone fashion conscious American, New York City dwelling male, I was forced to concede that there might just not be the man for an Irish fisherman sweater. Lindsay couldn't figure out why I kept indulging the man, and putting on sweater after horrible sweater, and honestly, I couldn't tell you. Finally, a mailman came in, and we used the distraction to leave. Before that it was a tractor beam I couldn't escape. Banana Republic might be an evil corporation, but it never made me feel guilty.

We decided to drive off to Slieve League, which I have to admit, I didn't really know what I was going to. But there wasn't much else to do, but go drive around and look at things, so we went. Honestly, at this point, it just seemed like, "what else could there be to see?" We'd seen so much natural beauty, and of such diversity so far that we may have been a bit burnt out on the idea of it. Yet we were both kind of surprised that there was still more goodness to be had. As such, we took more pictures here than we would anywhere else. That might have been because of the sheep though.

We go around the edge of these cliffs and little towns, and then at one point, there was a tiny little sign pointing us seemingly away from the cliffs, so obviously we drove right past it, and had to come back around. Then it was through some very rural looking areas with tiny, sort of poor homes. This might have been the only place in Ireland that didn't have a brand new car in every driveway. Slowly and surely we wound up and up, until we got to a gate, where there was room for one car. I had to get out, open the gate, drive through, and then go back and close the gate. There was a small parking area at the bottom for those who wanted to walk up to the cliffs, rather than drive what was promised by our trusty book to be a harrowing drive. Apparently, it was a couple of kilometers up to the top, and it was late in the day, so we elected for the road. This was a good move for several reasons. It took about 20-30 minutes to drive to the upper parking area, and I'm fairly certain we would have turned back and missed the whole thing. We also would have missed the scariest, most narrow, most right-next-to-the-edge-of-a-giant-sea-cliff road ever to exist in the history of driving. My insurance company would cancel my policy right now had they any idea what I was doing. There were parts where the top of a crest would be so steep that you literally couldn't see over it until that roller coaster like moment when you drove over it. Add to that the fact that there was the previously mentioned one car's width, and two way traffic, and I'll admit, I'd slowed way down from what we were used to on the trip. We crawled up the hills with a few butterflies in the stomach, but no life altering incidents.

The view at the top was indescribable. Well, I mean, there was a cliff, and some green hills, and a gorgeous sky, and I guess that's describing it, but really I'm doing the scene no justice. From the car park, you could keep walking up the cliff, seemingly forever, which I thought about doing. Eventually, Lindsay refused to go any further, and the ground was a bit muddy and slippery for my to deal with in my sneakers, so I turned back. Had I been wearing more rugged footwear, it's possible that I might still be wandering around up there, but we'll never know I suppose. Had I stayed, I'm sure I wouldn't have tired of the view.

Another curious feature of the area were the sheep. As you know, there are sheep everywhere in Ireland. But this was just nowhere. The idea of someone actually tending to sheep here was crazy. The place was huge, and I don't know how the sheep got everywhere, but there wasn't an area of un-nibbled grass anywhere. It was the best lawn maintenance I'd ever seen on an area impossible to mowers. Granted, the sheep poop was prolific. There's always a downside. Lindsay was finally in a position to shoot pictures of sheep close up, with no one around to scare her away. Of course she learned that sheep are in fact the most timid creatures in the world. Any slight movement in their direction causes them to start in the opposite direction. This didn't stop her from shooting about 8 dozen pictures of them. She made physical contact with them only once, and it was a fleeting contact. The sound of their nibbling is unceasing, and much more rapid than you'd expect, by the way.

After draining the camera batteries, and shooting every possible view of this monolithic natural wonder, we headed back down the road of very probably death, and safely made our way back to Donegal Town.

Back at the giant roundabout, we set to find a place to eat, and finally, at long last, decided it was, at long last, time to go back to the pub food well. Since leaving earlier in the afternoon, tour buses full of retirees had taken over. We went into one restaurant, and there was one of those movie moments where someone walks in the door, and a record scratches, the music stops and everyone looks up. We went in, took one step through the door, and saw the largest group of septuagenarians possibly ever gathered in Europe. There was a brief moment of realization, and it's very likely that we actually slowly backed out, not moving a muscle. They, like dinosaurs can sense motion, or so I've heard.

We went a couple doors down, and ate in a slightly more youthful pub, while we watched a match from the US Open, which was located very near where we live in Queens. We noted, with delight just how ridiculously hot and humid it was back at home at the time. This night was all about beef, and the return of the ubiquitous chips. Lindsay made with the beef and guinness pie, and I with a classic steak sandwich. Enough with this futile attempt at cuisine in Ireland. It was a night for roots.

After the dinner, it was pointed out that I had gotten off track with the Guinness, and we went to a local pub. It was maybe the most local of all the pubs we'd been to, with real regional accents, and a vague sense of "should we be in here?" Of course nothing happened, and while I, for reasons really unknown to me, turned down a local's offer for a game of pool, I was pleased that he'd offered. Shyness will kick you in the ass if you let it, which I did, and I'll likely regret not playing that game for the rest of my days. For the record, he put the quarters in and cleared the table by himself with such skill and accuracy that I was a bit pleased to be spared the embarrassment of my ineptitude at yet another bar game. Some locals started singing, not badly, but not particularly well, and we made our exit to go back to the creepy man's bed and breakfast with the nearly non-existent view.

The upcoming day would be one with nearly no plan or goal, off the coast for the first time, and down through the middle of the country. Things did not bode well.

So do we just wait for the cow to move?

After the prior day's events, this day was just for taking it easy. We didn't rush to get up early, or anything like that, and owing to the size of the giant meal the night before, it was nearly impossible. However, when staying in hotels and like, there's only a limited amount of time to take advantage of the breakfast you've already paid for. We held off as long as possible, but eventually we would miss the whole thing. So ready or not, it was time to eat again. For this is the way of things when traveling in Ireland. Plus, let's be honest, the dinner was pretty fantastic, so it would be a shame to miss out on good food right?

It was pretty much more of the same Irish breakfast stuff, but notched up a little in the quality department. The jam was ridiculously good actually, and I ate what some might call too much toast. Plus they had good juice that was perhaps as fresh as one could expect citrus to be in that part of the world.

