After our Newbury house sit we had another sit in Ealing looking after a fairly maniacal cat before we caught the train to Holyhead in Wales, and then a ferry to Dublin.  From Dublin we caught the DART train south to the coastal town of Bray where we had a three week house sit.

We found the Irish very friendly open welcoming people, with their drivers being equally polite. The few pubs we went to were small and cosy with low ceilings and plenty of Guinness. The cost of living appeared to be less than the UK but they are highly taxed due in part to the GFC implosion. Gaelic is prevalent on street signs, radio and TV and is taught at school. Apart from rugby, hurling (a mixture of baseball, hockey and lacrosse) and gaelic football (Aussie rules with a goal) are very popular.

Our house was a ten minute walk to the beachfront and esplanade so we only hired a car for a five day period to travel inland.

We initially took a day trip west from Bray to County Wicklow with our house sit host. It was raining intermittently when we got to Glendalough Lake at the head of which is situated an early Medieval monastic settlement founded in the 6th century by St Kevin. The colourful heather flowers on peat bog.

We took a trip up to a Dublin for the day to look around and see the play ‘Once’ at the Olympia, a theatre that dates back to 1879. It was interesting to see that the pre-play and interval bar is actually on stage and patrons are joined by the cast whilst having a drink.

3 St Patricks Cathedral and Health and Safety Irish style!

The wheel of a Model T at an exhibit, an Aussie entertaining the crowd and Jen standing next to a statue of a voluptuous Molly Malone of rugby song fame. The statue has many nicknames including the ‘Flirt in the Skirt’ and the ‘the Tart with the Cart’

Flat out!

Girls studying maps ……

Evening meal

I like her whale earrings

We met this guy on the train sharing theatrical stories to those who would listen

My favourite – ‘it gets crisp in the fall’

After passing Limerick (everywhere you go in Ireland there are familiar names) on our extended trip our first stop was the village of Adare where we stayed in a small B & B. During a walk through town we found the St Nicholas Church an Augustinian Friary founded in 1316 by the Earl of Kildare, and photographed the Desmond Castle erected in the early 13th century.

After breakfasting with an interesting couple from South Carolina we set off towards Killarney and the western peninsulas where we circled both the called Ring of Kerry and the Ring of Bere. The country out west is fairly desolate and hilly with farmhouses dotted over the landscape and the shoreline is convoluted and rocky.

We travelled along the southern coast visiting the Dromberg Stone Circle dating back to the bronze age, on the way. We stayed the night in the attractive seaside town of Kinsale where we found a bed in what had been an old bakery.  An elderly couple had been running it as a B&B for 25 years. 

The fabled Irish welcome, humour and hospitality shone through, being invited to an evening of music, song, dance performed by the youth of the area in the local church after which we headed to a genuine Irish Pub for some more of the same.

Rather than going to Waterford and up to Bray as we had originally planned we had to go back to Adare to get my computer charger! – a first world problem and an unimpressed wife. 

Just before we left Dublin we took the train up the coast a couple of stops to check out the Dalkey Lobster and Jazz fest. Dalkey is a seaside suburb of Dublin founded as a Viking settlement and later an active port in the Middle Ages.

We had been threatening for years to go and visit our good friends in Kelowna Canada and since we were as close as we were ever going to be to Canada we decided to go, and booked our flights…..