Dublin, Ireland

Pub in Temple Bar Area

Liffey River from Ha Penny Bridge

Bev a Writer's Museum

Entering Trinity College

Dining Hall in Buttery

Cricket Field

Fountain in St. Stephen's Green

Harcourt Street

Neighbor Hotel Entrance on Harcourt Street

Grafton Street Shopping

Interesting, but Now Defunct

September 28, 2010

 Today we departed the lodge at 7:00 AM for our bus ride to the Galway train station to meet the 9:05 AM  train to Dublin.  It was a raining when we arrived in Galway and we had half an hour to spare before the train left.  The train was very modern and we all had seats and tables.  The total time to Dublin took 3 hours and we met the Liberty Tours person who bused us to the Schoolhouse Hotel for our three night stay in Dublin.  In order to orient us to the city, we bought 2 day tickets for the hop-on, hop-off bus and took that 1-1/2 hour trip.  After leaving that tour, we walked to the Temple Bar area of Dublin and strolled through that area for a while in a light rain.  We stopped at St. John Gogarty bar and restaurant for some wine and just relaxed while planning our activities for tomorrow.  The Shack Restaurant was selected for dinner and we had a relaxing dinner before heading back to the hotel.

September 29, 2010

Our itinerary for today and tomorrow was to see the Book of Keels exhibit at Trinity College, visit the Writer’s Museum and the National Gallery of Ireland, stroll along Grafton Street and buy some remaining family gifts.  We caught the Hop-on Hop-off bus at stop #21 for the ride to the Writer’s Museum on Parnell Square where we spent time seeing the many exhibits including the published works, personal effects and portraits of Ireland’s most renowned writers.  From the museum, we again caught the bus for a short ride to Trinity College and then a walk to the library that housed the Book of Keels permanent exhibit.  The Book of Keels is a lavishly decorated 9^th century book of the four gospels created by Irish monks at Iona and Keels.  It has been in Dublin since the mid-17^th century when it was transported there for safe keeping during the Cromwellian period.  The decorations are outstanding and illuminate the manuscript with great detail.  The displays were excellent in explaining the meanings of many of the illuminations and the history surround the period when the book was copied.   Exiting the exhibit, we walked through the Long Room of the Old Library that is about 65 m in length and houses about 200,000 volumes of the library’s oldest books.  We then took a walking tour of the campus and stopped to view the wood paneled dining hall in the Buttery.  There is a large green space on campus consisting of College Park that contains cricket pitch and the Rugby Ground for playing rugby.  The remainder of the day was spent walking down Grafton Street and visiting several stores.  We decided to have dinner at the Schoolhouse Hotel and were not disappointed at the quality of the food.

September 30, 2010

Today was out last day in Ireland and we focused on the National Gallery of Ireland and concluded our shopping.  Although not very large, the National Gallery had a exhibition on Gabriel Metsu, Rediscovred Master of the Dutch Golden Age.  This contained 40 of his finest and most notable works and was a great exhibit.  The Gallery’s other paintings span the 14^th to the 20^th century, including a fairly extensive collection of works by Irish artists.  The remainder of the afternoon was spent walking through the streets of Dublin and doing some last minute shopping.  Dinner this evening was at Elys in the new Grand Canal Square area that was about a mile walk from our hotel.  Tomorrow morning we will be picked up at 7 AM to be transported to the airport for our flight back home.

Kylemore Abbey and Connemara

Farm after Leaving Lough Inagh Lodge

Kylemore Abbey

Dining Room in Abbey

Gothic Chapel on the Abbey Grounds

Inside the Walled-Victorian Gardens

Thached-roof Cottage in Tully Cross

Atlantic near Renvyle Peninsula

Herb Garden at Renvyle House Hotel

Renvyle House Hotel

Atlantic Coastline Near Glassilaun Beach

Bog after Peak Removal

September 27, 2010

Today is our last day of biking and it should be another rain-free day.  Leaving the lodge at 9:30 AM we biked to Kylemore Abbey, which was built by William Henry as a castle in the 1870’s on 15,000 acres of land in the Connemara wilderness for his wife.  It is now an abbey for the nuns of the Benedictine Order who purchased it in 1920 .  The castle had its own hydroelectric generating plant built in 1893, a fire brigade , a small Gothic chapel, and a walled Victorian garden.  The entire estate is gorgeous with great views of the lake and mountains.  The garden contained not only many perennials along the walkway, but vegetables. 

Leaving the Abbey, we biked to Renvyle House Hotel on the west coast of Ireland for a lunch of seafood chowder and sandwiches.  The grounds contained a 9-hole golf course and a very nice herb garden.  After lunch, we bike along the coastal route with views of the Atlantic and were accompanied by a very strong head wind.  In fact, on one straight level stretch, I could bike no faster than 7 mi/hr.  Although, I had planned to do the 12 mile land extension, which has to be a very hilly ride, I decided to forego the ride because of the strong wind.  Instead I worked on the trip pictures and converted them into a PowerPoint presentation.   We gathered before dinner to briefly talk about the highlights of the trip and enjoy a glass of champagne.  Tomorrow morning we must be ready to leave on the bus at 7:00 AM to catch the 9:05 AM train in Galway for our trip to Dublin.

The trip certainly appeared to end too soon.  We both biked the entire scheduled routes and saw a most beautiful area of Ireland with absolutely great trip guides and fun-loving fellow VBT travelers. 

Ride to Connemara

View From Kilmarvey Guesthouse

Kilmurvey Guesthouse

Thached-roof Cafe

Old Church in Kilronan

The Bog Countryside in Connemara

Mountains in the Connemara National Park

Lough Inagh Lodge

View from Our Room

Main Dining Room at the Lodge

Enjoying a Demo on Preparing Irish Coffee

 September 26, 2010

Today we leave the Aran Islands on the noon ferry.  Although the weather was cold and blustery, there was a short 4 mile ride to the north end of the island that end by some ruins and more houses of the island’s inhabitants.  About 10:45 AM we road into today, did a little shopping in the wool sweater shops, and proceeded to the ferry landing.  The wind was strong and cold.  After a 45 minute ride to the mainland at Rossaveel, we began biking for the day to our lodging at Lough Inagh Lodge near Recess in Connemara.  The route took us bog roads through the bogs of Connemara where the land was more yellow-brown in color due to the acidity of the land.  Normal grasses that give the very lush green color of most of the land we have seen cannot grow in the acidic bogs.  There were numerous streams and small lakes in the area and mountains in the background.   Along the way we passed many trenches where the peat had been cut from the bog and stacked to dry for later transporting to homes for fireplace fuel.  Also we saw sheep grazing throughout the area and often along the road.  We stopped for lunch as a small café where most of the people had smoked salmon or smoked mackerel.  The last 5 miles of biking was oriented toward the mountains with great views of small lakes.  Our last two nights will be a Lough Inagh Lodge (www,loughinaghlodgehotel.ie) which is situated on the shore of Lough Inagh where there is fishing, golfing, riding, biking, etc.  The lodge is beautiful from the outside with vines, which have changed to a bright red autumn color, growing on the exterior yellow-tan colored walls.  We had a large corner with an accompanying small sitting room with views of the Twelve Brns mountain range and the lake.  The land borders on Connemara National Park.   Tonight one of the entrée choices was lamb shank, which I had with an apple and kiwi filled crepe. n Bev had the seafood with vegetables and ice cream.