Galway- Our Rain day!

We made it through another rainy night!

Up at 8 and a short walk in for coffee & breakfast. Walked around but it's raining hard so... seeing as the casino was open we popped in to see what an Irish casino looked like. It's full of slots with a couple electronic roulette tables. I think there were only 3 people in the  place so Kelly spotted a machine and dropped in €5. In four spins it hit for a €50 payout! We left😄 👍

We went back to the flat and grabbed the car for some rainy sightseeing/geocaching. Kelly also elected to use her Hunter Wellie boots as her shoes were suffering water leakage.

Wellie boot time!

 On the way we stopped for some diesel for the car ($1.79cdn a liter) and headed into town. We found some parking and walked over to the Galway City Museum... which it turns out, is closed Mondays! Arghh!

River Corrib

We walked over to the High Street area with shops galore. Kelly was in her glory! Wool shop after wool shop to investigate.

High Street in Galway

Well said!

Old bars in these parts.

High Street 2

 We went in and listened to the organ player at St Nicholas Collegiate Church. He played beautiful music so we sat & listened. Lots of interesting dedications on the walls & stain glass of course.

Amazing music!

Gorgous Stain Glass

Dedication to Jane Eyre

More shop stops as we worked our way around the area. Lots to see and plenty of eateries for every type of food. As the rains continued we decided on the Movie Dunkirk playing at the IMC theater.. nice way to be inside for a few hours. The movie was very good.

It appears as though the eclipse happens every day on the west coast of Ireland!

Back to drop the car off and walk over to the center of Salthill. Kelly is famished do we set out to fix that problem. An early dinner at the Oslo followed by a nice walk along the waterfrontduring a break in the rain.It is now the nicest it's been since our arrival. Kelly spotted a leprechaun's car and had a picture taken proving once and for all that they do exist!

Yep it belongs to a Leprechaun!

Finally in the water... sort of!

Beach rock.

Black Rock Diving Tower.. lots of people out there!

 Back at the flat, we relaxed and enjoy the rest of the evening. Tired tonight so an early one for us.

Galway Girl here we come!

FYI "Galway Girl" is a popular Irish song that we have heard many times now! Just seems appropriate :-)

Kelly made coffee and we relaxed in our room prior to breakfast. Same cloudy, rain filled skies this morning unfortunately. See a trend here!

We are doing a little bit of planning on the fly as we had done none prior to the Galway portion. We looked at some airB&B's around the area and found a nice one up in Cong for the 22nd & 23rd. (This is the place that the movie "Quiet Man" was filmed many years ago and also home to Ashford Castle. It's a bit old... first built in 1228)

We headed downstairs for our full Irish breakfast.. again.Kelly filled out a post card for Lauren and we planned the route to the B&B in Galway. (Route planning via google maps to Galway(via N67 then N18 then N6)

Enjoying our morning coffee. Irish breakfast on the way!

Texted with Kris as he is boarding his flight back to Victoria via Toronto & Vancouver. All good with his flights.

We departed at 0:27 and had a wet drive around the various bays and towns that dot the coastline via Ballyvaughan, Bealaclugga, Kinvarra, Kilcolgan, Clarinbridge and Oranmore to Galway. Couple of nice churches that we planned to stop at but being Sunday they were pre-booked :-)

Once in Galway (Salthill area) we went to find the B&B and parked out front at 11:55. Pretty good time considering we didn't rush and the weather was crappy. I set up the car gps as "home" and because our chekin time was 2PM, we went for a nice drive out west to see the area.  The beach area is very close and we quickly found our dinner spot Da Robertas this evening! The dinner is with Paul Houlihan, former Team Manager of the Irish F3A Team that I met in Muncie, IN years ago at the Worlds. Easy 5 minute walk for us.