After that, we trundled back up the 3 flights of stairs spiraling up the middle of the hotel to our room, and feeling vaguely uncomfortable with the level of manservantude, we carried our own bags down, rather than ringing for the bellman. By the way, it should be noted, that it was the same bellman from yesterday. He was clearly there until at least midnight, and now he was there in the morning. Several of the servers and busboys from the late dinner were also on breakfast duties. I realize you pay a lot for the luxury of this experience, but there's a little part of me that thinks, "if I was that guy, working his face off, I'd hate me for enjoying myself in his midst." Apparently, that's some working class angst I'll have to work out before I can truly live the life of the wealthy bon vivant. Of course, that's likely some time from now. It may also be likely that I never get over that. Maybe that's a good thing.

The other great thing about Ballynahinch is not just that there's a hotel, but these beautiful grounds, along side the loch and a couple of streams. This place is all about fishing, which we're not so much into, but it makes for beautiful scenery. We left the stuff in the car, and took one of their walks along the loch. It's not a whole lot different from Maine, and the lakes and woods I was used to growing up, except that there are no mosquitos, and the greens are all just a little brighter. Nearly every direction you turn, there's something else that's beautiful. I've said the same about the rest of Ireland, but it was never more true than it was in the Connemara area.

The whole time we were walking, the rain would start up and mist us, and then go away. For some reason, you just sort of ignore it. There wasn't the blind panic that the sky was about to open up and drench you, but you just sort of knew it would pass. We annoyed some fly fishermen (who wear far more equipment than I understand the need for), and were shooed away from their fishing spot, and just enjoyed a walk through the woods, which we don't get to do very often. In fact, I'm fairly certain Lindsay and I could count the number of times we've walked in woods on one, maybe two hands at most. This is just wrong.

We hopped back in our car, which was starting to get quite a crusty exterior at this point, and took off through the streams and bogs. Just outside of the gates of the hotel, we slowed quickly to a crawl when there were numerous sheep in the road. We got past them, went another short stretch, and encountered a large number of lumbering cows, and there's really no way to get them out of the road. I can tell you that beeping doesn't work. It's even possible that they're deaf, because there was no recognition. They finally moved out of the way, but Lindsay made me drive through them slowly so she could take pictures of them. There's something about the way they drive in Ireland that made me want always want to be going as fast as possible when on the road and driving. So on the one hand, I was terrified that someone would come up behind us at the speed of sound, and on the other hand, I was picturing a very slow moving cow atrocity. In the end, there were no such events.


At this point, it was fairly late in the day. We were headed for Sligo, which can be pronounced Sleego or Slygo, depending on who you are talking to. But we had no real plans for the day, so we basically drove up along the coast some more, and looked at really pretty views, over and over. I'll just show you some of what we saw that day, because I'm basically out of ways to describe things at this point. I realize this is no way for a writer to be, but there you are.


Around four in the afternoon, we decided to stop at Kylemore Abbey, which is basically the former castle/retreat of a rich English family from the late 1800's, which was later donated to an order of benedictine nuns, who now run a boarding school for girls, as well as a tourist trap/beautiful building for passersby. When I saw this place on a brochure, I immediately said, "We should go there," because it was so picturesque. Then I could say I was a little disappointed, because A) it's not really that old, relatively speaking B) It's sort of a symbol of rich English people living in enormous splendor among who knows how many poor Irish people, and C) It was sort of expensive, and we didn't realize that we didn't really have to pay for looking and taking pictures until after we did so. But then I read about it a bit, and the literature, which could certainly be biased, suggested that the family who built the place weren't horrible people, and created lots of local jobs by building the place.

There were these Victorian gardens you had to take a shuttle over to see, and for some reason, I decided that we should go see them, since we paid I guess, despite the fact that I had no real desire to see the gardens, and Lindsay repeatedly suggested as much. As such, we took the shuttle over, got out, looked around, and got back on the bus ten minutes later. Now, this isn't to say that they weren't nice gardens. They certainly were, if you're into that sort of thing. Oddly enough, the thing we found the most interesting was the vegetable garden, where we looked at the plants of such things as peas, tomatoes, various herbs, and other completely run of the mill vegetation. I realize we could see this almost anywhere, but we were here. But not for very long.

Then you go into the castle/museum, which actually only had 3 rooms open to peruse. This is because the place is an operating International girls boarding school, as mentioned previously. That meant there were these really stark signs around every corner expressly forbidding entrance to anywhere. It was like a military compound, protecting nuclear missiles, except it was a bunch of nuns protecting a bunch of 13 year old girls. Of course, I understand that, but it was still odd to see some of the girls outside, looking like normal kids. I figured they would keep them under lock and key, exposing them to as little light as possible.

On the way out, there's a small hill, with like 3 sheep just chomping away at the grass. This was easily the closest Lindsay had gotten to one so far, and she got as close as she could for pictures. I would say they're a little ugly close up, as well as being an animal devoid of almost any personality. There's some merit to the idea of calling people who just go along as sheep. But then, sheep don't really go along with anything, unless that thing is eating grass. Constantly.

Sligo was perhaps the first place where we got lost. In every other place, we just followed the signs and drove the roundabouts towards the "city centre," which we did in Sligo, but it didn't get us any closer. Or so we thought. We were looking for a place called Pearse Lodge, located on Pearse road. It may sound odd, but we hadn't had to deal with street names and addresses in almost a week. And for good reason, because there certainly weren't any street signs, or numbers on anything. We turned around a couple times, thanking god that I'd gotten used to the left-hand driving by this point, and saw the word Pearse a couple times, but eventually, I had to stop and ask at a local mini-mart place. He had no idea what the place was, but asked me if I knew her name, which I didn't. But he pointed to the road in front of me, and said, "well, that's Pearse road, so it should be right there." It turns out we were pretty much there already, and just didn't know it. So once again, we found it without really trying, but we just weren't quite aware of it. So I'm adding to our tally as a win.

Mary and her husband Kieran run the Pearse Lodge, which is basically just another Bed and Breakfast, but if you look them up on the web, you'll find glowing reviews of their place from all sorts of people. There was a good reason for that. They're very nice, and they run a nice place. This might have been the first time in the whole trip where someone was genuinely above and beyond nice and helpful to us. Don't get me wrong, the others were nice, but Mary was really invested in talking with us, and making sure we were OK, and she talked to us, and I hate talking to strangers, but I liked her a great deal. She told us all these places we could go in town and all kinds of different restaurants, and had maps and all sorts of stuff. Plus, they had a huge number of things to choose from for breakfast.

