Erin Go Bragh!!

Whoa, boy, I'd better divide these pictures up into multiple posts!  But, I've already loaded all these pictures to this post, so I'll roll with it.

OK!  According to Wikipedia, Erin Go Bragh is usually translated to "Ireland Forever".  I don't know if we'd stay there forever, but we certainly want to go back - multiple times.  

The luck of the Irish was not totally with us during our travels.  We headed over the pond the same weekend that Hurricane Irene decided to make a huge mess of the East Coast.  Our flights were to go from LAX to Newark, NJ and then on to Dublin.  Yea, not so much.  After a lot of juggling and phone calls with the airlines, we finally got our flights settled and set off (via Toronto, London and THEN Dublin).

As an additional fun twist, Nick caught a slight cold the Saturday before we left (we left Sunday).  So during most of the time on our three flights, he coughed a lot.  Poor guy.  He was able to sleep some of the second flight from Toronto to London, but woke up quite a few times (usually right as I was finally starting to nod off).  Needless to say, I didn't get any sleep on any of the flights.  Kevin maybe caught an hour or two (he was sitting on the aisle while I was in the middle and Nick at the window).  But, oh well, so it goes.  We got there. Finally.  With MOST of our stuff.  

The lovely folks at London's Heathrow airport - well, they weren't our favorite people.  Without going into a lot of boring detail, our stroller - which was supposed to meet us at the gate (hence the term gate-check) - did not meet us.  We (and about 10 other families) were told to go to Arrivals, pick it up and then come back through security.  Huh?  Have those people ever BEEN through security at Heathrow?  That wasn't happening - we had another flight to catch.  We went to our other flight (which involved a bus, more security, customs, ID pictures, retina scans, blood draws, yadda, yadda...) and hoped for the best that our stroller would migrate over to our last flight (on a different airline to boot).  Yea, it didn't make it.

Thankfully, WE made it to Dublin.  Collected all our other stuff (which, thank God, DID make it) and went off to find the rental car shuttle.  Here is Nick on the shuttle.  He looks wide awake, right???

In our infinite wisdom during our trip planning, we figured "Hey, we arrive in Dublin at 9-ish in the morning.  We'll just get the car and drive a couple of hours to our first town.  No problem."  Our actual arrival time was closer to 3 PM local time and we were exhausted.  But we had to drive to Kilkenny where we had our hotel reservations.  Thank God for Hertz and the upgrade - the car was great and fit all our stuff.

Here is Kevin in our lovely Peugeot car.  Driving on the left side of the road.  Yea, that was easy-peasy on essentially no sleep in the last 24 hours.

He was out no sooner than we could leave the Hertz car lot.

It's probably no surprise that the drive from Dublin airport to Kilkenny is quite fuzzy in my memory.  It IS a surprise that we actually made it to Kilkenny and found our hotel with little trouble.  Our hotel, the Kilkenny Ormonde Hotel, was right in the center of town.  They gave us a very good recommendation for a restaurant (we arrived around dinner time), called Zuni.  We had a very nice dinner and found out that in Ireland, they call chicken fingers (or tenders) chicken goujons.  This became a common word in our vocabulary in the coming days.

After we had dinner, we knew we had to try and stay up a little later in order to get on Irish time.  Our hotel had a bar so we took Nick's DVD player and headed down.  Here he is set up with his blue blankie and DVD's.

Our first pints on Irish soil.  Ahhhhh....

After sleeping in a bit (thank goodness!) we headed out to enjoy our first full day in Ireland.  Here are the boys in front of the hotel.

After stopping for a quick latte (needed some serious caffeine), we headed down the block to Kilkenny Castle.

A view of the expansive grounds in the back.

The view back toward the castle.

Another view...

One of the very cool things about the castle (and all of Ireland, really) is that they have a lot of kid-oriented things.  The castle grounds has a HUGE play area for kids.  So we struck a deal with Nick - he could spend some time at the play area first, and then it was on to the castle tour.  He was on board.  Schools in the area were starting up later in the week, so the area was full of kids.

We had a hard time getting him off this when we were leaving.

You weren't allowed to take pictures inside the castle, so you'll have to go yourself to see it.  Here is the view of the river from the side grounds of the castle.

The gardens in the front of the castle.  You can see Nick just over the edge of the top of the stairs.

He's racing Finn McMissle (from Cars 2) along the path.

A view back toward the castle from the gardens.

Another view (and Nick still racing...)

The boys (including Finn).

Nick is becoming quite the photographer.  I was instructed to hold Finn.  We need to figure out a way to get him to take pictures from a better angle - the upward shot is not so flattering.

Another Nick shot (shocker!)

And one more...

Unfortunately, this picture cut off Kevin's head, but the other one wasn't as good.  So trust me, Kevin's head is well and good.  Nick liked to sit on the big circles.

Love all the colors of the store fronts.

An interesting statue (I have no idea what or who it is - bad tourist!!)

Ah ha!!  The Smithwick's Brewery!!  But, alas, not only did we miss the last tour, it was only for 18 and over.  Boo!  (Thankfully, the only place we went where Nick wasn't allowed).

Nick sitting in a Smithwick's beer barrel while Kev & I looked around the store.

