This is part two of my Ireland travelogue
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Dates -15 Dec - 1st Jan (technically 3am 2nd Jan)- 18 days, 17 nights
Some background -
The reason to start early is because many Christmas markets close by 23 Dec. So, if you want to cover 2-3 of them, then it is good to go early. 1st Jan is largely an emotional call to spend 31st Dec in a different country :)
Visa process forces you to book flights & hotels beforehand. For the most part, we stuck to the same hotels that we submitted, only couple of places were changed. But the travel route remained the same. It is remarkable, that means the entire planning was done over two half days :)
This trip will be forever remembered since when we landed in Dublin, first, we landed on 16th instead of 15th since our flight was delayed in Frankfurt. we spent the night at the Frankfurt airport. Secondly, our checked in luggage did not come. This no-luggage influenced our itinerary in interesting ways. We were lucky since right at the last minute we decided to take our jackets in carry on. Otherwise, we would be frozen. But, we had no change of clothes, no toiletries for a 17 day trip.
At the Dublin airport, the representative was optimistic that the luggage will come in the next flight or by next day. Some fellow passengers shared that a realistic expectation would be two weeks. Fortunately, we did had another day in Dublin before we had to travel ahead. A call that we made early was instrumental in making this trip successful. That we will not let no-luggage influence our itinerary. It took us sometime to internalize this, looked more difficult because we had packed very nicely this time with new trekking poles, new clothes for cold weather etc, but this was a wise call.
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Day 1 - 16 Dec - Dublin
Landed in Dublin at 9 am. At this time, we had two bad nights of sleep, 14 Dec night was spent at BLR aiport to catch the 3 am flight and 15 Dec was spent at Frankfurt airport in bitter cold. With no luggage, we took the bus to Dublin downtime and our first night stay was at Abbey court hostel. After checking in, we went for a good brunch (hot-food) at Cafe Crema, Dublin. Our first order of business was to buy some essentials to survive a day or two till luggage comes. Thankfully, Penneys chain is affordable with fairly decent inventory. Socks, woolen caps, change of under-garments meant that we can at-least venture out.
We had booked a 10 am tour of Trinity college with book of Kells library. We unfortunately missed it but they were kind to accommodate us for the 3 pm one. The tour was taken by a college student, interestingly an Indian, and it was okay-ish. The institution is beautiful, full of history. The library indeed is very interesting and majestic. After Book of Kells, we walked to the Dublin castle where the christmas market was going on. Had mulled wine, freshly baked pizza and roasted chestnuts (Kanishka had seen many cheesy xmas movies and most of them featured this). Interestingly, roasted chestnut was sold by an Indian and it is not so easy to peel them (unlike peanuts) - but hey, been there done that now :) Christmas market was a decent one.
We came back to hostel to take some rest before heading out for a pub crawl. But two nights of no sleep meant that we dozed off at 7 pm, only to wake up the next day morning :)
Day 2 - Leave Dublin, Kilkenny castle, Waterford
The first order of business of day two was to collect the rental car. We took the bus to SixT office, some 20 kms from our hostel. It was cheaper to rent from here than other centres :) With the car, we debated on whether to check on airport to see if the luggage has come or not. They were not picking any phone calls, so we decided to chuck it and then start our trip.
Kilkenny castle and Yulefest - Yulefest is the xmas market right outside this castle. They had a nice music group performing which added a festive cheer to an otherwise cold weather (It was near zero degrees). We had nice veg tacos from a food truck. The castle itself is decent, one of the better ones in Ireland. But, it is no way close to any German castle. Castle visits in Germany actually spoiled us :) Bavarian castles are grand, majestic. They gave you a sense of royalty. In comparison, Irish castles are austere. This Kilkenny one in particular was made/used by merchants. So, it still had some grandeur but one can not compare them :)
Post Kilkenny castle, we drove to Waterford to have enjoy the best Irish xmas market. But we chose, wrongly, to first do shopping at Penneys. By the time, we concluded that our luggage will not come and we should finish our minimal shopping. Penneys Waterford was crowded and it took us 2+ hrs. We were tired and it started to rain, so we decided to then head to our AirBnb, some 35+ kms away in Duncannon. Our dinner was at a lovely Irish tavern - Strand Irish tavern where I had my first Guinness (it was amazing!) paired with Nachos, burger and fries.
