Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Ireland: The Emerald Isle! Days 4-6


Day 4: On this day, my Mom and I had a full day of touring the Ring of Kerry. Along the way, we saw Moll's Gap, Ladies View, the Torc

Waterfall, and visited the grounds of the Muckross Castle. During our drive, we encountered a little friend on the road walking in the other direction!

We had a funny little adventure due to the wonderful guidance of our Frommer's Ireland book. He recommended to visit Glenbeigh- "sweet little seafront town with streets lined with palm trees and a sandy beach." We arrived at the town and didn't see any of that! Mom ended up going into the gas station, where the teenage attendant explained the palm trees weren't doing so well this year...check them out.
Anyways, we continued on through Cahersiveen, Waterville, Derrynane, Caherdaniel, and took a little interesting side journey to see Staigue Fort. The fort itself wasn't worth seeing, but I did enjoy Mom's worrying since we were off the beaten path. From there, we continued on through Sneem and finished back in Kenmare. It was a full day's journey! After a nap, we had a delish dinner at Davitt's, where they had some nice live music with fiddlers. For dessert, we had Irish coffee with a Banoffi pie--biscuit bottom, toffee, bananas, and cream--yummy!


Day 5: Today we spent the first half of the day journeying from Kenmare to Dingle. The ride was so beautiful to the town of Dingle! We went through rolling mountains, rolling green fields spotted with cows, sheep, lambs etc. When we arrived in Dingle, we had some delicious fish and chips. From there, we did our obligatory pictures in Dingle.


After that, we headed to Tralee, towards our place for the night--Ballyseede Castle! This was definitely one of the best parts of the trip-staying at a castle in Ireland for the night. Our room was so spacious, and we had slippers and robes to wear. :) We walked around on the grounds, played with the clever little dog of the castle, enjoyed a drink at the bar, learned some history of the haunted castle, then had a cool 2 course dinner in the dining room of the castle!

After dinner, we hung out at the bar with other travelers, enjoying a drink and writing out postcards to friends and family. Ironically, I had a hard time sleeping that night in fear of encountering the ghost....luckily, no ghost sightings this time.

Day 6: After a lovely stay in Ballyseede Castle, we left in our little nerd mobile on a full day's journey. We drove from Tralee to the Cliffs of Moher. Neither my Mom or I were really impressed with the cliffs. While they were of course beautiful, it was very touristy and crowded here. Sometimes it's hard to enjoy beautiful parts of nature with crowds of people speaking a million different languages, all trying to get pictures of their own.
We stopped for lunch and ice cream at a little restaurant in Doolin, and then headed to Galway, driving through the Burren. Mom and I were singing while we drove around all the hairpin turns. We stopped at the Galway airport and returned the rental car, then proceeded to our adorable hotel: The House Hotel. It was an adorable hotel, very nicely decorated, in an awesome location. We walked around Galway a bit, and getting a yummy dinner at a place called Milano. It was almost like a Bertucci's, haha. We enjoyed dinner, then deaded out and grabbed a glass of wine at a bar called "The Front Door." From there, we went to Taffe's, and spent a while there enjoying some drinks and some great, modern Irish music. On our walk home, we were surprised by how hopping it was in Galway on a Wednesday night!

Friday, May 27, 2011

Ireland: The Emerald Isle! Days 1-3

My first big travel entry! My Mom and I went to Ireland for 8 nights, 9 days from May 5-May 14.



Day 1: The first day we arrived around 6am. Amazingly, we were able to check into our hotel at that un-Godly hour, and chose to sleep for 2.5 hours. From there, we explored Dublin. We walked around near Trinity College, Christ Church Cathedral, and walked all the way to the Guinness Factory where we did the tour. My Mom and I both had our one and only Guinness of the whole trip that day. Yuck! After that, we needed another nap, as it was later afternoon then, and the jet lag was catching up with us. We later headed to Temple Bar area, a nightlife hotspot in Dublin, where we had a delish dinner, and a fun night out!

I have heard mixed reviews of Dublin from other travelers, but I liked it. I felt like it was a city I could live in. Wasn't my favorite city in the world, but I suppose it reminded me of Boston in some ways. Walkable, historic, cute. I enjoyed it. :)


Day 2: The next day we had a leisurely breakfast and took a train to Cork, heading southwest. That took about 3 hours, and then we got to see the "real" Ireland--rolling green hills, sheep, cows, farmland. After getting settled in our B&B in Cork city, we went to dinner at a trendy restaurant called SoHo and had some good dinner and drinks.