Next stop with the Rothe House.  It's a townhouse that was taken over by the Archeological Society and turned into a museum and gardens.  Honestly, the museum was sort of eh, not that great.  Here is the courtyard of the townhouse - that's the well.

The best part of it was the gardens.  They're up on the roof behind the townhouse.  It was very cool.  Here is a little gazebo type thing with grape vines along the side.

As we were going through the garden, one of the gardeners was there tending to some plants.  She was very nice and told us that we were welcome to eat anything we saw.  She also added that they use no pesticides so we didn't need to worry about chemicals.  Cool!  So, off Nick went to find something to nibble on (he, of course, stayed clear of the green beans and other veggies).

Success!  He found a TON of tiny little strawberries.  He was in heaven.  I started to worry that we were eating too much as he literally stopped at every plant and picked all the good ones.  Whoops!

The fruit thief in action...

The local ducks.  Surprisingly (well, maybe not so surprisingly), Nick wasn't too interested in the ducks.  Just the berries.

As we were walking around Kilkenny, we saw all sorts of yellow and black flags, signs, etc.  We had no idea what was going on.  So when I saw this sign I thought, well I have to get a picture of "Stripy Men"!  We soon found out that we were in Ireland during what is nearly equivalent to the Super Bowl.  The Irish National Hurling Championship (sort of like field hockey or lacrosse).  And County Kilkenny was in the final versus County Tipperary.

We continued our walk around Kilkenny and headed up to St. Canice's Cathedral.  Although Nick was doing really well, have to say we did miss the stroller at this point a bit.  Anyway, here is the inside of the cathedral with the beautiful stained glass windows.

The cool tower outside.  We were going to climb it but they didn't allow kids under 14 to go up.  I guess that's the second place kids weren't allowed, oh well.  Can't say I was disappointed that we couldn't climb 100+ stairs.

The beer gentlemen.

The outside of the Black Abbey - I liked the raven hanging out on top.

The Black Abbey - you can see Nick in the reflection.

The inside of the Black Abbey, the boys and more stained glass.

Yet another church - can't remember which one it was, but we didn't go in.  We were 'churched out' by that point.

Of course, after walking around Kilkenny all day, it was time for a pint.  We stopped at the Marble Bar for a Smithwick's (when in Rome, etc., etc.)

Nick had a ham sandwich and apple juice.  He also kept entertained by my phone.

A conversation about kids not drinking beer.

We headed out again and hit up another place, the Kyteler's Inn.  Big place and pretty cool.  It's said to be haunted by a ghost.

The original owner was accused of being a witch.  She was sentenced to be burned at the stake but was able to escape.  The town-people weren't happy and decided to condemn her maid instead.  She was whipped and burned at the stake.  Nice, huh?  It's her ghost that haunts the Inn.

Kevin was in charge of the guidebook and finding the places we'd go.

As we were getting ready to leave the Inn, we found that in an upper room, they were giving lessons for playing the bodhran.

We all tried to get Nick to do it, but he was too shy.  So I did it instead.  That's my back on the right in the grey sweater.

Me and my drum (with Nick looking on from the back).  It was really fun - a bit cheesy/touristy, but still fun.  Can't say I could start up my own band, but I could probably keep a decent beat.

Another view of the river from a bridge.

A view back to Kilkenny Castle from a bridge.

More evidence of the Stripey Men.

Night view of the Castle.

The next day, before we checked out of the hotel, we were required (by Nick) to go to the inside pool.  I didn't get any pictures (I SO wish I had!!), but they made any one getting in the pool use a swim cap, which they sold.  It was quite funny seeing both Nick and Kevin in swim caps - hence my wish for getting a picture.  The pool was nice - very big with a separate kid section where Nick could just stand up with his head above water.  We couldn't stay too long, but - as with the day before - we were able to get a fun Nick-activity in before we did other stuff.

After we dried off and packed up, we headed off to Kinsale. We did make a couple of stops on our way down, including Kells Priory.  It was one of those places where you just walked through a gate, through a field full of sheep and into the ruins.  You pretty much had full run of the place - no one there to watch you or take tickets or anything.  Here's the view of the ruins from the top of the hill and the path that runs down to it.

From the inside of the priory.

Ruins...

You could walk all the way to the King's River.  Here's the view from the river back up to the Priory.

The sheep that you walked through to get there.

And the sheep poop that you had to avoid as you walked through.  There was a lot of poop.

After we finished at the priory, we hit the road again.  We stopped in Cashel and had some lunch (at a pub, of course.  Nick had - yes! - chicken goujons with fries).  After lunch we headed up to the Rock of Cashel, which is a large hill with the ruins of a very old church and fort on top.

Here are Nick and I on the path up to the Rock.

Nick hanging out on the Rock.

A view of the countryside from the Rock.

Another church ruin - not sure which one it is.

The round tower of the fort on the Rock.

A great 'touring the countryside' day.  After Cashel, we drove down to Kinsale.  Nick took his nap in the car (I must admit I nodded off here and there as well).  A great couple of days in County Kilkenny (well, mostly Kilkenny; Cashel is in Tipperary, but whatever.  Details.)