For dinner we learned that, no matter what it looks like, for the most part, the best Italian food in Ireland is going be less than you'd expect in America. The servers were very friendly, and they tried their damnedest, but really, it was just kind of average. But it's funny, where in the rest of the world, had I converted the money to dollars and known how much I spent for average food, I might have been unhappy, at this point, Lindsay and I were having so much fun together that we really weren't disappointed with average food. It might sound cheesy, but for once, I sort of knew what it was like to not be picky, and just be happy with the experience. We then had some chocolate cake that was not really anything special either, but we were having a good time, so it was pretty good all the same.

Sligo at night felt a little more rowdy and raw than many of the places we'd been . That's perhaps because it wasn't a town so focused on tourists, but rather it was more of a regular place where working people lived. So it was a little more shady walking around at night than most of where we'd been. That's not a bad thing at all, we walked with a little more alertness that we'd been using. We decided to call it a night though, and went back to our brightly painted room, and got to bed. Not exciting no, but it was a big day.

In the morning, we'd make the final leg of the trip in a northerly direction, and be off to Donegal. We did not know that waiting for us would be, perhaps the most spectacular view we'd ever seen. Or course, what Lindsay will always remember will be the sheep.

Fog, Drizzle, Rain, Bit of Sun, Rain, Drizzle, and Done

We got up nice and early, because today, we'd be taking the ferry to Inishmore, the largest of the Aran Islands. There was a boat leaving for the islands every hour, so we wanted to get there to catch the 9 AM ride, so we would have time to see as much as possible.

Long story short, for reasons unknown, the boat didn't leave until past 10. I guess they wait until it's full. I did learn that Australians are fun people. There were a group of what I assume were students, and they would be damned if they weren't going to have a good time. I also learned that Japanese tourists (and there were many) do not generally dress appropriately for this sort of activity.

Did I mention the weather? Other than our time at the Cliffs of Moher, we'd been lucky so far in that every day was very nearly perfect weather. So, we'd made the choice to go to the Aran Islands on this day, rather than the one previous, which you know we spent strolling around Galway City, and playing in tide pools. But we were troopers, and a little fog and rain wouldn't stop us. It was make us slightly uncomfortable, sure, but stop? No.

We piled off the boat and were assailed by people offering various modes of transport around the island, which is about 9 miles long. There were small buses, and some coach and horses, and bike rentals. Our original plan was to rent bikes, but I will admit that the other options looked pretty tempting as the sky was a dull grey, and the rain spit at us intermittently. But our indecision basically lead us past that, and ended up getting a couple of bikes. I think the idea of the bike was burned into my head, and the practicality of actually riding on in the rain hadn't sunk in. For one thing, you get that line of mud up the middle of your back. Who wants that?

Once on our not-quite-the-right-size-or-in-great-shape-bikes, we began to experience just how out of shape we were. Right off there's a hill that curved up and around. Plus the caravans full of people who accepted the warm, dry, drive-around tour were passing us on the narrow roads. There was a hotel, and a couple pubs, and the knick knack shops, but almost immediately the stone walls started up, and the big stretches of desolate looking farm and grazing land took over. Right off, we were next to a little red house, with chickens all over the place. It's funny, because you think you see chickens a lot, but in reality, you don't see them in real life very often if you live in New York or Los Angeles. So Lindsay and I are taking pictures of the chickens, feeling very touristy, I might add, when a slightly slovenly man comes out with a slop bucket, and shoos them all away from us, seemly vaguely annoyed. At least we got one great shot from it. I have to admit it, the chickens were kind of interesting, and I can't really explain that.

Leaving the chickens, we noticed that we were heading up hill, almost exclusively. Along with that, the rain was coming on a bit harder, and we found out that our layering was causing some overheating. Within 20 minutes, I was down to a t-shirt, and had given up wearing my glasses. I could barely see anyway. We'd pedal up the hill for a while, and stop. Then repeat. There were supposedly beautiful views and vistas to be had, but we couldn't really see them, so we just had to take the brochure's word for it. We were trading the lead with a group of 3 Japanese girls wearing (I kid you not) mini skirts and heels, and riding bikes that looked comically small for them. At one point, I noticed them chucking garbage over the wall into the field. At first I wasn't sure, then I saw her open a new water bottle, drink about a gulp, and toss the whole thing over into the field. So I yelled at them. Of course it did no good, because they didn't speak English. I guess I just hoped my scowl communicated something, but they probably just thought I was insane. What can I say, I really dislike littering. Especially in a place like this, where there's so much history, which can get get buried in garbage a lot easier than you'd think.

There were ruins of old stone houses everywhere. You sort of stopped pointing them out after a while, because, "look, it's another one."

Our goal became the fort Dún Aengus, which was about halfway across the island. It's a stone fort that dates back to about 1000 B.C. I can't tell you how long it took to get there, but I can tell you how glad we were to get off the bikes. I'm guessing it was about an hour or so, raining the whole time, and getting fairly heavy here and there. At least point, I've got to give credit to my wife, who in the past has commented on discomfort or fatigue perhaps earlier than I would have, yet on this day, there was not a single complaint from her. I know, because I was preparing or it, because I was the one who said we should take the bikes. I went for the bikes, even though, deep down, I knew it was perhaps not the best idea. But to my surprise, and of course to her inestimable credit, she assured me over and over that she was, in fact, having fun. It truly was a wonderous land.

After parking our bikes next to 50 other identical bikes, we paid our 2 euros each (or $235, still the cheapest thing in Ireland) and spent as long as we could in the visitors center, before heading out to the fort. I really can't tell you how fantastic it was to get off that bike, especially since the way back would be mostly downhill.

We also weren't really aware, because of the fog, just how far away and uphill the fort was. It was still raining as well, but it's a funny thing about the rain in Ireland. It's never really that bad. The temperature didn't make you any colder, and while it was incessant, it wasn't really that heavy, and just when you'd had enough, it would hold off for a bit. Or course, it would inevitably start up again. But either way, it didn't really bug as much as you'd think it should. Maybe that's because we went to Ireland expecting crap weather, so we were fine. So we trudged up a rocky and quite slippery path to the stone fort. We couldn't really see how far away it was, nor could we really appreciate the size of it, because we could basically only see what was in front of us. It really makes you appreciate, at least a bit, how living here thousands of years ago would either produce extremely tough, if not extremely depressed people.