I would have liked to enjoy Cork more, but unfortunately, it didn't really work out that way. It was more of a stopping point along the way from Dublin to the Southwest of Ireland. From what I saw, it looked pretty nice.




Day3: This morning after a yummy breakfast at The Garnish House, we set off to get our rental car. It was my first time driving on the right side of the car and the left side of the road!! A little funky at first, but just fine. Plus, we had a major nerd mobile and that was very small and easy to handle. First stop, the Blarney Castle, so we could kiss the Blarney Stone! Did you know my family (the McCarthys, formerly the MacCarthys) once owned the Blarney Castle? Well, "we" did! Anyways, that was a fun time. The grounds are really nice there, and it was fun to kiss the stone. Kind of gross though if you think of all the lips that have touched it. I swore my mouth felt dirty afterwards. They say they wash it down everyday...but I've ALSO heard the locals pee on it. Food for thought-yum. Anyways, I kissed the Blarney Stone but Annie was too scared since you need to lie on your back, grasp some handles, and lean backwards upside down. Ha! Now I have the gift of gab, as if I didn't already!

Next, we began our McCarthy journey. One main event in this journey to Ireland was to see the house that my grandfather, who was born and grew up in Skibereen, Ireland, lived. The circumstances were quite funny. It's a long story but worth telling. Our instructions from a cousin who had been there were: go to a bar on the main street in Skibereen and find Michael Duggan at the bar. Apparently he's always at the bar and EVERYONE knows him. So, we get to the main street in Skibereen and see a bar. Long story short, we go in Bar 1, no one's ever heard of him or even the area dear old Grandpa lived. Bar 2, same story. Bar 3, closed with some random non-English speaking people outside it. Return to Bar 1, try to call Michael Duggan, he doesn't answer. They were really unfriendly in there anyways, (rare in Ireland), so we sadly moved on. I was feeling irritated and annoyed by our lack of info and that the most important part of our trip may not happen.
So my Mom had been told Grandpa lived on "the road to Kilkileen." So I decided to type Kilkileen in the GPS. After about 10 minutes of driving, we had to take a left down this super narrow, grassy road. We were unsure, so we stopped at a B&B and Annie went in to ask for help. We showed him the picture of the house we were looking for and he said he knew it and would drive us! So he (a 70ish Irish man) jumps in his car and leads us...to the wrong house. I hold up the picture and he insists it's the right house, but then states "I'm colorblind." Haha!
Ironically, while we were driving to the wrong house, my Mom says "That's the house!" and pointed, I slammed on my brakes, but I had to keep driving and following the man.
So we backtracked after the colorblind/wrong house incident and Annie was right!

We then ended up meeting the elderly couple who lived there, going in the house, touring it, and getting a chance to spend time in the house where my mother's father, my grandfather, lived in! It was a wonderful experience to share with my mother-especially on Mother's Day! :)



From there, we drove to Kenmare and after a little resting in our B&B, we went for a nice Italian dinner (haha, yes, in Ireland) and then to hear some traditional Irish music. This resulted in us dancing with an 80 yr old man who smelled very badly, like bacon, from some intense dancing. I couldn't understand a word he said due to his Irish brogue. That was a trip!

To be continued...

Wednesday, May 4, 2011

MGM/Foxwoods

Ah yes, another night staying at MGM! My Mom received two free nights every week of April to stay at MGM hotel at Foxwoods Casino. We decided to take advantage of it during the last week of April for one night. Our room was so nice! Quite a nice place to stay for free. Then, my Mom got free slot money and also dining rewards bucks.
After getting settled, we got dolled up and went to dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe. We had some fun cocktails and an appetizer and an entree, along with some good conversation. After that, we decided to play the slot machines for a bit. I started with the Sex and the City machine, which I've always wanted to play but has always been occupied. My Mom and I played and we both decided it was no fun!! Only after I lost $16, of course. We proceeded to the pigs machines, introduced by Meridith and Cheryl, and a new favorite of my Mom's (and now mine)! I was $40 down and really not doing well. I figured, okay, I'll play one more $20 and then I'm dunzo, $60 is my limit of money to "throw away" at a casino. I got down to my last $5 or $10 and thought..."Well, now I get a taste of losing." Then somehow after all sorts of Barnyard Bonuses and such, I somehow soared to $91! I then said "Okay, it's not going to get any better than this!" and cashed out. My Mom also won and I made her cash out as well. :)

It was just a quick overnight, but who doesn't love a free stay in a chic hotel? :)