A good friend is like a four-leaf clover; hard to find and lucky to have

Well, all good things must come to an end and we have reached the end of this part of our journey. We’re heading to Greece tonight (on a midnight flight – ugh), but looking forward to some warm weather again 😊
 
Ireland certainly has some magnificent scenery and the ‘Wild Atlantic Way’ down the south and west coast certainly lives up to its name. However, before I get to that, I need to back up to where I last left off, I believe we were in a little town called Swanlinbar. We headed off nice and early to do a wee tiki tour, taking in lush countryside, some small villages and arriving late afternoon into Doolin, which turns out to be a very busy little tourist village. Not a huge amount to it but a favourite stopover for the Cliffs of Moher visitors (like us). Like most of Ireland so far, it was very windy and cold, but we found a nice bar to park up in and enjoyed a lovely Irish stew followed by folk music. Just a stumble back to our B&B (minus the second B). It was nice and cosy, but our private bathroom was actually across the hall, so you had to unlock your room, skip across the hall and unlock our bathroom/toilet!! Wouldn’t want to be in a hurry. I now realise searching for ‘private bathroom’ actually needs to be ‘ensuite’.
 

We then headed to the Cliffs of Moher, one of Irelands most popular tourist attractions. We headed there early and a wee hint, buy your tickets online – it’s much cheaper. And if you’re over 60 (or near), don’t forget to get the senior rate everywhere – it’s a couple of euro cheaper and they never ask for proof.

I was last at the Cliffs of Moher in Dec 1999 – it was blowing a gale (nothing changes), freezing cold and rainy (ok it was sunny but still cold). As we were walking along the path, the wind blew my friend Nonie’s hat right off her head and over the cliff. We were like OMG, Nonie was distraught (it was her favourite hat) but nothing we could do about it. And literally a minute later, her hat blew back up in the air and landed on the path in front of us!!! I would not have believed it if I hadn’t seen it myself and if you don’t believe me, you can ask Rach as she was there too! Apparently, the winds off the cliff are circular and things blow down then get caught in an updraft. Nothing quite so exciting happened this time but they were still magnificent. And the visitor centre is waaay more developed – they have a quite cool 4D immersion video – see below for a taste. 

Leaving the cliffs, we followed the Wild Atlantic Way route which goes south and then around the south coast. Visiting Liscanoor, Quilty, Doonbeg, Kilkee before taking a ferry from Killimer to Tarbert before landing in Kenmare (via Tralee and Killarney). We had a really nice couple of days in Kenmare – a very cute wee town – before continuing south to Skibbereen, Clonakilty and Cork. We stayed the next couple of days in a country house between Ballyhooly & Fermoy. I love all the names 😊

We then started an almost zigzag route across the SE starting the trek back towards Dublin, taking in Tipperary and Carrick on Sur before stopping in Waterford. The last time I was in Tipperary, we got locked into a bar (they closed at 11pm in those days). We were treated to music, drinks and lots of laughs before being quietly released into the street about 1 am. We were told to be quiet but unfortunately there was a pay phone a couple of metres away and we’d had a couple, so we thought it was a good idea to call people in NZ and sing ‘It’s a long way to Tipperary’ to them at the top of our voice. I wonder how long that pay phone stayed there…..

From Waterford we meandered through the countryside again popping into Kilkenny to have a wander around the castle and town centre. I mentioned in my facebook post about getting locked in the last time I was there – this time we managed to get out in good time and headed to Muine Bheag for the next couple of nights in a nice little townhouse by the river.

We finally headed north about 45 minutes out of Dublin, spending our last couple of nights in Trim. We decided not to stay in Dublin as it was incredibly expensive - nz$180/n for a dorm bed and nz$480/n for a basic hotel room!!!!! Our budget doesn’t quite stretch to that! It way exceeds London, Paris, Florence, Rome and Athens in cost and made Belfast look positively cheap!

It does highlight what we have found, in that Ireland as a whole is really expensive – way more than we had expected it to be. A local told us that it is now the most expensive country in the EU. Food, drinks, groceries are on a par with the UK and accommodation is more expensive. When we compare it to our Athens hotel which is a lovely king room with balcony and fridge, roof top pool and bar plus a couple of restaurants and a quarter of the price of Dublin!

Anyway, we didn’t want to leave the Republic of Ireland without seeing the capital, so, we dropped off our rental car, put our cases in storage and headed into the city to take in the sights. It was unfortunately lightly raining most of the day, but we still managed to get about (please excuse the photography). 

Ireland is beautiful, the people are friendly and we have met a lot of people and friends along the way. And aside from the castles and ruins all over the place, often you feel like you could be in NZ (especially when we had to stop for some cattle being moved down the road). Listening to the local conversation we could also be at home (aside from the accent) – can’t get into the Dr for 2 weeks, high cost of groceries and cost of living increases, pension age and housing shortages. So same same, but different.

So, as we bid this leg of the journey farewell, I leave you with a popular Irish proverb - ‘Every man is sociable until a cow invades his garden’.

Slán go fóill, see you in Greece…

J&T xx