The fort consists of several semi-circle stone walls, the other edge being a huge sea cliff. The good people in charge of the spot decided to go with a laissez-faire attitude concerning safety, because there's nothing to stop you going over the side. Lindsay had read in the book that a good number of tourists had indeed gone over the edge and died from a sudden gust of wind. I took that in stride, and of strolled over to the side, where a little protective mound had been built up, to peer over the side of the cliff. The sea was angry that day my friends. On a clear day, the view is supposed to be quite spectacular. A little after that, I got about 5-10 feet from the edge, felt a gust of wind, and decided I'd seen quite enough. Truthfully, that was a bit scary.

After a little bit, we saw enough of the stone wall, and took the seemingly shorter trail back down the hill. Then we hopped on the bikes and started down the hills, along the northern side of the island. This was a considerably easier trip than the way up. We cruised along a narrow road, surrounded mostly by stone walls, with the occasional group of grazing cows. Oddly enough, on an island famed for its wool sweaters, we didn't see one sheep. That's like finding an area of New York City devoid of assholes. It just doesn't happen. But there was a distinct lack of sheep. We stopped along the way and fed some roadside flowers to a wet, tired looking horse, wary of course from our earlier encounter with the unfriendly chicken farmer, and a previous roadside horse who actually ate a part of Lindsay's bike handle. He tried to take the whole bike, but we managed to get away in time. That kind of thing makes an impact. If he'll eat bike, can human flesh and bone be far off? It's best not to chance it.

About halfway back, there was a supposed to be a colony of seals or sea lions (I can't remember which), which, if you know my wife, excited her a great deal. Yet it turned out that the weren't in, and the spot where you would watch them was rather empty. Regardless, it was far away and foggy, so we'd just have to do without them.

A few more cows, and a largely unsatisfying lunch at the Irish equivalent of McDonalds (Supermacs!), and we had just enough time to explore the tourist haven of the Aran Islands Sweater Market and Museum. As far as I can tell, the museum part consisted of a video on how wool is made, and some old photos of men in the sweaters. We spent a good amount of time in the sweater market, and while I certainly like the idea of the Aran Islands sweater, I can safely say that being a slightly fashion conscious man, living in 2007 in New York City, I just can't pull it off. I'm sure they're warm, and historically interesting, and had I boat, and spent a lot of time at sea, I'd be all over it. But the the truth is, I pretty much looked like a weenie. Lindsay tried on a couple hundred sweaters are well, and while there were some cashmere varieties that were OK, they weren't really worth buying in Ireland. I've mentioned the exchange rates, I assume. We ended up with a not terrible half zip sweater for me, to be worn only on the coldest of days, and a wool blanket that, by the smell of things, was only recently attached to the sheep. But it's certainly warm.

We got back on the boat for the 40 minute ride back to dry land, noting that the offensive littering Japanese tourists hadn't reappeared. I'm hoping they met with some sort of donkey based accident, but it might be too much to hope for. We had to hurry back, because tonight we'd book accommodation at the Ballynahinch Castle Hotel, and we had to get there in time to make the most of it. It was only about 40 minutes from where we were.

As we drove towards the Castle, we were entering Connemara, which had a completely different sort of landscape than the others places we'd been. There were lakes and mountains, peat bogs, and windy streams along the road. It was all at once, lush and barren, depending on the rise of the road. Approaching the hotel, the trees got more dense, and we started seeing fishing cottages cropping up. We're not big into fishing, or at all really, but you can imagine how nice it was there. By this time, the weather from Inishmore was history, and long behind us, and things were looking up.

We turned into the gate, and drove through dense trees, and pulled up to the secluded castle with a little trepidation that we were in the right place. Next to reception, a huge fire crackled next to some leather sofas. A man so similar to Fawlty's Manuel that I feel bad making the comparison, took our bags (heavy bags!) up 4 flights of stairs, where we discovered that we had no bills smaller than 50 euros ($38,000 US dollars), and couldn't tip him. We promised him that we would take care of him later, which he most certainly doubted, but showed no sign.

This room...this room was ridiculous. I almost made Lindsay go back down and make sure they hadn't upgraded us to some room we'd have to take a mortgage out to pay for. But no, this was the room you get, and at this point, we couldn't have been happier. We're talking a huge room, the first with climate control, a 4 poster bed, a flat screen TV (with 3 channels....), huge closets, a couch, a bathroom with a dual shower in addition to a bathtub with a TV embedded in the wall, complete with waterproof remote control, and just a whole lot of niceness.

The whole place seemed like it used to be a the hunting retreat of some very rich people, and the decor backed up that theory. This was for people who liked hunting and fishing. While we really weren't part of that group, we made do.

Soon it was time for our fancy dinner. The restaurant served a 5 course meal that was probably the best eating we had in the whole country. There was a salad, and a starter, and another thing, and the main course, and then the desert. I think we both had filet mignon, because sometimes, fancy can get scary and unknowable, where some of the other choices were a bit too exotic for us. I don't even think the meal came with any chips, but I'm not sure. They may have sncuk some in there amongst the truffles and such. I had some sort of lamb salad and a currant sorbet, and Lindsay ate something from the sea that she liked a great deal as well. For dessert, we each got this strange assortment of chocolates. I couldn't tell you what they were, because the waiter wasn't exactly sure. But what I can tell you was that they were all excellent, in completely different ways.

At the end of the whole thing, we were both near collapse from rich food intake. At that point, they offered us tea and chocolates by the fire in the other room. Neither of us had room for oxygen, much less any other food or drink, but honestly, how could we say no? Being served tea in a room like that, surrounded by wealthy foreign people on holiday is a strange thing. On the wall opposite the fire was a painting showing a pack of dogs taking down a wild boar. It was no small painting either. It pretty much went from floor to ceiling. Where the hell were we?

As you can guess, after eating like that, and walking around all day in the rain, that was about all we had in us, and we passed out, hoping to have some time to enjoy the hotel grounds a bit more in the morning.

And we finally had a whole lot of pillows too. Clearly, it was worth the money.

Tomorrow: Sligo.

No English

It was morning in Galway City. We went down to the hotel breakfast, which was more of the Irish breakfast variety, where I saw people just loading up on black and white pudding, which was obviously perplexing. At the same time, I was developing a disturbing dependency on Irish butter. I'm somewhat grateful that poverty made it less likely my ancestors could overdo it on that stuff. Then again, it's possible that centuries of poverty and starvation was more unhealthy than a bit of butter in the morning. It's hard to say really.

We played a rousing game of "what country are they from" as we ate breakfast, and we were hitting at about 50%, but mostly because you can spot an American from a mile away in foreign countries. I'm not proud of it, but there it is.

