Travel

Bunratty & the Cliffs of Moher

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Our first goal of the day, after the breakfast described in the previous post was to make it to the Cliffs of Moher another one of those must see sights on my list. First we entered the visitor’s center which was actually one of my favorites of the trip. I am amazed at how they turned a rock formation into such an interesting and dynamic learning center. There were stations that discussed how the cliffs were formed, the plant and animal life, as well as the weather. There were some really great interactive tables that showed hoe the tectonic plates shifted over time and how they are continuing to shift, and the was that the location of the cliffs moved with this. I really enjoyed it all.

The cliffs themselves were a whole different story; I mean knew they were beautiful, but I had no idea how captivating they could be; a sheer rock face jutting into the ocean, farmland reaching right up to the edge, and wind whipping around everything. It was picturesque Ireland. I think I used more of my card space there on pictures than anywhere else. These pictures truly don’t do it justice. I could have wondered around the cliffs all day had my stomach not started to growl.

After our trip to the cliffs we made it to Bunratty Castle. After a cheap lunch of deli ham, and cheese on brown bread from the local gas station and minimart and finding a place to stay for the night we headed off to the castle and Folk Park for the afternoon. To say the least it was rather disappointing. There were medieval type buildings but without people, or place there to explain it just seems like old or fake old stuff strewn about a fake old house. Other buildings were made to look old but were actually modern convenience shops aimed at tourists. There was a tea house and pub as well. One of the good things was a pottery building where the family that ran it actually made the stuff in the shop. It was probably my favorite part of the actual park.

The feast was a completely different story from the park however. It started out in a large hall where we were served mead and listened to traditional music on the violin and harp. It was during this time that we were asked if we wanted to be the acting lord and lady of the event. I could tell Chuck was going to say no so I said yes very quickly. They pulled us up on the stand and crowned us in front of the whole party. The feast was lively and fun Chuck got to do a little acting and I got to have my awesome vegetable soup again. This was a dish I was so incredibly excited to recreate because it was so good. I did find a recipe that seemed pretty close to what I expected except for a few small details. 1) we asked at the feast what the soup was spiced with and they said curry, so I added about 1 teaspoon of that 2) I roasted my vegetables in the oven before making the soup to get the flavors to come out a little more.

I really enjoyed making this soup, it was so easy, and healthy! We decided to make a whole night of it by making it into date night! Starting with the soup and salad for dinner then sliced up the aged goat cheese that we brought back from Dingle, and had it with crackers, and sliced pair. To wash it all down we had a very sweet apple reisling that we got last week at the farmers market. It was all so delectable. We both ate and chatted until we were stuffed. The perfect date night!

Doolin & Traditional Irish Breakfast

By Jessica

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Waking up in Doolin was pretty interesting. It was a gorgeous little fishing town nestled into the hillside. We had our first real Irish Breakfast here. As we found out each Irish Breakfast is a little different but all the basic parts are the same. It starts off with a fried egg, two sausages, two or three slices of rasher bacon, a tomato (cherry, or sliced) that has been cooked, some pan fried mushrooms, black and white puddings, and sometimes what we call hash browns. Sometimes they also include toast. Tea and coffee are always made to order, and you almost always get your own little pot of the stuff, never someone walking around filling your cup for you. We both loved waking up to this every morning, it really was wonderful. Irish bacon, is not like our in that it’s really just like a thin slice of ham, that is fried like bacon, though we found that they even call what we call ham bacon. The sausages were just like dinner sausages, nice and light in flavor, I really loved their sausages, but I will discuss this more later when I give a hand at making them. Now for the puddings; black and white puddings sound gross, and actually taste pretty darn good, once you get past the idea of what you are eating of course. The black pudding is typically made of pigs blood, while white puddings are typically just beef fat, they of course have to some other things mixed in but that’s the main part of it.

Now this was a dish i really wanted to make, but it turned out much more challangeing than i thought. Turns out that no one would seel me pigs blood. Not that i’m emtirely suprised but man the looks on peoples faces when i told them what i wanted to do.

New Grange

By Jessica

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Day 3 of our trip did not go as planned. I drank a little too much the night before and ended up sleeping later than I wanted to, though I think a night out in Dublin is a pretty darn good excuse. Very first thing we went and got our car. This cute little beauty. We went through some basic safety stuff with the rental guy, about roundabouts and driving on the opposite side of the road, however none of this prepared us for the actual driving.

We were still in the city, so not only were we getting used to different striping, signs, and the other side of the road, but also a ton of traffic. When we first pulled out I’m pretty sure we were both holding our breath. Of course the first obstacle that we come to is a roundabout, now living in our area we encounter these pretty often, but none as big as this. Many of these roundabouts are so big and have so many intersecting roads that there are actual stop lights within them. Talk about confusing. It didn’t help that the lights are also not overhead they are all off to the side, so it’s harder to tell whose light is whose. Anyway we survived, only to get lost.

The GPS took us to New Grange the tomb, not the visitor’s center that is required to get access to the tomb. For whatever reason our GPS didn’t even have it listed. So we traveled around, asked for directions and eventually figured it out, though we lost half a day. It was an adventure and I think we both had a good time. Also during our lost phase we stopped into a random pub and had lunch. I had the most amazing vegetable soup ever, which I found all over the country (I’m serious it was heavenly) and Chuck had his first foray into the Irish version of Shepard’s pie. Which, surprisingly he wasn’t very fond of. Every place we went added tomatoes to their Shepard’s pie which he said gave it a “Sloppy Joe” taste, he actually said he liked mine better! This is one of the only recipes I decided not to copy exactly. Instead I will provide my recipe for Shepard’s pie, and a link to a traditional Irish version that I found.

