We arrived home from Ireland last night and I wanted to write my first post before I forget our new Gaelic words!
This was our first experience staying in an Airbnb and it definitely set the bar high. The price was right and although staying in a room in someone else's home might not be for everyone, we would highly recommend the experience! Our host, Jacqueline, was so welcoming and helpful. She drove us to the bus station, spent an entire afternoon driving us around the mountains, and taught us a lot about Ireland. (She also warned us that our hostel in Dublin was going to be quite noisy...more on that later.)
This trip was a bit of a do-over because our trip to California this spring was full of bickering and seagull poop. I wanted something relaxing this time so we stayed in a medieval village (with castle and all) and spent our time being fairly low-key (living like locals, visiting the pubs, and walking).
Here's a taste of our little Irish village.
The entrance to the town. One of my new favourite expressions is "have in or take away" (instead of dine in or take out). You can see "take away" written on this Ma Bakers sign.
Other new expressions include:
Slainte - Gaelic for "cheers"
What's the craic - what's the fun/what's the gossip
Have a wee - as in, "Do you want to try that new restaurant? Why don't we have a wee?"
Cead mile failte - Gaelic for "a hundred thousand welcomes" (this was already very familiar to me because it is on a sign as you enter the campus of my alma mater)
Grand - great, wonderful, good
Our walk up the mountain led us through "Leprechaun Habitat" - ha! Of course, we found the pot of gold.
In front of King John's Castle, built in the 1200s. Everything about this town sparked my imagination because of the medieval ruins - so fun!
These are ruins of a Friary, built in the 1400s. Our Airbnb was directly on the other side of the Friary and our bedroom window faced the ruins. No hotel will ever top that!
Our host told us CS Lewis gazed over at this area of Ireland and the location inspired Narnia. I didn't want to look into these details too closely because I am very eager to just accept it. I was in Narnia. The end.
You know me and of course I had to throw in a food photo. This was from a Tea Room that was very kitschy and yet quite a novelty and very adorable. Hubby had an "Irish breakfast" which included... black pudding. (You may have heard this called blood sausage or blood pudding.) I tried a little taste of it suspecting what it was while he had no idea.
More later on a couple of little day trips we took.
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