Day 3 - Rock of Cashel, Blarney castle, Kinsale & Cork
We decided to start early and do both
Rock of cashel and
Blarney castle in a day. It was windy & cold when we arrived at Rock of Cashel. These are largely ruins of once beautiful castle that was later given to Church and then historical events led to its abandoment. The ruins are interesting to see. Fairly well preserved with some good views.
Tickets to Blarney castle were expensive but they include garden visit. The Blarney gardens are really good, perhaps more interesting than the castle. We did a 2hr plus walk in the garden and loved being in nature, stretching our legs. It was cold but scenic cold (Reminded me of gardens in Munich) . The castle is famous since it has a stone on top and if you kiss the stone, your wish will come true. Some myths around the stone exist but the stone is placed at a bottom slab which makes it really difficult to kiss, I could not make it there. Plus, a hygiene issue :) . I would absolutely recommend this place for its natural beauty
After Blarney castle, we drove to the scenic town of Kinsale with its multi-colored shops. We had our dinner at
Jim Edwards Kinsale where we were able to to catch 2nd half of World cup final between France & Argentina. In front of me, France equalled Argentina score to take it to extra time. We did not stick around for the extra time and decided to instead explore this small place.
Centra is a local chain of quick-grocery shops that we were discovering everywhere. Kinsale was quiet with everyone glued to watch the final. We decided to drive to Cork to checkout their christmas market. While the market was closed, we did saw their light show which was interesting. Our stay was at perhaps one of the
best Airbnbs ever :) They had heated bathroom flooring, french press machine for coffee, selection of jams (one with whiskey too) and very cozy ambience.
Day 4 - Killarney, Ring of Beara
We only had daylight between 8 am to 5 pm. So, we typically used to start at 7 am so that we can cover first hr in darkness and make the most of the daylight. We left Cork and first went to Killarney visitor centre to get some recommendations of things to do. We got to know about
Ring of Kerry,
Ring of Beara and
Dingle peninsula.
Per the guide at visitor centre, all three are beautiful. Kerry is the most popular one, Beara is the unexplored one and Dingle, well it is very very pretty. Tough choices ahead :) We decided to do Ring of Beara today but ended up doing all three during the trip.
Our first stop in the ring of Beara was
Bonane Heritage Park where we saw our first Ireland's stone circle, a human settlement evidence from Stone age. Pretty amazing if you think about it.
After Bonane we connected to the Wild Atlantic Way. The coastal drive in Ireland is known as Wild Atlantic way and it is very very beautiful. Most of the ring of beara is sparsely populated, Dec season makes it extremely less touristy and it is very very beautiful :)
We stopped at the Mare's tail waterfall, had lunch at
Lynch at Piere in CastleTownebere (amazing soup and sandwich), went to Dursey Island cable car spot (right at the end) and just soaked in the beauty. We would stop at a place and then do a 20-30 min walk to soak it in. At Castletownebere, we saw their church and explored the town Ring of beara was our introduction to Irish coastal beauty and it is indeed worth it.
Day 5, Gap of Dunhoe
Our stay was at this
out-of-nowhere Airbnb, a farmstay which had a kitchen. We cooked our dinner last night and prepared breakfast. This Airbnb happened to be next to Gap of Dunhoe which we hiked today. Perhaps, our best day of the trip.