The weather is not great with 15 knot winds and continuous rain coming down. We headed west to Spiddal West and checked out the wee town. We stopped out on the pier that had no docks, just the boats moored for the tidal flow. Much different from what we see at home.  A return back towards Galway with s stop for lunch at a Padraicins Seafood Bar & Restaurant. The seafood chowder was excellent along with the smoked salmon salad. High Recommendation from us!

The port in Spiddal. Boats are rear roped to a pulley and pulled in to access.

Our ride for the week.

After lunch it was back to the airB&B in Salthill to unload our luggage. We met Suzie the proprietor and her daughter Emma and quickly settled in to the room. It's a large room with a huge window looking out onto the street with a double bed, separate shower and a toilet in a room next door. It will work well for us. The internet is ballistic here! Only dream of this back home!

Can't complain about internet speed here!

We went for a walk down to the main shopping area of Salthill with its many casinos. FYI We did not know about the Casinos!!  As this is a summer tourist "meca" the casinos are here to extract money from the tourist crowd.

We grabbed a few items for the room and headed back to relax. Showered and ready we headed off to the  Oslo Pub to meet Paul and his wife Ros for a drink

Paul and I get caught up.... Irish style!

After introductions we had a drink and delved into conversation. Lots of RC stuff as well as local spots of interest for our travels and explorations over the next few days. Dinner was across the street at Da Robertas and it was fantastic. We had a great evening learning of Ros's new found family and Paul's RC exploits. ( I know where his RC field is so hopefully a stop in on Tuesday!)

It was great to get caught up and always nice to see people that are local but you also have a previous connection with. We hope to reciprocate the visit if they ever get to the west coast of Canada sometime.

One last stop at O'Conners (our band-mates would love this place!) for a drink then a quick 5 minute walk home and it was into the rack. A great day all round.

(Also texted with Kris... in YYZ now and on the 16:10 flight to YVR ....sitting in a big seat of course!

Doolin and Area

Up at 8am and we headed downstairs for our full Irish breakfast. It was delicious as was the coffee.

Texted with Kris and the gang. Off to the pier after picking up Kris from his B&B and meeting his nice host. We met everyone and had a look at the passenger boats loading up then making their way across to the Aran Isles. The boats pounded through the surf and Kelly was getting sick just watching them.  Glad she was not on it!

A tad windy!!

Boats loading passengers.

 We stopped back at the shops and said our goodbyes to the Mackays and Kris. They are heading back to Dublin now to catch a certain show at the Merchant's Arch.

Kelly & Shelley shopped the various woolen shops that made of the commercial part of the town... or should I just say road. Kelly found a nice sweater and then it was off to the woolen mill (actually just another store) Doug & Shelley then headed back to Dublin and we headed over to see the Cliffs of Moher. It looked pretty busy so we headed down the hill to the town of Liscannor.  Yep another wool shop to peruse while I did blog notes 😄

Around the bend was another coastal community of Lahinch. A huge sandy beach was home to surfers, kite surfers and swimmers!!!  It's 14 degrees out!! They also have a nice golf course adjacent to the beach area.

Lahinch, Ireland

Pano of the bay.

 We stopped and parked at a Vantage point and hiked over to the cliff edge. Panoramic views of the beach & golf courses.

Latte time for us as we walked the streets of Lahinch. The huge beach is a very popular surf area with a large amount for surf shops and schools. Although cool by our standards everyone is enjoying the water it seems.

Kelly also grabbed a post card for Lauren then we headed to the Cliffs of Moher . Huge crowds and a full parking lot made us skip it until later when everyone was headed home:-)

Back towards Doolin with a drive through to countryside. We stopped at The Smokehouse in Burren and sampled some salmon before crossing the street for our first Irish Geocache.

Cliffs of Moher

.Queen and her castle

More great views.

A little windy but dry!!

Amazing views!

 After a quick pit stop at the B&B we headed back to the Cliffs to get some exercise :-) Amazing views as the weather was cooperating nicely. (No rain!)