We then went and spent some time in the rooftop jacuzzi, a feature that made the less than stellar room a distant memory. Honestly, there's not much to say, but I firmly believe that any vacation that doesn't include at least a little hot tub is probably a failure.

We left our stuff with the hotel, and went off to explore Galway City while it was actually open. It turns out that it's a really nice place to walk around, shop, and eat. In that respect, it was actually a little better than Dublin. There was a mall right next to the hotel, which I decided we must walk through, since I am inexplicably drawn to malls. I have no idea why. Inside, it was pretty much what you'd expect from a small mall, but the thing is this: in the middle of the place, just off the food court, is a medieval wall, from the old town wall, which they built the mall around. Where else does that happen?! Certainly not in the shopping malls of southern California. It happened that there was a Flanagan's shoe store in the mall. Lindsay made me take a picture. You can see what a good actor I am from my nonchalance.

There were actually several more Flanagan owned establishments we started to see from this point on, including a Pharmacy, some sort of accountants, a quite large real estate firm, and an auto dealer. All of them spelled my name the way I spell my name, proving what I've been saying my whole life, that I spell it the correct way. Why people want to put in extra "n's" I'll never know. As we went north, it got more common, which makes sense, since we were basically in the area where the Flanagan's come from at this point. Some day I hope to use this knowledge to borrow money, but I haven't worked out the details yet.

We also stopped briefly in a comic shop in the mall, and I must say that if you're reading comics in Ireland, you're a trooper, because that stuff was not only in euros, which probably doesn't seem as expensive if you're actually Irish, but all the books were marked way up, even if it was charged in dollars. I mean, I love comics, but there's a limit. But then, maybe the economy is just that good. Still, to have to take out a mortgage just to read all of Preacher is a stretch.

It was about 8-12 minutes before we tired of the wacky Irish mall, and we sauntered out to the area with the shopping, restaurants, and bars that were not in the mall. In fact, the whole area was blocked off from traffic and situated in old medieval lanes, all cobblestones, and stone walls and such. It was there that we stumbled into a jewelry store (Lindsay almost can't not go into them), and Lindsay got a new ring to add to her wedding finger. It's a sort of claddagh ring, but very subtly so. I wasn't going to deny her the pleasure of Irishing up her hand, so we made that happen, and I even picked up a ring, which makes me a ring wearer now. I'll admit, it's a role I'm not entirely comfortable with yet, but I'm working on it.

At lunch, we figured, now that we're in Ireland, what a fantastic place to get some pizza! So we went into Fat Freddy's, and had what was not at all bad pizza, followed by not at all bad chocolate cake. There was a bit more "where are they from," where we were thrown off by an American guy who looked like he was very much from England. Our ability to judge people was starting to end up in doubt, a little more wandering, and it was time to get out of Dodge. After all, we had about 30-40 minutes of driving ahead of us.

Then about 5 minutes into that drive, a bottle of Diet 7-Up started spraying all over the passenger side of the vehicle, and I made the mistake of laughing at my wife's misfortune. But here's the thing, if a soda is going to blow up on you, I can't recommend Diet 7-Up more, because there's no sugar, and it doesn't get sticky, and there's no color, so it doesn't stain. Plus, if it's a rental car, you're golden. But we ended up pulling over to a large beach area, or what passes for a beach in Ireland. It wasn't soft sand, or particularly nice water, but it was quite sunny, and there were the people of Ireland, out there, desperately pale, but enjoying themselves.

At this point it was about 4:30, so we stopped only a couple towns outside of Galway City in a place called Spiddal, where we found a place a bed and breakfast just outside of town, on the coast. After we dropped our stuff in the room, we started off down the road to go to the edge of the water. We traveled down a little road with what looked like little vacation homes, and then through some tall grass, down to a rocky coast, that wasn't much different from Maine. I kept coaxing Lindsay out a little further and a little further until we were scampering on the rocks like little kids having a lot of fun. We played in tidepools and grabbed little hermit crabs who desperately wanted to be returned to their spots in the cool water. Then I did what I always do, which is to go out almost as far as it is possible to without putting myself in real danger.

But it had been a while since we'd had pub food, and nearly 24 hours since we'd had chips. Yes, time to go eat dinner. We actually had a really nice dinner, except for the fact that the food wasn't all that good. I don't know what that pork tenderloin did to the cook, but he certainly made up for it, by cooking the living hell out of it. But for some reason I didn't mind, because I was having fun. There were actually some vegetables served with the chips this time, and it's possible those actually saved us from malnutrition, but we'll never know for sure. What I do know, is that there were 3 german men who walked in, and two of them had matching coveralls, and didn't know how to ask me for the salt. But we sorted it out, and we worked out a deal for the salt after some rough translation.

When we were looking for a place to eat (there were three choices: takeaway pub food, nicer pub food, and the dreaded Irish/Chinese food), we noticed that Spiddal was Gaeltacht, or native Irish speaking. The road signs had no English translations, nor did the restaurant signs. Sure everyone spoke English, and the menus weren't in Gaelic, but it was a bit strange. Not a bad way.

But I don't think that was why we couldn't understand the man who kept speaking to us at the bar. At least I don't think so. This was our first, and unfortunately only experience with absolutely shitfaced old Irish men. I got Linds and I 2 pints of Guinness, and he just kept talking, but we didn't understand one word. At one point, he asked if we were Fins, which was an indicator that he was out in space, since, as I said, Americans stand out like, well, Americans. But he was harmless if not altogether eloquent, and other than the fact that Lindsay wouldn't let me leave her when I wanted to go to the bathroom, we had a nice time. The town was small and quiet, and there weren't many tourists, so we just hung out, and then walked back to sleep for the night. After all, the following day, we were off to the Aran Islands, where it would be raining.

The Full Irish Breakfast

We woke up, packed our stuff, and went down to the breakfast area where it was in fact time for the Full Irish Breakfast. Our second bed and breakfast, The Castle House, had no other breakfast options, so they served the traditional breakfast I've previously described. It came on a heaping giant plate of food, which was obviously something we were getting used to, and I'll be honest, the puddings didn't really seem all that freaky at first. So I decided to eschew my normal hesitancy, and give those puddings a try. There were 2; black pudding and white pudding. Black pudding is beef or pork fat, some salt and pepper, grains, and some fresh pig's blood. White pudding is the same, but without the vampiric ingredient. Wanna make our own? Go here. Now apparently no one in Ireland thinks this is a strange meal, but who am I to begrudge a people who have until relatively recently gotten by on the best of a small amount of available food. If I had to live on a diet of 85% potatoes, I would very likely feel like experimenting with pig's blood as well. Fortunately, for me, I got to experience the joy of many excellently prepared Irish potatoes (normally fried), but unfortunately, I also decided to give the black pudding the benefit of the doubt.