Gap of Dunhoe is a simple 14km long trail that just goes through some mountains with some water bodies in between. It reminded me of Kashmir's great lakes trek. It is absolutely stunning to walk and the walk is very easy as well. What made it interesting for us is that in these 14 kms, we walked in cold, in sun, in rain, and few mins in small hail stones as well. The views around you just made up for everything. We took many clicks and took 4.5 hrs to finish this simple walk
Post this hike, we had a wonderful lunch at Sneem -
The village kitchen. They had this bread pudding custard (bread-cake + pudding + custard, all in one dessert) which was heavenly. Together with soup, irish coffee and pasta, it was a sumptuous meal after a good long walk. After food, we went to Kenmare to get our clothes washed, again at Centra stations, there are washing machines at the back. We knew that we had to visit a washing machine once every 4-5 days, this was the first one of it.
Day 6, Ring of Kerry
We left the Airbnb sufficiently early to reach wild atlantic way by the time daylight hits. Our night stay today was our poshest - a stay at a castle (a bucket list item :) ) We had booked a night stay at
Ballyseede castle. So, we had to drive through ring of kerry and then reach the castle by 4 pm.
Ring of Kerry has many stop points but we chose a few. We were fascinated by these stone-based architectures, from 800 years ago. The same time when in India we already had large palaces, intricate architectures, Ireland folks were still living in these stone made basic homes but it still is pretty fascinating on how they made it. In the first one that we visited, there was a group of folks already present there.
With some fire, and some instruments, they were calling to spirits. It was little spooky to be there with them but it was fun. Turns out Irish folks believe in these mystical arts, chakras, shamans very much.
Along the way, we made a quick pitstop at the Charlie chaplin statue. Our next big stop was the Kerry cliffs which I thought were magnificent. The cliffs is basically a land which is next to ocean at an elevation range. It gives spectacular views of the sea and you can see how the sea-waves has cut the rocks. Most of these cliffs were formed thousands of years ago as part of volcanic eruption.
The entire drive was beautiful and being in December, it did not feel that crowded either. We stopped at the Red fox inn where I had a pint of Guinness before driving to the castle. Ballyseede castle is a true hotel-castle, it has giant statues outside, rounded pillars on the sides. Inside, it has been completely remodelled with all the modern hotel amenities but it retains some of the stone-elements of castle, in particular near fireplaces. The xmas decor was in full swing and sofas, and the decor made it really royal. We had dinner at the castle itself with more Guinness :)
Day 7, Dingle Peninsula
Day 7 began with perhaps the best breakfast of the trip, in the castle. Freshly prepared omlettes, amazing bread, juices cakes - we feasted like there is no tomorrow. Our plan of the day was to visit Dingle peninsula and I am so glad that we did it.
Dingle peninsula is spectacularly beautiful, my favorite among the three. If I had to choose one, I will pick Dingle over rings of Kerry & Beara. It is just amazing.
We also stopped at a famine hut along the way which documented how locals survived the terrible famine. Painful history. But this was remedied by the scenic way that came. We stopped at multiple places, had our apple while sitting next to this bay. At one place, we were able to do a short walk, walk on cushiony grass and explore raw nature.
We also stopped at a local famous pottery place to buy our new coffee mugs. I am writing this blog while sipping coffee from this mug as of now :) After Dingle, we drove to Doolin, where we stayed at Glasha Meadows Bread n Breakfast . At night we headed to Mcganns pub where for the first night we heard local Irish music.
A note on understanding Irish pub scene - Most pubs will have music but it will start only after 730 pm, likely 8 pm. Pubs are full by then. Everyone in the town finishes up their work and heads to these pubs for socializing. Everyone knows each other. Irish folks love to chitchat with their Guiness and listen to music. But, they only serve food till 8 pm only. Pubs will be open, music will go on till 1 am but no food. Folks drink alcohol without any food, Guinness is also a heavy stout, a pint takes 45 mins to finish and folks drink it casually. Pubs will not come to ask you to leave if you are not ordering. Musicians also come and play as if they are practicing, It is very informal (for example - they may have their backs against audience) . On food, veg options are very limited. But they do love potatoes. We got potato fries (french fries) everywhere. They call it chips and it is served with every meal. Potatoes is the most common thing that is grown there and they do love their chips. At Mcganns, they custom made a veg dish for us and we hungry folks ate it all. Understanding this nuance of pub culture took us sometime.
