Farewell Portugal, hello Ireland.

The tour was great. A lot of people may think that tours are NOT the way to go, but when you visit a country for the first time, its great to have someone take you to not only the main sights but all of the wonderful, out of the way gems that we experienced. Fabulous. If we ever go back to Portugal, we know where to go. We were also very lucky with th group we had - lovely, interesting people. A great 11 days.

The early start to the airport was unavoidable but the flight, when we finally boarded, was pretty good. We booked business class for a little extra which gave us a few niceties like exit row  and priority boarding (that's another story. 

Our cab driver in Dublin didn't know where we wanted to go but I just happened to look at the map the previous night and managed to direct him to our apartment block. It was a great apartment just on the edge of the city - 20 mins walk to everywhere. We had a quick lunch in town then bought a few supplies for when the kids arrived - wine, beer, nibbles. They arrived around 10pm and we were very excited to see them. Afew drinks then off we went - at 10pm still daylight.

We had a great time at the oldest pub in Dublin (12th century!!).

The next day we visited the outside of a couple of churches (not allowed in unless we stayed for the WHOLE confimation mass - 90 mins). 

Visited Trinity college after a lovely lunch in the main pedestrian street in Dublin filled with fabulous buskers.

We then headed off and had the first decent coffee since leaving home the on to the famous Temple bar. What an amazing afternoon. The music doesn't get any better than what we experienced - guitar, tin whistle an 2 Irish acordians. We were spoilt. 

A quick stop at he unit before a walk back into town for dinner and a few drinks. We left the kids in town to party on.

Today Jim and I headed off on foot for 30 mins to collect our car. I meant to book an automatic but made a mistake and we ended up with a manual - poor Jim had to re-aquaint himself with the joys of a manual whilst negotiating unfamiliar territory.

The drive to Kenmare was fairly straightforward until we entered the national park and Jim had to  share narrow roads and sharp corners with tour buses. The scenery was spectacular.

We arrived in lovely Kenmare and settled into our townhouse quickly before walking the 4 minutes into town for what was basically a pub crawl.

There was quite a bit of live music about but the last pub had 2 amazing musicians - guitar and accordian - that were brilliant. We were very 'active' with our participation which left many wondering if we were drunks or musicians. Our harmonies during the last song - amazing grace - convinced them of the latter. (PS everone in the place was singing - not just us).

Looking forward to the Ring of Kerry tomorrow.