It was not good. I barely found the napkin in time, and I most certainly didn't make it with a swallow. Remember the picture with the Guinness? It was kind of like that, but much worse. I also came to sort of enjoy the Guinness, where I fear the pig's blood market is going to always be shy of my business.

I don't eat eggs, so I put mine on Lindsay's plate. She got one egg, and I got two, because I guess they feed men more as a matter of course. And she couldn't eat that much, so when we left, it looked like I'd eaten all mine, and she actually found a way to not eat hers, and produce one more. It's not fair, but that's how it worked out. The bacon was sort of palatable, but then sort of not. It's about the size of a medium or large dog's ear, and there's a little tail hat hangs off. That part is like American bacon, and the other part is like that, but without fat, and more like the texture of leather. After the pudding attempt, I fear the sausage had no chance. It was just too similar. And that left the tomato, which was sadly on its own, and I didn't want it.

In an effort to avoid sounding like the pickiest and whiniest eater on the face of the earth (which I know I'm not, because that would have been me at age 10, and I'm much better now, believe it or not), I do have to say that before any of this happened, it didn't really matter because almost every day, we filled up on brown bread and toast. Every morning, they made with the brown bread, and Irish butter, and that stuff is just ridiculously good. Then came the toast, which was a huge amount of toast. I'd eat some fruit, have a bit of tea, and some juice, and I'm full before they bring the real breakfast. By the end, I just told them to not bother bringing the whle cooked breakfast, because the waste of food was getting to me.

In this dining room, there was a family of British people with exceptionally posh accents. In the center of them was their grandmother, who asked each member of her family, about 8-9 times, how they'd slept, and what they were doing that day. Her voice was magnificent in it's comedy. It was high pitched and squeaky, as if it was off an old re-run on PBS with lots of old people which teenage girls who practice Wicca think is funny. And every time she repeated the questions, it got funnier and funnier. For the record, they slept fine, and the girl was going to resume her windsurfing lessons. Oh yes, they windsurf in Ireland, and they'll teach you how to do it as well.

We didn't really have much to do on this day, and we didn't have that far to go, so we were going to take it easy. Originally, we would have had to drive around the mouth of the Shannon River, into Limerick, and then back to go up the coast, and get to the Cliffs of Moher, and then find a place to stay, but we figured out that there was a ferry that crossed the Shannon, and would avoid Limerick, and let us stay on the coast, and not have to inland. It saved about an hour or two.

Plus the ferry was wicked cool. Maybe it wouldn't be all that cool if you'd done it a bunch of times, or perhaps it wouldn't be that cool if you were on it and it crashed like in Grey's Anatomy, and you lost your face, and then got rejected by the jerky, but hunky doctor, but it was cool to me. The Shannon is a big river too. The trip was about 20 minutes across, and this morning was one of the first we experienced with any kind of weather. It was a little foggy and rainy, but not really very cold, so after the ferry took off, we were able to go up and take a look around as we crossed the river. Plus they had a snack bar.

After driving off the ferry, we took off up the coast towards the Cliffs of Moher, which was really our only destination of the day. We drove through a lot of small towns, and stopped a lot, and moved along, and repeated it, all going slowly up the coast and finally, started climbing a bit towards where the cliffs here. But the higher we climbed, the foggier it kept getting. And as we pulled in to the parking lot, the visibility dropped down to about 4-13 inches. Now, I'm not even going to begin to complain about the weather, because I still think we picked about the luckiest week in the history of Irish weather to travel, which you can see in the pictures, but this did kind of blow.

Why did it blow? Out of everything in the entire country, Lindsay really wanted to see the Cliffs? Was it because they were some of the highest sea cliffs in Europe? No, but it was used as the image for the Dread Pirate Roberts as he pursued Princess Buttercup in the Princess Bride. And therefore, it's very near where a Sicilian would have been messed with, as death was on the line.

That was the nerdiest thing I might have ever written, and I run a comic book website.

Anyway, I drove into the wrong entrance, and I pulled up to the gate for tour buses. They wouldn't let me in, justifiably, but she just told me that I was in the wrong place. But while she was telling me this, a bus pulled up behind me, pinning me against the gate. He got out, and came and told me that I was in the wrong place, but at the point, the lady on the intercom was non-receptive, so I held up a busload of people for a while. They eventually opened the gate, and my stupid foreigner time was over. I'd like to point out that the bus driver was the nicest person outside of the B&B owners we may have met the entire time in Ireland.

So the Cliffs...may well have been there. But we couldn't tell you because the fog didn't give much away. As you walked up and up, you ended up closer to the edge, and the only place you could see anything was just past a big sign that said, "DON'T GO PAST THIS POINT," which is where everyone went of course, because apparently, there's no security in Ireland. If you want to be a jackass, and fall off a 600 foot cliff, go nuts, because we warned you. Yeah, that's Lindsay's head right in the center above the sign. It took some convincing, but she went. So I went and peered down at the ocean, but I felt like I kind of missed the spectacle of the whole thing. There were huge numbers of people just staring out at grey nothing. And they were taking pictures. Well, so were we, but we were doing it ironically, so that's better.

Then, just as we were about to give up, the fog lifted, and pulled about 50 feet away from the cliffs for about 10 minutes. It was pretty nice, but we didn't get the big sea view. Also, at this point, people felt the need to start hopping the barricades, and trundling up to the sheer open cliff face to get a view. Some brought very small children. At least in America we have rules, and they're very often followed because of fears of the electric chair. Or so I'm lead to believe.

But, I can tell you that they have a very nice cafeteria at the Cliffs of Moher. I had an Irish Stew that was awesome. Much better than the canned crap from the first day in Dublin, and Lindsay had some other thing I don't remember, but I remember she liked it, and that's pretty notable.

The drive down from the cliffs was incredible. There were these sort of mountain switchback roads, and I think it's quite possible I nearly lost Lindsay to an early heart failure on that drive. I'll grant you, it was a bit narrow. It was raining a bit, and it was a bit hard to see, and finally, it was a bit scary. But it was a whole lot of fun as well. You could watch the video to hear Lindsay's terror, and my cackles of glee.



