Day 4 Ireland - County Clare

The morning of June 20th we awoke in time for a delightful breakfast and headed out for more Irish countryside. It was a very busy day, so there are a lot of pictures from the first half of the day.


The view from our breakfast table was beautiful.


I was tired of the usual "full Irish breakfast," so I ordered something different. I had to have some more of those Irish bangers, they were just so good I couldn't help myself.

Gregg wasn't tired of the blood pudding and such in the Irish breakfast, so he stuck with it.

I believe I deserve a breakfast service like this each and every morning.

Good stuff!

After breakfast we headed out to check out the grocery stores in Limerick. I'm sure that most of you don't know how much of a "foodie" I am, but one of my favorite things is to see what different grocery stores are like. This photo is from a "Tesco", it is a lot like a Wal-Mart here in the states.

I did buy some vanilla extract that had specs of vanilla floating in it. Other than that though, I was pretty unimpressed.

After visiting Tesco, we went to a nicer store that was right around the corner. This place was called M&S. It was full of fresh produce and prepared meals. I can totally see our grocery stores in the States making this transition soon.

Here I picked up some candy for the kids, gummy pigs and Turkish delight. If you don't know what Turkish delight is, it's rose flavored gummy candy covered in chocolate. Payton didn't care for it, but I thought it was... a delight.

After touring the local grocery stores, we stopped for some coffee. It is so strange that you can't find actual coffee brewed anywhere in Ireland except Starbucks, which are few and far between.
Everywhere had machines like this one or instant coffee. Oh, and they look at you like you're crazy if you ask if they have iced coffee. Needless to say that when we saw a Starbucks, no matter when that was, we jumped at the chance for the good stuff.

We drove by this church. Because it was Sunday, people were making their way to services.

They didn't dress up either, you'd never know they were going to church just looking at them.

I couldn't help but get a shot of the car again, it's just so damn cute!

This was another drive by castle. I believe it is Adaire Castle. This was as close as we got though.

Next we stopped off at Bunratty Castle. It is a high traffic tourist area, so we made our trip quick, but it was so nice outside we got out of the car and walked around a bit.

Bunratty Castle stands beside the O'Garney River. It is an exceptionally complete 15th century fortress. The castle you see today was the fourth castle built on this spot, and it was largely built by the MacNamara family in 1425, but in an earlier incarnation it was a home of the English royal family, until it was destroyed by the Irish chieftains of Thomond in 1332.

After the current structure was completed, it was ultimately taken over by the powerful O'Brien family clan, they ruled from here and lived in luxury. In their time, Ireland fell to Cromwell, the castle was taken over by a variety of English families, until the last abandoned it in 1804.

The castle is a kind of historical theme park on 20 acres of shopping, restaurants, and pubs.

We walked through a few of the buildings before heading across the street to do a little shopping. I failed to purchase anything due to my indecisive nature. There remains a few items that I wish I would have picked up over there.

Here we are behind the castle on our way back to the car. From here we headed North to our next destination, Dromoland Castle Hotel.

Upon arrival this place was breathtaking, and this first set of photos does it absolutely NO Justice!

You'll have to wait for better pictures after my next post.

Dromoland Castle Hotel is seriously, like a dream.

These were all taken before we checked in. I couldn't help but take pictures.

They have a helicopter pad, complete with helicopter, this place was fit for a king.

We stayed the 20th and 21st here at Dromoland. The 21st was our 15th Wedding Anniversary.

This is the entry area where you check in. Luxurious!

We were taken to our room. I had to take pictures.

Air conditioning isn't available ANYWHERE in Ireland, that took a little getting used to.

The bathroom was beautiful too.

Peak-A-Boo!

Staying in a castle, in Ireland on your 15th Wedding Anniversary is totally NOT overrated!

King size beds are few and far between too by the way. We were very comfortable none the less. We had a bed to lay about during the day and one to sleep in at night, HA!

Television in Ireland leaves quite a bit to be desired. They have very few channels and that number is quite deceiving. There might be 12 channels, but three or so of them are duplicates. They also play a lot of American television shows, we even got to watch South Park in Gaelic, that was funny stuff, "Oh meu Deus, eles mataron o Kenny!"

This was just a taste of our experience at Dromoland Castle Hotel, from here we headed out to The Cliffs of Moher, which were completely breathtaking.