Ireland

Earlier this year, Brian's employer, Novell, was bought out by another company. You're probably wondering what this has to do with Ireland right? Well, his new director is located in Ireland and all the managers for the European offices were planning to attend meetings in Galway, Ireland. I was planning something else! Another American family from our Church offered to watch the kids for an extended weekend so Brian & I could get away to Ireland before the managerial meetings took place.

We flew to Dublin on Friday afternoon, rented a car and headed out into the countryside. I wasn't thinking clearly when I reserved the rental car. In Ireland, which was formerly associated with Great Britain, they drive on the opposite side of the road; no big deal, Brian was able to manage just fine in England last year. I reserved a manual transmission car, which is what I usually reserve. Problem, the stick is also on the opposite side of the steering wheel! It's a good think Brian is so skilled!

The countryside was beautiful with a variety of vegetation. We saw a little stream that was heavy on iron and it lead to a pretty waterfall.

Our first destination was Glendalough, a monastic ruin site dating from AD 498 to the 17th Century. There were a few falling down buildings, lots of head stones and a round tower.

We made it to Kilkenny quite late, as the GPS and Google maps excessively underestimated the driving time along the country roads. Now this wasn't the fault of either companies, but the highly erroneous posted speed limit. Nobody, besides a rally-race car driver on a closed course, would drive that fast on those type of roads, and live to tell the tale!

Kilkenny was a nice little town with a castle on the river. We were able to walk around the town in a few hours. We had intermittent rain, sun and clouds that day. It was cool to watch the formation of the clouds from across the valley.

Next stop was the Rock of Cashel, a 1000 years-old castle on the top of a rocky green hill that overlooks the valley in all directions. Within the walls are a collection of historical religious buildings, a round tower and a 12th-century Romanesque chapel. When we started the tour it was sunny with blue skies. By the end, it was a down-pour. The weather can change quite drastically and quickly on the island! I'm not a huge fan of the symbol of the cross, but the Celtic High Cross we were seeing at all of these monastic ruin sites is pretty cool; the Celtic aspect making the difference I think. When the Christians came to Ireland, they cleverly combined the symbol of the cross with the pagan belief of worshiping the sun, hence the circle around the cross.

While we were driving to our next destination, we came across some cows being herded along the road. This is not an unfamiliar site to me. However, one time shortly after getting married, Brian wanted me to take a picture of a cow being pulled in a small trailer behind a truck, another familiar site to this country girl, but an altogether hilarious site for Brian the "city boy"! I didn't take a picture that day years ago and Brian always reminds me of that occasion. I wasn't going to pass by on this opportunity to get a picture of some cows on the road, right next to Brian's window!

Talk about great luck, we saw a rainbow in Ireland, but couldn't find the end of it!

I think the highlight of the many sites in Ireland was the Cliffs of Moher or the "cliffs of insanity" as I like to call them! They are located on the west coast of Ireland, rising 203 meters from the ocean. It's a beautiful, but harsh area, continuously taking a beating from the wind coming off the ocean. There were several times while we were walking around that I had my breath taken away and could barely walk in the wind, fearing I'd get blown away if I let go of something solid!

You can see just how windy it was from this video.



I think I also liked this area of Ireland more than the others because we found a fantastic restaurant and I finally made a great reservation for the night, a little B&B that was so quaint. This was finally "mini-moon" quality!

At this point in our trip, we had crossed from the east to the west of Ireland, now it was time to cross back to Dublin. We visited another monastic ruin site called Clonmacnoise along the route. This route also happened to be the "Highway of the Kings" and the monastery here dates from AD 548.

Back in Dublin, we walked around the city, viewing the various churches, state buildings and popular tourist sites. We happened to be there the day of the All-Ireland final of Gaelic football. We caught a little from the outside of a pub, but it would have been really fun to attend the game.

We had a fabulous trip and would definitely like to spend some more time in Ireland, especially mini-moon style! Everyone needs more trips like this one.