Back to Doolin to drop the car off and walk down the street. A little reconnoiter and we found a nice spot for dinner. It was right beside McGanns Pub and it is called The Riverside Bistro. Incredibly good mussels and caprice salad to start and then a fabulous stuffed chicken dinner for Kelly and a steak dinner for myself. Very good.

Back to the B&B to relax and unwind. Our bodies are in shock though.... no pub food lol

Surfing the net for a B&B later in the week... thinking lakeside now.

Going West

Up to the sound of an alarm nearby... arghh not the quietest place for sure. Kelly made some coffee and I got ready to go first to clear the deck:-)

Kris arrived as expected at 9 am and we grabbed a cab to the car rental agency at the airport. After some upgrades we departed in our BMW for the town of Doolin. Why Doolin you ask? Well apparently Doug & Shelley saw a Netflix movie about the pubs & their local Irish music in Ireland and this was rated as one of the best so... off we go! 

M1 to M50 to M4 to M6....Coast Route--- past Farnablake take Athery turn off to R348 (5 circles) Left on L3104 jog on R446 to L4102 to N18 near Clarindridge right on N67 to R478 to Doolin  3:22/255km . At 10:20 we were on the road in our BMW.  Although we hasd some toll roads on our route but it was straight forward... throw coins in a basket or one that takes a picture of your car and you go online to submit payment.

We stopped in Ballinasloe and the local LIDL for a pit stop then found a great little place for lunch at Kariba's. Very good home cooked food!

14:42 we arrived in Doolin.  Wind, rain and more wind as the remnants of hurricane Gert passed through.

Quick check in at our B&B, arranged breakfast and then unloaded the car with Kris's help. Nice big room with views of cows and the surrounding area :-)  Off to the local pub McDermott's recommended by Michael our B&B host. I could almost through a rock and hit it.

Jill, Drew, Jenny, Doug  & Shelley returned from the Cliffs of Mohor joined us and we got caught up on events. The wind was hollowing up there so it wasn't much fun. Some of the routes where closed in fact. We had a nice dinner as Kris arranged a place to stay close by.  We started our "Musical Pub Crawl" across the road at McGanns.

We made it to Doolin!

Drinks with the gang!

 The lineup was out the door so we booked some seats and waited outside. After less than 15 minutes we were escorted to the best viewing table in the house.. and it was!! Unfortunately the millennial's in this three piece group seemed more interest in Facebook and texting in between individual tunes. 4-5 minute breaks after each tune to "socialize"....  after three tunes we headed down the road back to the first pub... good music but huge crowd so we moved on down to the next pub called Fitzpatricks. It was packed as well with a single fellow on a guitar ( he didn't seemed to interested for some reason )

Awaiting our table...and music!

Next s stop at Gus O'Conner's and it too was hopping with live music from five people playing various instruments. The music was the best we heard tonight so we finally sat down and enjoyed a pint and a sing-a-long. We packed it in at midnight for the walk back to the B&B. Kris & Jenny stayed till the end though. 

Off to bed.... no wireless here but will use hotspot to upload the blog and add a few pictures when I get better connectivity.  

The Word for the Day is "Guinness"

Moving a tad slow today after a great evening of music. Kelly was up and headed to Tescos for some coffee cream and a danish while I showered up.

Coffee was excellent as I finished up the blog from the day before... yep life gets in the way sometimes. .Kelly was ready to go and we grabbed a cab over to the Guinness storehouse. We had a 10:45 time slot and didn't want to miss it!! The huge block of buildings is very impressive and the displays of the Guinness operation were incredible. A must do if you are here!

We made it!

The name says it all.

Kelly concentrates!!

Gravity bar.

The different levels of the showrooms explained in great detail, the whole operation from clean mountain water, locally grown barley & hops etc right through to the sampling of the final product in the Gravity bar.  The 360 degree views from this vantage point really impressed us.

They also showed how things had changed over the years as technology and innovation made the production easier. The coopers story was most impressive as they hand made hundreds of thousands of barrels over the years. All to be replaced in later life.