Having driven all day, filled with sight seeing, coupled with a sense of jetlag, I used to feel very sleepy by 8 pm local (1:30 am IST), more so since it became dark after 5 pm. Plus, alcohol makes me sleepy. After a pint of Guinness, I really wanted my bed :) . So, it became difficult to overlap with pub music time but Mcganns had this lovely local pub feel which we liked. We listened to an hr before heading back.
Day 8, Cliffs of Moher, Doolin
Perhaps, the most famous landmark of Ireland is Cliffs of Moher. We would have spent 3 hrs here - very windy, cold weather. Parts of the trail were closed due to winds. But, we did saw music being played at the cliff. Cliffs on its own are very beautiful. At couple of places, there is waterfall coming out of the cliff-rocks but the wind carries the water upwards instead of letting it fall. This makes it water-rising, pretty interesting phenomenon
Post the cliffs, we had a lazy lunch at the cafe itself. We went for some local shopping and bought some magnets. We decided to check this Burren national park which may have been better named as barren national park. We did an hr long walk and then decided to checkout local markets. We found an Indian restaurant nearby at Ennistymon and got Kebab packed. We also visited this cool indie bakery - Unglerts bakery
At this point, we got confirmation that both of our suitcases has been delivered to a friend's place in Dublin (a friend whom we made at airport lounge only). Earlier, we got confirmation of one and a day before, we got the confirmation for the other. We were near west coast but a point that is closest to Dublin by road in our entire itinerary. 24-25-26 Dec are anyways days where things were going to be closed. So, our earlier plan was anyways to do some more local walks. But instead, we decided to drive to Dublin, collect our luggage and be back. This will give us fresh clothes, other utilities and perhaps also save us the time to wash our clothes again.
Day 9 - Doolin - Dublin - Westport
It was a 500km drive day. We left Doolin early and went from the right of island to left, on a highway that just straight to the heart of Ireland and reached Dublin. Our luggage was there and our new friends offered us tea, home-made Poha, Sev and were very hospitable. We discussed a lot about living as Indians in this country - they were enjoying here, this country is extremely friendly and no trace of racism. We bonded well on this. We took the suitcases back to our car and now again drove back, again cutting across the Ireland. This is how the maps looks like -
On the way back, we stopped for a late-lunch/dinner at Mekong Chinese food in Longford. This place had plenty of veg options, big portions and warmth :) It had started to rain and when it rains, it is cold rain. Things were closing since folks were going for their Christmas eve celebrations. We did some grocery shopping knowing that everything will be closed tomorrow.
Day 10 - Westport
Our night stay was at a lovely homestay - Catherine's lair. It had full access to kitchen, a living room, bed and everything. It was 25th, the day of Christmas and nothing was open. Catherine had a lovely spread of breakfast and we enjoyed it. The weather prediction was of rain the whole day, it was going to be a gloomy christmas. But in the morning it was sunny. We pushed ourselves for a drive and to see if anything was open, nothing was. By the time, we hit the road, rains had started.
We took the Nephin road and drove to Malaranny beach. To our surprise, there were a few cars where folks where getting out in their swimming costumes and heading to the sea for a quick dip, in freezing rain, strong rain and a temperature of 4 degree celcius. Seems that this was some kind of christmas tradition. We looked at them in utter shock.
We drove further and Nephin is also part of Wild atlantic way and the views are stunning. My god, this country, this teeny country has packed nature, pristine nature, no civilization in abundance. God bless them.
In about three hrs, we were back at our homestay. We decided to finally use their living room with a Netflix-tv and watch some movies. Our homemade lunch was three bean salad with sauted tofu, naan and hummus. It tasted heavenly.
