Blogs from County Meath, Ireland, Europe

Before you go on, Dear Reader, just be warned...this was one of the funnest days ever, so if you are feeling overly cynical, get yourself a nice cuppa or a perfect Guinness and relax. Our last full day in Ireland dawned with, what else, more clouds and intermittent sprinkles, but a nice warm temperature and lots of what we call in Oregon "sucker holes." Niamh had decided that we really needed to experience the full Irish breakfast before we left, so we sat down to eggs, rashers, sausage, black pudding, roasted tomatoes, toast, marmalade, butter, coffee, and Fea's JOOSH (translation: juice). We were almost done with this amazing meal when Niamh realized she had gotten beans and mushrooms as well but forgot to cook them...I think we did JUST FINE without. Shawn, as an employee of ... read more

Hello again Another fab day in Ireland. We went for a walk from the country Thatch House up a side road for about 6-7 kms this morning. It was a definite wake up as it was only about 12 degrees but we are on a large hill and the wind chill must have been close to 0 degrees. We then decided to take in all the local sites,castles and ruins in County Meath. We started at a town called Navan and had the proper sunday roast lunch at one of the local pubs there with all the locals after they had been to church. The meals are enormous and it is like sitting down to the equivalent of our hot Christmas Day dinners or like the old days for those that remember how special Sunday lunches ... read more

After leaving Buncrana we head south to Dundalk. We had decided to get up and leave, it was a long day of driving around 3 hours total, but completely do able. We decided that since we got into Dundalk early we would not go to the B&B but go to Newgrange instead. We had called in advance to see how crowded it was…you’re not allowed to reserve a spot or anything but it is nice to know what you’re getting into. We arrived and had to wait about an hour for the next tour to begin. We wandered around and got some lunch at the center, which was great. Then we caught our bus which takes you to Newgrange. It’s a neat tour because you go into the passage tomb – which is super tight. In ... read more

Great Breakfast at the College, light and airy. Picked up the car from the carpark. I will never complain about Adelaide carparks again. The carpark had 7 inches either side of the car, and shorter than the Ford Focus's length. Took a number of back and fro's to extract it (almost needed a can opener). Left the park and drove in circles until the gps could find a satellite (close buildings, very high, satellites low on the horizon). Drove to Newgrange which was particularly hard to find. Another national treasure 60km from Dublin you have to know all about before you can find it. The signposts for this place only started 1km before the turn off to the site, and in typical European style, have no distances on them, so you just drive into the ever ... read more