The carved stone outside the entrance

A smaller ancient building a few meters from New Grange

When we finally made it to the visitors center shortly after lunch. This is one of the few sights on my list that I just HAD to see. New Grange is one of the oldest known tombs in the world, much older than the Pyramids, or Stone Hedge. Being able to go inside is very cool, I mean i was standing in the exact place that ancient people stood, in a building that many im sure gave their lives to buid. Suprisingly, it’s one of several in the area, and is the only one that visitors are actually allowed to go inside. The visitor’s center was also very interesting, sporting 3D models of all the tombs in the area, tools, and trinkets found in the area, and hypothesis on how and why they were built.

That night we decided to try and drive to Doolin. Unfortunately we didn’t arrive until around 11 pm so finding a B&B was nearly impossible. Lucky for us the Doolin Hotel had one room available, It was the honeymoon sweet and we were happy to take it.

Dublin Day 2

By Jessica

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Day 2 in Dublin started out with a stroll down Grafton Street with to go coffee and tea. Chuck did not like his coffee, however the Irish are tea drinkers so what’s to be expected? My tea was fabulous. We stopped at the Molly Malone Statue for a while, and made note of the brightly colored doors, but decided that this area was far too commercial for us. I know what did I expect for a shopping district? I just really wanted to see everything. Luckily Saint Stephen’s Green was right nearby, so we decided to take a nice long stroll there. It was a beautiful park, and with the nice weather it was full of people. We spent quite a while in a stone garden watching the swans and birds in the little pond. Then we spent another good amount of time strolling around the grounds reading about all of the different plant life there. I really liked how there was a little sign to tell park goers what each plant was.

For lunch on the second day we went to Sinotts. A very cool bar that was actually in the basement of a large building. It was so typically Irish with privacy walls, and a huge square bar right in the middle. The food there was amazing as well. Chuck said that the bangers and mash he had there were the best of the whole trip, and he ordered it at least 4 times. What I want to talk about, however is what I ordered, mostly because it’s not what many people typically think of when they think of Irish food. I got Chicken Curry served with rice, and a large sweet tortilla like thing (Right now I’m wishing I took a picture!). This was something that we saw on the menu all over the country, and not just in the city, and it wasn’t what you expect a curry dish to look like either. It reminded me of a stew a slightly spicy stew that was delightfully thick and mixed with peppers, onions, and peas. The tortilla thing was surprisingly sweet, and really helped to mellow out the spiciness, which I assume is to help it appeal to the masses of Irish who don’t typically eat spicy foods.

Most of the recipes I found for this dish included apple, however the one that I tried in Ireland did not include apple, so using the recipes I found and my memory I crafted my own recipe for this dish.

There are quite a few things I like about this dish. For starters its very simple, it can be done in a single pan, and really the only thing I didn’t already have in my pantry was the peppers (it’s not season yet). Also it is a little different than my normal stir-fry style. There was some heat to it but it wasn’t overpowering, and it’s easy to make for large groups. Perhaps next time I will try it with the apple in it and see how it goes?After lunch we decided to venture to the Nation Archeology museum, which as total nerds we both really enjoyed. It was a good overview of a lot of the artifacts found all over the country, which was helpful because as we found out later a lot of the actual sites we visited did not have museums or artifacts nearby to associate with them. One of the most interesting displays was a grouping of bodies that were discovered in the peat bogs from the medieval era that are almost perfectly preserved. It was so very cool as well as creepy.

To end the night we had a dinner, then went to temple bar for a night of craic and music. The first band we saw that night was pretty awesome band and played traditional Irish music mixed with some of the modern stuff. I liked them so much I even bought a CD. They were fun loving and joke cracking and really made my night. Check them out for yourself (this is the only link i could find). We ended up staying out quite late and unfortunately I was not feeling so hot in the morning.

Dublin Day 1

By Jessica

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I think that it’s good to start off this tour with Dublin, since we actually started there. Not being a city girl I wasn’t in LOVE, but as far as cities go this is probably one of my favorite. It has a very old world feel, but with so much innovation at the same time. One of the major things that I noticed was the lack of skyscrapers. There are none, unless of course you count the Guinness gravity bar, which is completely glass and gives an amazing view of the entire city below. And since I’m already discussing Guinness I may as well start with Guinness Beef Stew, which is like any other stew, rich delicious, and reminiscent of home. I made this dish last Monday, however it did not turn out the same. It wasn’t as thick as the one that I had in Ireland, but it overall wasn’t bad. One of the major differences is because the weather was so nice I ended up putting the whole thing in the crockpot, instead of actually following the directions completely. I think my next foray into this dish I will definitely follow the directions precisely.

St. Patricks Cathedral

One thing I did not expect to see here were so many different nationalities, and food styles, I know it was probably a little naive but I totally expected the whole country to be pasty white, with wisps of red, and the same style of food. There were just as many pizza, Chinese, and kabob places as any other big city, as well as your typical American fast food joints, which we found out later in our trip, and not surprisingly, actually serve different sides in other countries.

Christ’s Church

On this first day I was surprised with how much we actually accomplished after running on little to no sleep. We visited the Christ church, St. Patrick’s Cathedral, and green, Temple Bar, Guinness Brewery, and O’Connell Street. We did a hop on hop off bus tour, paying 21€ for two days of hopping. I liked the tour because not only were the drivers knowledgeable and comical but you got to see nearly every sight in the city on the route, with the added bonus of being able to get off then pick up where you left off, or if your feet were tired from walking you could just enjoy the ride from the open air second story. In actuality we probably didn’t even need the bus because it didn’t take us long to walk across the entire city, in fact we did it several times, but as I said it was nice to have the option.

Ha’ Penny Bridge

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