We took the bus from Galway to the small village of Doolin, spend our first couple of nights in a nice B&B called Sheedy’s Doolin. The town is really broken into a couple of districts, just a few blocks apart. And by districts, I mean one has two pubs and the other has one. Other than that there are a couple of small shops, maybe a couple of coffee shops, one real hotel (which was well booked for summer weddings), and no gas station or grocery store. So if you didn’t bring it with you, and cant get it in a pub, you’re out of luck. Don’t get me wrong - it is a charming place - for a night or two - but we would end up here for nearly a week!

Doolin is the home of the famous Cliffs of Moher, and they are amazing. We took a few walks from Doolin on the 18 km trail along the cliffs. No, we never completed the full trail, mostly because it seemed that every day when we went walking, the storms would roll in - and we would soon head back toward Doolin (and the Pubs). We saw some spectacular views on the walks we did take though, and we also took the boat cruise under the cliffs on what turned out to be one of the nicest days we would have.

The rock formations in this area of Ireland are incredible, but the most amazing thing was to see all the rock walls. In clearing rock from the ground to create grazing ground and some dirt, sooo many rocks had to be broken up and moved. Seems the best thing to do was to make walls out of the rock, creating a patchwork of farms. This could really be seen when we visited the Aran Islands. We took the walk-on ferry (leaving our large bag at the B&B in Doolin) to spend a few nights on the islands. The ferry stopped first at the smallest of the three main islands - Inisheer.

We only had a couple hours to spend here before heading to Inishmore, where we would stay, but this was enough time to walk most of this small island (and still have time for a Pub visit). There is an interesting shipwreck on the rocks on the southwest end of the island, there since 1960. It was amazing to see all of the rock walls on the walk to see this, and on the walk back to town. There were also some beautiful beaches on this little island. After having some refreshments, we jumped back on the ferry for the trip to Inishmore - the largest of the three islands.

On Inishmore, you can ride bikes to most of the key sights on the island or...you can take their version of a hop-on-hop-off bus - different guys stand in front of their vans and for 15 Euros, they will drive you to those 5 places, giving commentary along the way. Our guide was a great guy, but the commentary? Well...”that’s the school over there”, “that’s the store”, “that’s a Pub”. Anyway again - he was wonderful, and with nearly everyone that remains on this island living of a pitiful government pension, these summer months and visitors help them put away a little something extra for the slow season, and we were happy to do our part.

The cliffs at Dun Aonghasa - an ancient stone fortress overlooking the Atlantic - were amazing. About a 15 minute hike in was well worth it, as the views were incredible. Amazingly, there are few barriers to the cliffs, as you can see in these photos - look closely to see where people are standing, and where I would stupidly go as well for a few photos. Then take a look at the overhangs - yikes!

We also made a stop to see seals, and to see the Seven Churches - ruins of I think 3 churches, and the graveyard. The island is a beautiful place, and for anyone thinking to visit - a day trip is plenty - or one night max. We stayed for 2 nights (had planned on 3, but having done pretty much everything in the first 5 hours and combined with the rain, we were left to watch sports on the big screen...

Anyway, we enjoyed Doolin and the Islands, but were anxious to get back to civilization, so we cut our stay a bit short and headed back to Dublin.

Once in Dublin, we enjoyed getting caught up on laundry and a few other things, and also took a walk to visit St. Patrick’s Cathedral, with it’s beautiful stained glass and interesting history. And of course after St. Patrick’s, we made a visit to Teeling’s Distillery, near our hotel (which was also beautiful, in it’s own way).

We also took a tour of the Kilmainham Gaol (Jail). This was a very interesting tour, and one we would highly recommend. Built originally in the 1700’s, it was later modernized in 1861, and eventually became most famous for housing the 14 leaders of the Easter Rising - the group that led the effort to end British rule and create an independent Ireland in 1916. Though unsuccessful, the way the British handled those leaders (putting them in this Gaol as political prisoners, and then executing each one by firing squad), solidified the support of the entire country, which 6 years later would gain independence from Britain.

