In Honor of St. Paddy

Two years ago today I booked airfare for Greg and I to Ireland, to date, the best way I have ever celebrated St. Patrick's Day. We went in August of '09 for ten days. 
We spent the first three in Dublin and The Stag's Head was by far our favorite pub there. Far enough from Temple Bar to not be filled with tourists of the obnoxious sort. Exactly what you would hope a Dublin pub to be.

We did a lot of wandering about including around Trinity College and saw the famous Book of Kells there.

Given my interests, we ended up coming here, to the National Museum of Archaeology & History, all three days. Unfortunately, no picture taking was allowed inside, but in one word, amazing! The artifacts were straight out of the books.

Good food not for an arm and a leg is a bit hard to come by in Dublin, but luckily we learned about Avoca. They have multiple locations throughout Ireland (see below). The food in the café was really amazing as were the contents of the store. Knits to wear, cozy things for the home, bright colors = ♥. If you go to their website, you'll get the idea.

Of course, we visited the Guinness Storehouse.

Went on a tour here, Christchurch Cathedral.

Day four we picked up a car and drove north to County Meath and visited Knowth and Newgrange (below). 

Both are 5,000 year old passage tombs. Amazingly, Newgrange is still completely intact inside (Knowth has collapsed) and you are allowed access as part of the tour to the two sites.

On the morning of the winter solstice, sunlight enters the tomb through this box above the entrance, illuminating the passageway and burial chamber.  

There are a number of satellite tombs in the vicinity of the main ones.

And spectacular carvings on a number of the structural stones at both sites. I've been mesmerized by the concentric circles ever since I read about them in undergrad art history.

After our time spent in the Neolithic, later in the afternoon we moved on to the early Christian at Monasterboice, famous for its high crosses.

Next day we drove to Achill Island. 

We stayed here at the Bervie Guesthouse, a restored coastguard station in Keel. 

Amazingly beautiful setting that accentuated the coziness of the accommodations, and the owners were sweet as could be. This was my favorite place of all that we stayed. I wish we could have spent more time on the island.

We did have a nice walk around after arriving before a very yummy dinner back at our lodgings.

It seemed like life might just be a little simpler here.

Shaggy sheep roaming about munching on salty grass = my sort of place. (I have a thing for sheep. I'm sure it will come up again some time.)

In the morning it was on to Doolin in County Clare. 

Doolin is famous for traditional music and the session at McGann's didn't disappoint. Neither did the Guinness or Jameson.

Doolin is very near the Cliffs of Moher, so we went there the next morning. However the weather was horrendous, so we snapped our pics and were on our way.

Next up was the Dingle Peninsula, County Kerry. (This quaint abode was somewhere along on the way from County Clare.) 

To get to the town of Dingle, we took Conor Pass. Breathtaking. Quite literally.

Next day we took a guided (of course archaeological-themed) tour of the Peninsula as Greg needed a bit of a break from driving given the harrowingly narrow road of the day before.

We stopped to take in some natural scenery too. If you have a close look at the rock way out beyond the cove you'll see why it's known as The Dead Man. 

The tour took us to several early Christian sites including the Galarus Oratory, an early (somewhere between 6th and 10th century) church.

That afternoon we travelled on to Kenmare where we were treated to a rainbow, however, no pot of gold.

Our last full day we drove across the country to County Wicklow. We stopped in and had a bite at the original Avoca location, home of their handweaving mill.

Then we visited Glendalough, a sprawling monastic site from the 7th through the 13th centuries.

Tombstones galore = my kind of place. (I am fond of cemeteries as much so as I am fond of sheep, but for different reasons.)

I'm not really at all religious, but this was probably the most beautiful place I've ever been, not totally attributable to the natural scenery alone. I think the centuries of reverence by others sort of wears off on you while you're here.

Our very last night in Ireland, we had dinner at the Roundwood Inn in Roundwood, County Wicklow. I attempted to snap a shot of the quaint interior including the fireplace where a nice real fire was crackling away. Unbeknownst to me at the time, I captured something (or rather someone) special in the otherwise so-so pic. A little while later, Greg went to the restroom. When he came back he was all wide-eyed and he leaned in close and half whispered "I think that's Daniel Day-Lewis two tables down." Shortly after he and his party left and we confirmed with our waiter that it had indeed been him and that he had a house nearby. I then remembered the pic I had taken and sure enough, there he was (middle of the fireplace). I had joked about running into Bono while we were there, but an Academy Award-winning actor turned out to do just fine.


Well I hope everyone had a happy St. Patrick's Day. Shamefully enough for a girl named Erin, I forgot to wear green today. Greg is out of town and as I'm not one to go to the pub by myself, I'll be having my Guinness tomorrow night anyway, so I'll make up for it then.


♡,


Erin