The huge gift shop proved irresistible to Kelly as she picked up a few items and I also got a nice shirt. Kelly & I grabbed a bite of lunch as the trek through the Guinness facility was wearing us out!

Next we walked over towards Trinity College to check out the park and older buildings that still provide schooling for students. We also made a stop at Dublin Castle along the way. Very convenient cover for when it rained.

Dublin Castle

Trinity College

Trinity College

A quick stop at the apartment to drop of the shopping then it was off to find Kris and the others for a pint. They were at the Brazen Head Pub (est:1198 and the oldest pub in Ireland) and we joined Kris. Chelsea, Austin and little London for a glass. They had been at the zoo today and had some nice pics to share. They headed back to their apartment while Kris, Kelly & I went looking for a light dinner... yep a fish supper again!! 

A long way from home!

 We walked around looking for a geocache while Kris headed back to change. No luck with the cache so off to the  Old Stonehouse Pub to watch some live music from the fellow we saw last night. He was very good but played to a dinner crowd so the music was lighter than we saw last night.

We pulled the pin early and headed back at 9 PM.

A little packing and blogging as we head out to the west coast tomorrow

Off to Dublin

Kelly's alarm woke us at 7 am and coffee was poured shortly after. Showers, packing and then awaited our chauffeured ride to the Birmingham airport (BXH).

Dan was early so we loaded up the car and headed off via the M6 to the airport at 09:14.. yes early!!

The M6 has the only Toll portion of highway in England and it also has variable speed control. The big LED speed signs change as required to flow traffic through. There is never any stopping so no real delays. Dan also mentioned that a speed camera is right behind these signs so best not to exceed the limit.

We arrived at the airport at 10:00 and dropped the car at the Train depot parking lot. A short ride on a small passenger train took us to the main terminal. By 10:15 the bags were checked and we headed upstairs to Frankie & Benny's for breakfast. Someone is starting vacation early with a mimosa!!

Through security and at the gate with minimal fuss. The Ryan Air B737-800 pushed a bit late @ 12:18 and we parked in Dublin at 13:37. Through Customs and we easily grabbed a cab down to Parnell street and our AirBnB.

Away we go to Ireland

English countryside

Love technology... this is us (blue dot) on final to DUB

Unfortunately it is located 3 stories up and no lift! We packed our stuff up and checked out the place. Small but tidy and clean and will do for our short time in Dublin. It took us a few minutes to sort out the electrical as everything is switched off. Using the blow dryer as a tester we had it sorted out:-)



After texting with Kris, we headed off towards the Temple Bar district which is only a 9 minute walk from our place. Quick stop at Starucks for some via's. We met up at the Auld Dublin Pub and enjoyed catching up and celebrating London's 1st Birthday!

Look a pedestrian shopping area!

Great looking little pubs dot the corners.

River Liffey

Pedestrian bridge

Pub lunch with the crew

London is the birthday girl!

After a bite of late lunch (smoked salmon to die for) we walked around the area and got a feel of the atmosphere. Did I mention that the Guinness is very good! The gals went and did some shopping so the guys popped into the Norseman Pub to enjoy the live music that was going on. This place was established in 1696!

Temple Bar

I liked the number

Tesco stop for some supplies then we went back to the loft apartment that the crew were staying. Very nice corner spot with lots of room.

After a small birthday celebration for London we headed off to find some live music for the balance of the evening. They had watched a band the previous night and wanted to find them again.. if possible. We walked past several bars and listened to tier offerings when Kelly said lets try the Merchants Arch wwich is right by the pedestrian bridge. Low and behold it was the guitar player from the previous night along with a fiddler. This was the spot to be so we found some chairs and spent the evening enjoying these musicians talents. Turns out his name is Zach and he is only 20. Amazing artist I will say!

Evening's entertainment

End of the night!

We shut the place down and headed back home to bed. A great first night in Ireland!