It’s our Wicklow day.
A friend of Dana’s from work grew up in Wicklow and recommended it as a
great little town to see while we were here.
We also see brochures around places for bus tours to Wicklow, and see
that one of Brittany’s favorite movies, “P.S. I Love You” was filmed in
Wicklow. It’s also the kids’ last full
day in the UK and Lauren wants to see some Irish countryside. We’re really glad that we did Guinness the
day before now so that we won’t have to rush today – just do what we want, when
we want. We get out at our average time,
about 10:00, and drive down. It’s just
about an hour drive south of Dublin, and we expect to see water and some nice
sights like we saw at Land’s End.
We love what we see as we get into town – just a cute little
town, but it’s busy! Lots of activity happening, and then we see that it’s the “Taste
of Wicklow” today – we love a “taste”! We find parking at 4 hour space
and just start walking. We see a sign
for the black castle ruins and decide to check it out... We find water! YAY!
Views.. just gorgeous! And there
is a lighthouse that Brittany can walk to this time.
It’s another sunny day, we have been so lucky with the
weather – but there is still a chill in the air. You wouldn’t know it, because people are
swimming in the ocean. BRRRR… We walk
back toward the castle ruins (checked out the lighthouse first) and it dates
back to the Vikings. There isn’t much
left of it, but you can definitely see walls and windows – and it’s SO
windy. Got some great pics, and just
enjoyed hanging out up there for a while.
We walked back down and there was a place where you could get to the
water’s edge. Dana wanted to stick her
toes in the water and Thomas, Lauren and I head down with her. We hear squeals of delight – Dana has found
sea glass!! She has a little bit of an
obsession with this stuff – she found it first at Martha’s Vineyard, and then
again in Italy – and she can seriously spend hours on the beach looking for
this stuff. She’s going to have a friend
of hers make a jewelry piece out of it.
We get Dana out of the water, and walk up to main road to see where we can find lunch and the “taste”. We’re not really sure where to go, so I ask some local men who are standing nearby if they know where to get seafood (we figure we’re near water, this should be a great place to get fresh fish) – they’re not very helpful, and point in general to the direction we’re heading and say there are several places in that direction that serve fish. I ask about the taste of Wicklow, yah, that’s up there too – is there a central location? No, it’s all around… you just taste. OK – very specific info. We run into our first “taste” just a few doors down – it’s a butcher shop that’s cooking sausages out in front – they look REALLY good. They’re leek and chive flavor – we wish we could take it home – and Brittany says she’s going to ask her butcher to try and make some (they try different kinds of sausages all the time). He tells us that there is more taste of Wicklow as we walk up the main street we’ll see signs, and then there is a main gathering at the Abbey, and we’ll see that further up. We ask him about a seafood place (we didn’t want to ask a food place about a food place, but he’s a butcher, not a restaurant) – and we can understand him (totally clear). His friend, not so much – his friend says a place and points in a general direction, but we seriously can’t understand him – I try to get the guy that we can understand to say the name of it, and I thought that the friend said something near The Bridge Tavern, but now it seems like they’re talking about the Bridge Tavern itself. It’s down the stairs (like through an alley way that goes down because it’s closer to water level) and on the road that runs parallel – We find it!!
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| Tasting sausage |
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| See, funky bread on the burger... |
Thomas doesn’t do seafood so much, but I’m getting pretty
good at scanning a menu for a burger at this point (they have one!, We’re in!) I have the “sea trout” (which is just like
salmon to my taste) and tomato linguini.. Dana has this amazing looking open
faced crab sandwich – Lauren has a nice pile of butter baked crab claws –
Brittany tries the Hake (like cod) – and Patti has the cheese and tomato melt
(they called the “toasteds” and we’re seeing them on almost every menu). Thomas had the burger, but I don’t want you
to get the impression that he’s not taking food risks. None of the burgers are like the burgers are
like our burgers at home – different prep for each, some are pork burgers or
lamb burgers, they all come with different burger sauces, different buns of
varying textures and toastiness… so just getting a burger isn’t as safe as it
sounds. The best burger is still the one that we had in Cornwall, the night
that Robbi waited on us and I got my bottle of wine because of his burger.
