gregkoster

Introduction

This is a blog of the Jazzbeaux trip to Ireland in September 2012. We flew to Dublin for two nights, then rented a car and drove a loop around most of the Republic of Ireland: down the East coast to Kilkenny and Kinsale, then to Sneem on the Ring of Kerry; after dropping our son off at Shannon for his return home to work, we backtracked to Killarney and Dingle, then Galway, and finally a Farm B&B near Dublin.

During the trip, Jazzbelle kept detailed notes and I [Jazzbeau] took lots of pictures. After returning home, I revised the notes to remove names [to protect the guilty, as they say…] and put it in my voice to avoid confusion. Jazzbelle became “DW” in internet parlance [“Dear Wife”]. We were accompanied on the first half of this trip by our son [“DS”]

gregkoster

Friday September 7 – Flying to Dublin

DW and I flew Aer Lingus round trip JFK to Dublin. Our DS was able to join us for the first week but because Aer Lingus doesn’t fly out of Shannon every day (say what???) he had to fly Delta. We all had uneventful flights and arrived in Dublin Saturday morning to a warm sunny day.

gregkoster

Saturday September 8 – Dublin

We met up at the airport and took a taxi to Trinity Lodge Hotel in Dublin, left our luggage at the hotel and hit the sights: Trinity College and Book of Kells, Grafton Street, St. Stephen’s Green, Number 29 Georgian House tour, Merrion Square, National Gallery (for a quick look at one Caravaggio and one Vermeer), National Museum of Archaeology (the original Cross of Cong and Tara Brooch, amidst a host of treasures). We ended the day with dinner at Gogarty’s and the Traditional Irish Musical Pub Crawl that starts there.

gregkoster

Sunday September 9 – Dublin

The weather was cooler, and damp. We took the Hop On-Hop Off bus tour and hit 3 major places: Jeanie Johnston famine ship, Guinness Storehouse, and Kilmainham Gaol. Mass at 6 pm at St. Teresa’s, then a DIY pub crawl.

gregkoster

Monday September 10 – Wicklow

Today brought rain! Great, considering this was the day we picked up the car from Avis [a nice Audi A6 to handle all of us and our luggage] and DW started driving on the left. She had had absolutely no problem staying on that side of the road; the hitch was staying too far left on the country roads because it always looked as if oncoming traffic was going to smash into us. That gave me agita and scratched up the side of the car [thank God we took Full Insurance; but we checked later in a parking lot and EVERY car in Ireland has the left side all scratched up…]

We drove South from Dublin through Wicklow. So far so good. We and car stayed intact. There are a few sheep that wished they had moved sooner…but none ended up on the table at dinner.

Not letting the typical Irish weather stop us, we went in our rain gear plus umbrellas to Powerscourt to see the gardens—most beautiful, fragrant roses.

Then to ruins of St. Kevin’s monastery in Glendalough.

We arrived in Kilkenny that night and dined at our hotel Zuni Townhouse. We were too tired for pubs, but got a good night’s sleep.

gregkoster

Tuesday September 11 – Kilkenny & Tipperary

Cool and clear weather. We walked around Kilkenny in the morning and toured Kilkenny Castle and the Cathedral of St. Canice. We even climbed the ladder to the top of its 100′ tower. Holy! We drove to the Rock of Cashel in Tipperary in the afternoon and onto Fethard to see the remains of the old town wall. More pubs tonight.

Lest you think we are all sots, we like the pubs for the music, too!

gregkoster

Wednesday September 12 – Waterford

We headed for Waterford and a tour of the factory. It was very informative, even though we are not big W fans. Their presentation pieces are really amazing [esp. the 9/11 memorial to Father Mychal Judge!]

Next stop was the Old Midleton Distillery tour [now owned by Jameson] DW let the boys go in while she had a bite to eat, a walk and a nap.

Onto Cobh (pronounced ‘Cove’) just in time to get into St. Colman’s Cathedral and take a look see. Then a walk on the quay.

Our hotel for the night was The Old Presbytery, a lovely B&B in Kinsale where the owner, Noreen, called and got us a table at Fishy Fishy [the best restaurant in town]

gregkoster

Thursday September 13 – Cork

This morning we took an hour and a half walking tour of Kinsale before heading to the Liss Ard Estate in Skibbereen – this was something DW came across in one of her brother’s emails with pictures of ‘the wonders of the world.’ It has the Irish Sky Garden Crater. And we were in it, walked up the outside of it and around the top rim of it. Neat! Also were introduced to souterrains. Next stop was Bantry House on the shore of Bantry Bay for tea and scones. Delightful! We walked around the gardens and up the 106 steps for a view.

It was a memorable driving day as an elderly gent backed out of his space and into the side of our rental car. Thankfully his plastic bumper collapsed and spared our car more than a slight scratch [on the left side – no one will notice anyway…]

We made it intact to the Sneem Hotel, ready to tackle the Ring of Kerry on Friday.

gregkoster

Friday September 14 – Ring of Kerry

We drove the Ring of Kerry and saw three ring forts, Derrynane House [the home of Daniel O’Connell], views of the Skellig Islands [no boats out that day because of high waves], and Ballycarbery Castle [a ruin which DW discovered] where we squeezed under the barbed wire and explored what was left of this structure from hundreds of years ago.

On that night to the Oak Wood Arms hotel near Shannon airport, to be ready for DS’s flight the next morning.

gregkoster

Saturday September 15 – Killarney

This morning we were up bright and early to get DS to Shannon Airport by 8 am for his 9:30 flight. It took off on time. He arrived safely and found our van in good repair in JFK long term parking. He’ll pick us up next week, so this was much cheaper than three limo rides!

We then had to backtrack to Killarney to see Muckross House and explore the grounds.

We made it to the Alpine Guest House in Dingle before 8 and had a lovely dinner and then went pub crawling.