On Saturday the 12th, we started our long drive to Galway. It is nearly a four hour drive straight through, but as per usual, we made some stops.
Our first stop was a quick one in Kells. Kells has a small abbey where the Book of Kells (a manuscript and Celtic Gospel book written in Latin, containing the four Gospels of the New Testament) was written and kept safe for hundreds of years. After a quick walk around and photo stop, we continued on our way.
Our next stop was at Causey Farms, which is a working farm that does tours and also educational work for school groups. We first got the chance to make some Irish soda bread. We mixed everything together and left it to be baked while we went on a tour of the farm. There was every animal you'd expect on a farm and we even got to watch some sheep herding.
By the time we were done with the tour, it was time for lunch. The farm has a small cafe and we got to eat roasted vegetable soup with our bread. Megan and my bread was a little dense. We didn't mix in quite enough moisture. But dessert, scones with jam and cream and tea, more then made up for it!
We loaded back onto the bus after lunch and finally finished our drive to Galway. There was an extra excursion that most of the group went on that evening, so Megan and I teamed up with two others in the group to catch a cab into the middle of town for dinner. We were dropped off at Eyre Square and the walked down the main road into the Latin Quarter. With all of the tourists, it took us a while to find a restaurant with seating available right away. Eventually we did though, and I had a dinner of fish and chips with a charcuterie board for the table to split. We took a taxi back then and called it a night.
The next day (Aug 13) was our full day in Galway. We started out with a walking tour through the central part of town, learning more about the area we had been the previous night. Along our walk we saw the Lynch Castle, the site of the first lynching, the Spanish arches, and both the old and new ports.
We had some free time in the city then. Megan, Kris, and I broke off from the main group to leisurely do some shopping. We visited a lot of stores including souvenir, antiques, art, wool, and jewelry. We also walked through two local artists markets. Galway is a wonderful city with twisting winding streets to explore. We found that as soon as you got off the main road, the locals were friendly and the shops were less crowded. We met up with some others for lunch and then spent some time just sitting in Eyre Square while enjoying a coffee. We all loaded back onto the bus and went back to the hotel for a bit.
Once again, there was another extra excursion that evening that Megan and I didn't sign up for, so we had our own fun. We found a nearby cinema and walked down to see the Barbie movie. It was so much fun! The theater even had thick red velvet curtains that pulled back to reveal the screen once it was time for the movie to start. I really enjoyed the movie too.
After the movie, we walked back discussing the movie and called it a night.
And that's it for this update! Next blog will include the Cliffs of Mother and the Dingle Peninsula!
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