We finish eating, Lauren checks out the little bookshop for
the Winnie the Pooh books again, and I get something from a coffee shop, I
think I’m cool because I use the local lingo, “Can I get a take-away
cappuccino?” – and I love their phrasing, “Of course you can” – well that’s
lovely then. And when she’s ready for me
to pay she says, “That’s 2.50 when you’re ready…”. So polite.
We walk back up to the Abbey that the sausage guy referred us
to, and it’s a full festival – scones, baked goods, meats… there’s a stage
where there will be a show later. We’ve
already eaten, so we look around a little and then head back. On our way out, Britt and I spot caramel
shortbread like we had at Kensington Palace, and we have to get some – she says
one, I say why not two, and the guy says that it’s 3 for 5 euro…so 3 it
is. She puts it in her purse for later –
which may have been a mistake. Later
they melded together, but it just made for a double-decker shortbread caramel
cookie. Nothing wrong with that.
We walk back to the car and stop in little shops along the way – the kids find some stuff and I get a couple of teaspoons. I’ve had a lot of coffee while we’re here (I love coffee that other people make for me), and each time you get little spoons with your tea or coffee, so I that will be my souvenir for this trip – I like to find everyday items that are common where we are but not really found at home. We stop back at the sausage place and Britt and I each get one in a hotdog bun. SO GOOD.
The drive back to Dublin goes well, until we get to Dublin
itself. I think that Tim is just leading
us all around the city. On the way out
we made a couple of left turns and found ourselves on a motorway. On the way back it is taking us as long to
get through Dublin as it took us to get TO Dublin, and I’m tired of going in
circles. It doesn’t help that sometimes
Tim gives me a “bear right” direction after I’m too far down the road to get right
(the lane is full) – or that sometimes I just miss the turn in general – and it
just takes longer because of all the one way streets. But we finally recognize where we are and
find our parking spot. I seriously think
that it took us just as long to get around Dublin as it took us to get from
Wicklow to Dublin. I’m very happy to see
our street finally.
I’m tired from the wind and being outside and the drive – so
we chill for a minute (or hour), I nap, others read and relax before we head
back out on the town. We want to head to
the Temple Bar district and I want some oysters, I’ve wanted them since we saw
them on a postcard for Dublin – they even have an “oyster stout” that goes with
oysters… I looked up on the internet and there are two pubs in the area that
have oysters. The Porterhouse seems to
be the best option – it’s 4 floors..and they’re all full. So we just walk through the area and check
out menus – no oysters, except for the actual Temple Bar that gave the area
it’s name – and you might have guessed that it’s also full. Thomas tells me that he doesn’t think that
Dublin is famous for oysters, or he would have heard that. I’m not sure – but I’m obviously not getting
them tonight. I’m really not that hungry
since I had two lunches, so I give up on my oysters and we just get a place
where people can find something. I get a
couple of appetizers as a meal; the tomato and carrot soup (together – it’s
like a really hearty tomato soup) and the goat cheese stuff portabella (you can’t
turn down goat cheese). Britt gets pizza
– she’s trying to Sally it up while flirting with the waiter – asking if she
can have banana peppers on the pizza (he’s never heard of them) – and we can’t
have water because they have a boil order right now. Ok we don’t want water, and we don’t want to
know why. So since we can’t have water,
we get our berry Bulmers.. our new favorite drink - yum. Patti and Dana get Greek salads – but these
are not like our Greek salads, there is no lettuce, just tomatoes and cucumbers
and olives with feta. And Thomas gets a
burger…
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| Temple Bar district |
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| Britt flirts... |
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| Greek salad |
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| Tomato and carrot soup |
We walk around a little more and find a cute shop where
Lauren finds a great Ireland hoodie – very soft! And Patti finds a great shirt
for a gift too.
We walk back to the apartment, across the foot bridge – and I
get a little sad realizing that this is our last night together in Dublin – the
kids fly out tomorrow at 9:30am..  |
| Last night in Dublin |
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