Some interesting stories - one of which was that not only did the British execute each of these men, but one - James Connolly - was already dying from his wounds, and fearing his death in hospital could make him a martyr, the British rolled him into the firing squad yard, on his death bed, and shot him as he was laying there. Of course their actions did end up making him a martyr.

The other story is of Joseph Mary Plunkett, whose last request was to marry his sweetheart, Grace Giffords. She was brought to the Gaol and they were married in the small chapel, and after about 15 minutes of supervised visitation together, he was killed. Later, in 1923 Grace was also imprisoned here during the Civil War, for three months, and used her artistic talents to paint the walls of her cell. Here is a YouTube of the song “Grace” - well worth watching. And when I googled this, another I found was of 39,000 football fans singing this song at a game, to (I assume) their UK opposition team.

Our final full day in Dublin was spent - in Belfast! We took a day-tour up to Northern Ireland, visiting Dunluce Castle (beautiful ruins, and now known as a Game of Thrones filming location) and the Giant’s Causeway on the very northern end of the island (very near Portrush, where the Open Championship was held a few weeks earlier). The Giants Causeway is an incredible place with thousands of interlocking basalt columns coming up from the sea, a result of a unique type of volcanic eruption, and there are similar columns across the water in Scotland.

You can hike down to this area (or up and around to it over the cliffs), and see where the myth of Finn MacCool comes to life. As the legend goes - short version - the Irish giant Finn is challenged to a fight by his Scottish counterpart, and builds a Causeway to Scotland. He sneaks over before the fight to get a peek at his opponent and sees that he is much larger than he is, so he runs back home and tells his wife. His wife calms him and gets him very drunk and he falls asleep, at which time she dresses him in a diaper and bonnet, making him look like a baby. The Scottish giant comes to Ireland to find Finn, and finds his wife instead who says Finn has gone on a trip. The giant doesn’t believe her and takes a look around the house, finding a baby as big as a full grown man, and realizes Finn must be enormous! He runs back to Scotland, demolishing the causeway as he goes!

From here we then we passed through the town of Bushmills, nearly hijacking the bus as we drove by the Bushmills Distillery, but Tommy just drove on! We made a stop at the Dark Hedges (a Game of Thrones filming site), before heading to see the Titanic Museum and Experience in Belfast.

The Titanic Museum and Experience is quite “brilliant” as they say in Ireland. The building is on the site of the shipyard where the ship was built, and appears like the bow of two vessels - the Titanic and the Olympic - which were built in side by side yard slips, now outlined with their shapes. The building is the height of the vessels, and is pretty incredible to think about as you walk into the building - even for those of us from the shipping business, and having seen much larger vessels. The experience works you up 4 floors of exhibits around the construction of the Titanic - then you work your way back down as you view and listen to exhibits having to do with her sinking. One includes an IMAX “type” video of the vessel on the bottom of the ocean. Only a few pictures here as this was really something to see for yourself - hard to put into a few pictures.

We ended the day with a long drive back to Dublin - in pouring rain, while our driver Tom, and tour guide Gavin, played music and led the singing! The perfect end to our time in this beautiful country. As Tom, and others had told us - “It’s a great little country - if only they could put a roof over it”! So true!!

It rained (often) during our time in Ireland, which felt a bit like home and maybe kept us from doing a few outdoor things we would have hoped to do. And when we headed to Croatia (where we are now, in 80+ degree weather), we thought "great"! The interesting thing is, we already miss Ireland! The people there were just incredible. Everyone was extremely friendly and helpful all along the way, and it was very easy to use public transportation to get to anywhere you wanted to go.

A great time in Ireland. Now on to the sun (we hope) and a different kind of island life.

Please enjoy the rest of the photos in the album.

Slainte! (pronounced "'slawn-che") To health!

Tim & Eileen