We took a littel detour at this point, because at the bottom on the hill, I turned left instead of right, and after about 40 minutes or so, I thought, "hey, is the ocean supposed to be on our right side?" It wasn't, and after talking to a tour bus driver and confirming our mistake, I turned around on a scary narrow seaside road and nearly grounded out the car on some immense looking rocks. We were trying to make it to a certain castle before they closed for the night, and we just about made it. Oh well, we got some nice pictures of the outside. I still haven't seen a sky that looked that good since I've been back, and I'm looking for it. No photoshop there. That's actually what color things were there. There was, that evening a medieval style banquet, but we actually didn't have te necessary formal wear to participate. That may not have been the reason, but it sounds good.

Now it was starting to get a bit later, and we had nowhere to stay, so we decided to make for Galway, which is apparently the coolest city on the west coast of Ireland. No, there's nothing terribly touristy or historic in Galway, but there are lots of young people, and a music scene, and good restaurants, and all that. We checked the book, and thought it might be a good night to get a hotel, so we found a place in the middle of the city, and like many of the other places we tried to find, we magically ended up in front of it. It's true. We just kept ending up in front of the place we were headed, over and over, without really trying. The whole place was a little creepy that way.

The Hotel Meyrick came highly recommended by our little book, which would explain why the price in real life was a great deal higher than what it said in the book. But what the hell, we were under budget for the day. The lobby was all black, and just about too cool for us. But then when we got to the room, we were brought a bit more down to earth. The sun was actually directly outside of the window, so the room was about 145 degrees farenheit. Or whatever that is in centigrade. Plus, it so happened that just outside this window was not a gorgeous view of the center of Galway City, but rather a busy bus terminal that operated all night. Lindsay's the tough one, so she got us a new room, which was slightly cooler, and a crappy view, but at least it didn't make any noise. Also, hotel rooms in Ireland don't come with air conditioning, which makes sense, because it's not hot that often there. But one some days, or any days we tried to get hotel rooms, it could have used it.

We got spruced up and went out to find some food. Only at this point, it was sunday night, and things close in Ireland on sunday night. So we did quite a large loop around Galway City, and finally we found a somewhat swanky hotel with a very nice restaurant, and we had a great dinner. For once, I don't remember exactly what we ate, but I remember they had great bread.

On the way back to the hotel, we found the lively part of the city with all the cool restaurants and people all over the place, but what are you gonna do?

Besides ask the locals or the hotel concierge I mean. But I think she was away from her post when we left the hotel, and my experience asking concierges for recommendations never really turned out that well.

There had been a great deal of driving and walking up to this point, so we decided to try and get some sleep, and turned in sort of early.

Besides, there was a breakfast in the hotel the next morning. Oh yes. All you can eat Irish breakfast buffet!

Tomorrow, we drive for about 40 minutes. Sweet.

The Two Words were Failte and Slainte

But in reality, I probably know more than that. You see, when you're trying to be all entertaining with the writing, you say things that aren't necessarily true, but are just slightly more interesting than the real thing. There I've given it away. But I learned it from Frank McCourt, so it's sort of appropriate, isn't it? There's still a question though. What do the words mean, and more importantly, how are they pronounced. Well, I had to wait to find out, so you'll have to as well.

We woke in Cashel and headed down to our first Irish breakfast. I had been weary about the idea of Irish Breakfasts, which are much hailed for their heartiness and goodness. But here's the thing: I'm not much of a breakfast guy, because I don't really like breakfast food all that much. And you heard how it went with the bagels. An Irish Breakfast consists of eggs (Never ate eggs), tomato (which makes a fantastic ingredient when it's in something), sausage (could go either way, because there is a lot of different sausage out there), bacon (I had thought that there was no way to go wrong with bacon), and usually black and white pudding (which will be explained, but suffice to say, the name isn't nearly descriptive enough). This is all I knew going in. But we were told this morning that we had our choice of several options at breakfast (yay!), and we both went for the pancakes (yay!), which weren't really as good as American pancakes (Aww!), but good enough (yay!). There was also, at each breakfast, we would learn, brown bread, toast, butter, orange juice, and tea. We really go into the whole tea thing while we were there. I miss that.

We were sat with some British people who weren't so into talking to us. Now, we're not the most outgoing couple in the world, but we were sitting there in silence, when Lindsay shocked me by taking the bull by the horns, and starting up some conversation with them. Bless her heart, she went right in while I was thinking about it, and they were avoiding it. I would place them in the age range of the 50's, middle class, and from somewhere in England I couldn't identify by accent. Not much came of it, but dammit, we tried!

It was 2 hours to Killarney, which was at the edge of the Ring of Kerry, our destination and activity for the day. When we got to Killarney, we were overwhelmed by a tourist trap. It was campers, and rented cars, and people from just everywhere in the world walking around waiting to hand out money for overpriced everything to the waiting merchants. We learned that if you just sort of follow the road and signs, you'll end up in the middle of town every time, and before we knew it, we were held up in traffic behind a lot of cars looking for spaces that weren't necessarily there. But I admit I did myself proud by finding and parallel parking in one that happened to open up. Please don't forget, it was reverse parallel parking as well. No mean feat. We popped a euro in the parking meter (US equivalent: $87), and went off for our allotted hour.

There were basically a lot of shops selling Irish knickknacks, and I started seeing a ton of places who sell crap with Irish names on them. I read that there are 4 million people living in Ireland, but 40 million people who live elsewhere, but say they're Irish, so this is a big industry to sell "authentic" crap with the "Irish" names on them. But sure, I looked through it. Wouldn't you? I've already got Flanagan coasters, and I don't really need a shotglass. The next step up is the big plaque with the crest and family motto. For the record, the Flanagan crest and motto is pretty badass. The motto is "Certavi et vici" or "I have fought and conquered," which I like, because it's already done. Much nicer than, "I will fight and conquer," which sounds very hard. And you can't beat the flaming sword and the tree of knowledge. Awesome. I didn't end up buying any of that, but I admit the pull was ever so slightly there.

So we had a bit of lunch at some place who had handmade ice cream (vegetable soup and brown bread for me, some sandwich with chips for Lindsay), and we were on our way. After some "discussion" about whether to do the Ring clockwise, or counter-clockwise, we couldn't figure out how to go for the latter, so we accepted the former.

