Ireland part 4, The Finale

Our last few days in Ireland were spent in and around County Cork. We visited Cobh which is the last place the titanic took on passengers before its fateful voyage. We visited the Titanic Experience

 

 

Cobh

Picturesque little town, we took our lunch at the Titanic Bar and Grill restaurant under the White Star Line building. The food was A-mazing, and we tried an interesting lemonade that was brown in colour.

Titanic Passengers waiting to be ferried out of the Harbour

 

White Star line building today, we stood on the same balcony!

We stayed at an amazing B&B in Blarney and travelled around the area visiting lots of attractions most notably Blarney castle where we managed to climb to the top and kiss the Blarney Stone. The headless image below is me actually doing the deed. I am grateful for the grating under the stone, I could imaging one could accidentally slide right through the gap to a squashy fate without them.

 

I kissed the Blarney Stone

Blarney Castle Estate

W and my Hubby also got to visit the Cork University Hospital to have W's permanent cast put on his broken wrist. I think I forgot to mention that two days before we left Australia my son broke his wrist at school. While they did that the rest of the group went to the English Market in Cork.

We left Ireland from Cork, but my folks continued to travel around to Northern Ireland before arriving back to Dublin.

Where did we go next? The Netherlands! More on that next time.

Ireland part 3

We hired a car and travelled from Dublin to Cork.

My favourite place in Ireland that I visited... it is hard to say but, I really loved Kilkenny. I could see myself living in a place like that! All the streets are full of blooming floral baskets and the buildings are ancient and gorgeous, it really is such a pretty town set by the lovely River Nore. Kilkenny Castle is an imposing building but lovely and grand too. The grounds are quite huge to walk around. We didn't go inside, instead we took a ride on the Castle Tram around town and took afternoon tea at the Design Centre cafe.

Kilkenny Castle

We ate dinner in the red building on the left side of the picture. It is called Matt the Millers and the food was amazing! While we ate we watched them resurface the bridge, what would have taken weeks back home was done unbelievably overnight. They also had a live band playing real Irish music. Irish singing always have such a good fun vibe, how can you not have a good time when you hear it. It was magic.

We had a pub lunch at Syd Harkins where we enjoyed the most delicious Soda Bread ever. The publican was very kind and gave us lots of local info.

We also got in a bit of shopping at Dunnes Department store and Mr W's highlight was the massively huge ice-cream cone he got at Kitty's Cabin lolly shop

Ah Kilkenny I love you!

Ireland part 2

After a few days in Dublin we headed out west. We visited Cashel Rock which was in an amazing state of decay. The guides were incredible and we learned so much. None of us could quite make our hands meet around the totem that assures you will never have another tooth ache so we all have to keep looking after our teeth. I must admit we added this to our itinerary so we could sing It's a Long Way to Tipperary but we really enjoyed the visit too.

The country side is amazing and green. Even though it was July it was still chilly (by Aussie standards) but the sunshine was lovely.

If you look closely in the photo above you can see the bishop's walkway just under the 3 windows. It is designed so he could walk around without being seen, unless he wanted to and then he could be above the parishioners. Behind (on the town side) the castle there is an extensive grave yard. Until recently if you had a relative buried here in the graveyard you had the right to be buried here too.

Wow it was awesome and imposing!

More Ireland next time.



The event that consumed 2014

I noticed at the beginning of this year that I did not post last year. NOT EVEN ONCE! Oops, but I spent the first half of the year planning a family holiday which we took over 5 weeks during July/August and the second half of the year recovering from it. LOL

We visited a lot of places in Europe, the UK and Ireland but although we saw and did so many things we barely scratched the surface.

I am going to post a few moments from our trip over the next few months. Hope you don't mind... actually hope you enjoy seeing these posts.

We travelled from Perth, stopping at Doha and Frankfurt, to Dublin.

I remember the flights were long!

We forget how far away we are in Australia until we decide to travel to the Northern Hemisphere. We flew with Qatar Airlines to Frankfurt where we got lost in the airport and somehow managed to get out of the transit lounge which meant I got a very intense pat down in the middle of the airport while going back to board the plane. Not sure what warranted it but let's say there wasn't much that was left un-felt. Ick what a violation of my rights!!

We flew Air Lingus to Ireland and the thing that struck me the most was how truly green the land was as we first saw it. Well it is the Emerald Isle after all but I still didn't expect the green to be so green.

We took a Green Bus Tour and hopped on and off around the city over two days. Some of the drivers we absolutely hilarious as they gave live commentary including on occasion commenting on the crazy traffic conditions. We stopped by to visit Oscar Wilde (his statue anyway) and the Little Dublin Museum. The men went to Temple Bar.

I really loved the afternoon we spent at Dublinia where we got to experience the long history of Ireland, Vikings, Middle Ages and more were all exhibited in interactive displays.  Of course no trip to Dublin could be complete without including a visit to the Guinness Storehouse (where I couldn't bring myself to drink more than a sip of my pint).

The pint I couldn't drink, another in our group was so happy!

More of Ireland next time.






Girls weekend away for International Womens Day

Last weekend we packed up to head to Busselton which is a seaside getaway just a few hours south of Perth. I left the city a bit later than I had hoped which meant driving in the country at dusk and in darkness so I was a bit rather worried about hitting a roo* in my little nissan pulsar.

We stayed at a gorgeous resort called Aqua. All I can say is that it was LUX!

Two of my best girlfriends, my goddaughter, her nan and my mum all spent the weekend together leaving all our men at home and it was wonderful. We spent some of Saturday being pampered at a day spa. We all had something different, but I chose a to get my lashes and eyebrows tinted then have a back, shoulder and neck massage followed by a facial and foot massage. It was wonderful!

We ate plenty of yummy food, there are a lot of great food producers in the south west so there was lots of amazing cheeses, fresh foods and even delights from a french bakery eaten over the weekend. We even has several bottles of champagne and more of sparkling local wine too.

We wandered around the Sunday market, went for an early morning stroll along the ocean and even dipped of toes in the amazing infinity pool at the resort. We had lots of laughs and although we only spent 2 days away, we thoroughly relaxed and it seemed like we had been away for much longer. None of us wanted to leave so we even organised late checkout until 4pm!

We got back to Perth (and reality) at 6:30 on Sunday afternoon and drove past 3 roos road kills ranging from tiny to gigantic so despite my hubby saying there are no Kangaroos on the Forrest Highway apparently he is wrong! Glad we didn't meet them ourselves.

I included a few pics of the resort. I was amazing and I do hope to go back sometime... Might even take the boys next time. Lol

*A Roo is a Kangaroo