Blogs from County Galway, Ireland, Europe - page 35

Okay... *tries to remember* For reasons I don't remember anymore, I didn't go to Cork at all but travelled straight from Dublin to Killarney. Killarney is a really pretty, and my first instinct was "omg I wanna live here!" But after a couple of hours, I'd realized it's wayyyyy too small to live in. I spent to nights there, took a tour (where, I've no idea anymore). Because it was weekend, the hostels were booked and I slept in a mixed dorm with two Californian guys, Paul and Ben. First I didn't like it all, but then I was glad because they were fun to talk to, plus a clear Californian accent was a real treat after all these Irish accents, haha. Then I went to Dingle, which is a whole lot prettier than Killarney, and ... read more

Tuesday, June 17, 2008 D’Arcy of Galway, Ireland With plenty of advice from former D’Arcy pilgrims (Dianne, Rick, Josh, Paul, Eric, etc.), we decided that today we would search out what we could of the family, D’Arcy of Galway. We had read in the Rick Steve’s guidebook that there were 14 significant, ruling families in the middle ages in Galway. They are more commonly known here as the tribes of Galway. D’Arcy is one of them. We also knew that a former vicar of the St. Nicolas Collegiate Church was John D’Arcy and that a banner in the church had the crests of all 14 families. We wanted to find more. We asked around a bit and found a few more locations of the crests. One was in the middle of the main park in the ... read more

Well it's been a while since our last update, haven't been up to much just chilling out and saving some cash for the main event. A few months ago we went to Galway so we're catching up on that one. Zoe was the driver this time. I lost a couple of years of my life to many near misses. Na, she was very good but the navigating was exceptional (yep, we had good road signs to follow this time). It was very nice, a place that everyone over here goes on their hens and bucks nights. So you could imagine that there was a lot of drunk people. The Cliffs of Moher were a lot like the Apostles in Oz but very nice. They had a lot of shops built in to the hills, very cool. ... read more

As we biked along the azure coast of Inishmore (the largest of the Aran islands) off the West Coast of Galway, we basked in the sun’s warm glow and drank in our idyllic surroundings; stone walls interspersed with wildflowers, undulating hills, grey seals languishing on warm rocks, cows lazily grazing in green fields, and the clear blue waters of the Atlantic ocean sparkling like a sea of diamonds. Dave sidled up to me on his bike and we laughed together, held hands, enjoying the (rare) Irish sun and discussed how much we loved being together, and how blessed we were that the sun was shining and allowed us to enjoy the outdoors. It was in this setting (whilst still ambling along on the bikes!) that Dave proposed to me asking me to share many more moments ... read more

Jessica finally finished her paper...she is done with school until the fall! We picked her up at Corrib Village and drove her to the school to turn in the paper. We then went down to the City Center to do some shopping on Shop Street, which is right next to Merchant Street (these Irish come up with some clever names for their streets). I picked up an Aran sweater, and Pam managed to find gifts for all the nieces and nephew. I got a few shots of Shop Street and Eyre Square. Later in the day, we dropped Jessie and one of her roommates off at the rugby game (Connacht vs. Cardiff Blues). Cardiff kicked Connacht's butt (39-6). Connacht was the home team...it was not a happy time! Apparently, Connacht is so bad that they are ... read more