The Adventures of Linda and David: Ireland

Going to the emerald mine naturally got me to thinking about my trip to Ireland. One of the places I had always wanted to visit was Ireland and a few years ago I had the opportunity to go. I had enough airline miles for a free roundtrip ticket to Europe so flew to France to visit some friends then off to Ireland for 10 days. I was with 2 French ladies. Francoise was the mother of one of my French friends and Monique was a friend of Francoise’s. Neither of them spoke English and I don’t speak French. We rented a house in Birr, County Offaly, Ireland and split the costs. The house was located within the castle walls and we had the freedom to walk around in the world class gardens and visit the museum located within as well as the giant telescope that at one time was the largest in the world. Luckily for me I met William Dumpleton, an Irish astronomer who was at the museum the day I was there and he took me on a private tour of the telescope. This is totally off limits to the public so this was a rare treat. Today the castle is the private home of Lord and Lady Rosse. I didn’t have the opportunity to meet them as they were out of the country when I was there, however, I did have correspondence with Lady Rosse to rent the house and she was so kind to us and had everything ready for our arrival. We used the house as our base and took day trips either by train or driving the small car I had rented. We took one extended trip to the beautiful southwest and rented a second house there for 2 nights. (It was too far for a day trip and we had several places to visit in that area). I packed in all I could fit into my time in Ireland. One day was spent in Galway and we took a bus tour of the Burren and visited the Cliffs of Moher. We had the best tour guide in the world who extended our tour and gave us a complete visit to that part of Ireland. We also visited the Blarney Stone, and yes, I kissed the stone! Cork, Tipperary, Killarney, Limerick, Adare, and every place in between. One day we took a train tour of the bog in Clonmacnoise. That was really interesting. Another day we took the train to Dublin and rode the double decker jump-on jump-off bus tour (my least favorite part of Ireland). We took another day long tour bus to visit the Ring of Kerry. Absolutely the most beautiful place I have ever seen! We were in Kenmare on the summer solstice and it was amazing to still be daylight at midnight. I loved everything about Ireland except for the fact it was so cold there. Probably my favorite of all was visiting the many stone circles and Newgrange. The driving experience was new for me… driving on the left side of the road and driving a stick shift and having to shift with my left arm was a challenge at times but gave us many opportunities of humor. Ireland was everything I had hoped it would be and more. I will always cherish this trip as one of my most favorite ever. The friendliest people on the planet live in Ireland!