Our generous homestay host recommended us to use the fireplace and gave their wood to us. Another guest had purchased coal blocks and suggested that we should add it to create warmth. We did it and the room became heavenly. We ended up watching two movies, one of them will be in my top 10 of this year.
First movie was the cheesy Glass Onion - A Knives out mystery. Full of style, clever writing and acting, it was a fun watch. The second one was Everything Everywhere All at Once - and it is 4.5/5. Mind bending mystery, so many things happen and so much power. Loved it. Great movies, cozy room, fireplace, all this meant a perfect 25th Dec
Day 11 - Westport - Cuilcagh Boardwalk trail, Coleraine-Londonderry
This was the day where we leave Ireland to enter North Ireland. Our night stay was at a small town called Coleraine in Londonderry. But on the way, right at the border of these two countries, we found an amazing hiking place - Cuilcagh Boardwalk trail. As usual we left early but I wanted my morning coffee but no shops were open in morning, it was 26th morning after all. We ended up driving via Sligo, again a grand drive.
Cuilcagh boardwalk trail was very interesting, we started when it was bright sunny. But within 30 mins, we went from sunny to rain to snowfall. Interestingly this was Kanishka's first snowfall. We hiked for an hr and the entire natural park around us turned from green to white. While it was cold, it was also very cool to walk in this. From the carpark, you walk 3kms to get to the start of boardwalk trail. Our raincoats saved us from getting wet (Quechua raincoats had the highest ROI in the trip) but the snow made us slow. At the start of boardwalk, the wooden boards were also snowy/icey making them slippery. Almost everyone who went with us turned back at that point, so did we.
We did close to 7km hike and then returned. Hungry after the long walk, we went to a pretty quirky cafe/pub called
Granny Annie's at Enniskillen. We had our regular - soup of the day and a veg dish (pasta here). By the time we reached Coleraine, I was drained and we decided to order in Dominos, it was not good.
Day 12 - Giant Causeway, Carrick-a-rede rope bridge
Now in Northern Island, under the rule of British, we decided to visit the most famous place here -
Giant causeway followed by
Carrick-a-rede rope bridge. Giant causeway was very interesting. They have maintained it well with running tours available. Our guide explained the geology of the causeway and shared some fun giant-stories to make it more interesting. The causeway indeed is nature's marvel and it is pretty amazing to walk on them. We ended up walking more and took the long red-trail to reach back Had some amazing panoramic views of the entire area from up top.
After the Giant casuseway, we went to the Carrick-a-rede rope bridge, an actual bridge that connects to a remote island-rock ahead. This bridge was actually used by fishermen back in 100 years ago, with a much poorer construction. It is pretty safe now to walk on but a walk here does offer amazing scenery to soothe eyes.
Post the rope bridge, we also made the customary stop at the Dark Hedges, a shooting place used in Game of thrones. I think in season 1 but I do not recall. Anyways, it is a highly touristy spot now but hey, we are tourists too ! Our dinner was at this pub The Quays. Kanishka tried whiskey from the oldest registered distillery - Bushmills.
Day 13 - Belfast
Day 13 started with a quick drive to Belfast. We stopped for breakfast at this Bob & Berts cafe- I assumed this to be a mom-n-pop kind of cafe but it turned out to be a chain. Anyhow, the breakfast was decent. Our main attraction for the day was the Titanic museum.
Titanic museum is actually a museum on the shipping industry of Belfast but boy, what a museum. It is perhaps the most modern museum that I have seen. Very fancy, very clever use of projectors, amazing representations and in all of this a woven story of Titanic - what happened, how, aftermath etc. I would say, it is a must attend though it is expensive.