Today was the day Lindsay did the most praying. Now for a woman who isn't really at all spiritual, this was of note. You see, the Ring of Kerry is an old, windy, narrow road, and unlike the roads we'd seen so far, this one has a sea cliff along one side of much of it. There are also other cars who are ostensibly in their own lane, but the idea of two lanes is nebulous at best. Plus there's the aforementioned ability to go at what seems like a high rate of speed, often by people who are not driving in their accustomed driver alignment. For me, it translates to big fun. For Lindsay, it means a lot of gasping and clenching from the left side of the vehicle.

So what of this Ring? Is it really as good as all that? Yes it is. It's astonishingly beautiful, and we were blessed, not for the only time, with gorgeous clear weather. I've grown up on the coast of Maine, and I've driven down the Pacific Coast Highway, and so far, this is the winner. There's something about the color of the hills and sky in Ireland that just blows away anything else I've ever seen. Every corner you turn has the same ingredients, but they're mixed together in such a way that they seem completely new. It's absolutely stunning, and I thought that perhaps that this might be as good as it gets, but it got better in the days that followed. So yeah, it's a nice place to visit.

But then something bad happened.

We stopped in some little town about halfway around the ring, and got out. There was big cathedral there (and everywhere in Ireland), where we went in to look and Lindsay took some pictures. Not being a churchgoer ever in my life, it's odd to be in a place where religion is so omnipresent, or at least was up to a few years back. But I don't even have any idea what's appropriate, so we went with a tone of general respect and looked around, and came out. Just after this, we're walking down the street towards a little market that was set up on the street. All of a sudden, Lindsay has whipped around, and she's yelling at some kid. I didn't even see what happened, but apparently, she got shot in the butt by a pellet gun. I'm sure that if I was any kind of a man, I'd have chased the kids and beaten them up or something, but the fact is, they were gone before I even saw them. Besides, I'm not sure how international law works, but beating kids can't ever be good. This kind soured Lindsay on the town, so we hopped back in the car, and gave the scenery a little time to soothe the wound sustained in the awful little town with the nice cathedral and shitty little 12 year olds.

Again, this was a further example of never really feeling terribly welcome in Ireland, especially in the first few days. The sentiment towards us was always professional and courteous, but well shy of friendly. We were there, and they were there, and that worked for the most part, but there wasn't a lot of personal contact that made me think that anyone actually wanted us around for that long. I suppose I have that coming, since I work in the Empire State Building, and I make a habit of silently cursing mouth-breathing- sidewalk slowing,-taking pictures of goddamned everything in creation - tourists on a daily basis. But I do do it silently. I don't know what I was expecting really, but we were determined not to let it get us down too much.

That forgotten and left behind us, we still had a long way to go. We stopped in another town in desperate need of toilets.

Side note: In Ireland, you say "toilet." You don't say restroom or bathroom, but just "toilet," a word we tend not to use directly here. It feels a bit like you're being impolite, just a step removed from "John," but you get over it.

We stopped at a little coffee and tea place run by a man supposedly in his foyer, where I made the mistake of ordering a carrot cake. They forgot to mention that there was absolutely no sugar in this dessert at all, but we made it through OK with a pot of tea (love that tea!). It was a strange place where it was in this gorgeous spot on the coast, but it was just shy of what we would consider appropriately professional. I was a fan of the novelty of the whole thing, but the bathroom really was kind of nasty.

One of Lindsay's goals was to get some up close pictures of sheep. Ireland is literally full of sheep. You couldn't fit anymore if you tried. However, regardless of what it looks like, they do not want to be hugged. Or if they do, they don't know it, because they run away with very little provocation. At one point, there were some sheep who'd managed to escape the fencing, and were strewn about the road, just waiting to be exploded by passing, ignorant vehicles. So we thought that would be a good time to get out of the car, and try to take pictures of them while also ushering them to safety. Of course, this caused them to run away from us, and more into the road than they had been, and we never really got close enough for that elusive great sheep shot.

Turning back inland near the end of the ring, we drove through the Killarney National Forest, where we found a place, the only one we saw in Ireland, who let you frolic among, and get close to their sheep. It was a sheep petting emporium of sorts. Alas, it had just closed, and once more, the sheep were not to be in Lindsay's vicinity. But driving through the forest was something else altogether, as the land morphed once again into something new and beautiful with these great hills and lakes, and trees, and just more scenic pretty than you knew what to do with. There was almost no direction we couldn't point the camera and come out with something nice.

That evening we had a reservation at a Bed and Breakfast on the northern coast of the Dingle Peninsula, which is just north of where we were. It was getting pretty late though, so we hauled back through Killarney (which we took no pictures of either time), and drove out to the most rural of places we'd been, a town called Castlegregory. Apparently, the incidentally named Conor Pass, which runs along the southern side of the peninsula was something to see, but we wouldn't know, cuz we didn't see it. We got to the B&B, and there were some young, tough looking polish people wearing a great deal of name brand clothing across the hall from us. We headed off into town where we looked for food, and ended up coming up short on choice, and ate some burgers (it took 3 days) in a pub. They were actually really good, and came with chips of all things. The accents were getting thicker as we travelled up the coast, and it was starting to get harder to understand some of the older people, like the guy who ran the pub. We were told that there was live music that night, and figuring that we'd need to hear traditional Irish music at least once, we stopped back in a little later, got a couple of pints of Guiness. I tried to order Beamish, which is a stout brewed on in Cork, and therefore closer to to where we were, and despite the fact that the room was covered in Beamish ads, I was told they don't serve Beamish. Oh well. I made it through most of this Guiness without wincing. But one was enough.

The music we heard was in no way traditional. It was something wholly other. I'm not even sure I can explain it. There were three of them. The singer was not unlike Sonny Bono in look, and there was an acoustic guitar, and some keyboards. The music was a mixture of standards, and a couple of Beatles songs and some country favorites. He didn't know all the words to any of the songs, but he tried his damnedest to sing when he clearly had no ability to do so. It was odd, and somewhat charming, but not really what we were looking for. Down the road, on the way home, there was another pub, attached to a youth hostel, where apparently, every 18 year old in Ireland had gone to hear a rock band that actually sounded really good play. Lindsay and I both thought we'd heard Eddie Vedder singing some song we'd never heard of from the road. We went over to check it out, but the place was chock full of people right at the entrance, and we just weren't energetic enough to deal. But this was in the middle of what seemed like nowhere, so that was a bit strange.

So we went to bed, because tomorrow was another early start, and it was already 1 AM. We got no extra sleep on this vacation. No one said it would be easy.

Next: Puddings and Ferries. I liked one. The other, not so much.