We ended up walking a lot post the museum. We went to city hall and explored their historic museum as well. Decent one. We had dinner at this Punk Pizza place which had one veg pizza :) At night, we went to this iconic music space where a bunch of folks had come to play traditional music. We stayed there for 1.5 hrs before calling it a day. Our night stay was at
Ashfield Bnb
Day 14 - Belfast -Malahide - Dublin
The day 14 morning began with an amazing walking tour organized by Deadcenter tours who has a tour called A History of Terror tour. It was rated very high and I also loved it. This is a tour of the violence in Belfast during 1970s, IRA vs non-IRA, unionists vs nationalists and how it impacted the daily lives. Our guide was non-partisan and shared lot of historical facts, its consequences and how it impacts the present day lives of folks. Like in Germany, I am in love with such walking tours, and this one was also 5/5.
It was a 4 hr tour and because of this tour, I had to cancel the trip to Ward castle where Winterfell was shot in GoT. One was a touristy checkbox item while this one was perhaps one of the 10 best things of the trip. We were also under a clock since I had evening tickets for a light show at the Malahide castle. During this season, they deck up the garden area around the castle with interesting light shows and it gets sold out. I had booked tickets back in Nov only. Light show was good, some very interesting play on light reflection. Good fun!
Day 15 - Dublin
We were staying at a very friendly host Airbnb in Stillorgan, a wee bit far from Dublin though. Now was the time to soak in Dublin and the very first thing that we did was to take the Jameson Irish whiskey tour :) The tour itself was good fun, all new for both of us who do not drink whiskey and can not even tell from one whiskey to another :) But it did include a tasting and we acted like we know this stuff - it burns like hell :)
After the whiskey tour. we walked to Little museum of Dublin. They had a quick 30 min tour of Irish history filled with quirky facts. While this museum/tour was rated high, I found to be ok. Museum has lots of quirky facts, and a big exhibition on U2, who I came to know is an Irish band, but overall, it is a skippable one. We had lunch at this Mexican place where we had tacos with rice - our only rice during the entire trip. The day ended with us again at Penneys buying a suitcase for our luggage.
Day 16 - Last day, Dublin
You have not visited Dublin if you have not visited the Guinness storehouse. While it is ridicilously expensive, it does offer a pint in the end and it goes through the entire process of beer-making, includes beer tasting along with some very fancy gadgets/exhibits. For example, they have one section for ingredients in a beer and when it comes to water, they have built a giant indoor waterfall, just for the sake of it. The marketing/advertisements of Guinness were very cool, ahead of its time. Some of these were good and they have a nice panoramic glass dome on top where you can drink your free pint and enjoy the city.
Before Guinness storehouse, we went to the local church and did a self guided tour. Church, like all churches was a normal church but with some fanciful things. This one was bigger than others and a giant organ for a gong. I have always liked glass painted window-walls in churches and this one had plenty of those. Before the church, our day started late with us finishing the packing.
The last engagement of the trip was a 31st night concert 10pm-midnight to welcome the new year. It was a musical concert orchestra with two leading singers. But we saw something pretty extraordinary during this event. First, the music was really good and the singers did a great job. But the leading female singer changed her dress between each one of her appearances. The male singer did not do so. Never understood it why. At midnight, they also had a unique crossed arm shake with strangers sitting next to each other joining their hands. Irish folks, as we had seen the entire trip are very friendly and included us as well.
The concert ended at 12:15, we reached home by 1 and then left for airport at 4 am. We had stopover at Frankfurt for only 75 mins and I was expecting that we would miss our connection. But miraculously we didn't. On the way back, they got us via route which bypassed security check for transit, this made all the difference. I bought nice Paninis at the Frankfurt airport and had them in the plane.
We thoroughly enjoyed the trip. I ended up driving 3000 kms during the entire trip. Kanishka also drove in a foreign country for the first time. If there are three take-aways from this trip, these are -
1. Ireland is ridiculously beautiful. Sheer abundance of beauty, pristine beauty, untouched, it is just amazing.
2. Irish people are the friendliest. In all of my travels, I had never seen a more happy group, warm, welcoming and strangers walking and offering help, it is just mind boggling.
3. Ireland is expensive.
I will expand on all three in the next post.
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