My Irish friend, Anthea, was heading for a close friend’s wedding outside Dublin this summer. After our successful road trip in California, I knew we made great travel partners and I was excited to tag along with her to check out Ireland and spend some more time with her.
Anthea was keen to have me along and to show me around her country. She was interested in seeing some places she had never been, and taking me to some of her favorites.
Anthea was keen to have me along and to show me around her country. She was interested in seeing some places she had never been, and taking me to some of her favorites.
In addition to the wedding, Anthea wanted to take the opportunity to see some friends and family in various parts of the country. She whipped up a road trip that would take us from Dublin along the west and north coasts and into Northern Ireland. Even though Anthea doesn’t live in Ireland anymore, she still has a car there that her mom drives these days. So we’d have freedom to drive far and wide.
She met me at Dublin Airport in “Bobby”, her tiny Fiat subcompact. It was morning when I arrived, and I was determined to stay up all day without taking a nap. I knew it was important to get on the clock properly so I wasn’t jet lagged for my whole trip.
The first thing I noticed about Dublin was the astonishing lack of high rise buildings. Normally when I come to a new town, I’m surprised by how big it is. Though its Ireland’s largest city by far, Dublin feels small, and almost suburban.
After a few errands, we took a drive into the local countryside and had some seafood and Guinness at Johnnie Fox's, a very charming pub in the hills popular with visitors, then stopped for a nice view at The Blue Light Pub to get a good view of Dublin from above. The surrounding hills were lush and green, as expected, and we enjoyed a great view of most of the city. I was surprised to see sailboats in the bay. I always think of the sea around these parts as being especially rough.
The River Liffey cuts Dublin in half and empties into Dublin Bay. I’m told folks identify closely as being from either the north or south side of the river. Anthea grew up on the south side of the city in Churchtown.
Anthea gave me a couple of choices for cultural sites to see in the city. I chose the Guinness Storehouse tour. Since the 1700’s, Guinness beer has been made in the center of Dublin. Even though I don’t often drink it, it is one of the world’s most loved beers, so I was curious. The factory area is the size of an entire neighborhood and it’s a charming place to walk around. But as we neared the entrance, it sunk in that I was dragging Anthea on a tourist activity tantamount to Alcatraz in San Francisco. It turns out that the tour doesn’t really show you actual operations of the plant. It’s more like a museum celebrating the company. But you do get a properly poured Guinness served to you at a penthouse bar that overlooks much of the city.
From there we walked across the city center meeting her old friends along the way. A good tactic for getting face time with friends during a short visit is to set a time and place and put out the word. Those who are really hot to see you won’t miss the opportunity.
We posted up at Grogans bar in the city center, and the friends streamed in. It was super fun for me to be welcomed into what was clearly a hot spot in town and get to chat up Anthea's friends and other locals. It was an unusually warm evening so we lounged outside in the lanes all night where a band was busking and entertaining the pint-guzzling masses.
After a couple days in Dublin, we headed for a music festival held at Charleville Castle in Tullamore, west of the city. The previous couple of days had been rainy there, so the ground was a muddy slop. Luckily I was able to borrow some wellies, the knee high rubber boots most locals keep on hand.
We bopped around from big top tent, to backyard DJ party, to main stage, sampled all the local talent and met up with some more of Anthea’s local friends. We were all impressed by one band called Meltybrains, an original, high energy, high concept band that reminded me a bit of Talking Heads and Arcade Fire.
Between performances, I got to meet some members of another local band called King Kong Company who were hanging out in their camper van. They enjoyed indoctrinating me as an honorary member of their clan by showing me the proper way to sip their home brew cider from a giant glass jug - curling my pinky finger through the ring at the rim while resting the bottom of the jug on my elbow and lifting it into the air. “You’re one of us now!”, they shouted.
I also got to taste another of their creations made out of a local swill called Buckfast that they named Commotion Lotion. One of them rattled off a number of Buckfast recipes including one champagne cocktail called The Velvet Elvis. It was neither tasty nor terrible, but they were a fun bunch.
My biggest accomplishment of the day, however, was refraining from letting any of my belongings ever touch the mushy ground. I wouldn’t have access to a washing machine until I returned home over a week later. So keeping clean was a big win.
The next day we headed to Achill Island, a sleepy beach getaway town off the far west coast of Ireland. The road to Tullamore had been a modern highway, but the proprietor of our B&B described the road ahead as “savage.” I didn’t know what to make of that.
Indeed, I found the drive to be far more bumpy and curvy than I had expected on this trip. Luckily, the diphenhydramine sleep aids I was using to combat jet lag also double as motion sickness pills. Otherwise I’d have been in a world of hurt.
On they way to the island we passed a large sign that read “An Ghaeltacht”, which indicates we were in Irish-speaking country. Now I felt a bit ignorant. I always thought that Gaelic was an ancient Irish language akin to Old English. I didn’t know people actually still speak the language (they call Irish) in many parts of the country. There are radio stations and newspapers that are completely in Irish. All signs and government forms are written in both languages. Kids are encouraged to learn it in school, but unless they live in one of these areas, they are likely to forget most of it. I also noted that it doesn’t resemble English much at all. Accents vary across the country but the Northern variant I heard on the radio reminded me more of Hebrew than anything else I could think of.
I wondered how long it has been since it was the main language, so I read up. It was in the late 1300's that locals were forced to assimilate and learn to speak English after invasion and settlement by the English over the previous hundred years or so. It seems like a matter of political history and luck that many languages we take for granted today are still widely spoken.
Anthea has a friend named Paddy living in Achill who we’d be staying with. Our first mission was to find our way to his restaurant and hostel called Pure Magic. The coast was wild and stunning. Horned sheep run wild everywhere, munching on the ubiquitous grass. Herds will sometimes run through the middle of town on their way to some mysterious appointment.
Some of the locals still burn “turf”, a mixture of grass and mud that makes an inefficient but fragrant fuel for fireplaces, so the air has a sweet musky scent at times. A few fishing boats scoot around the bay. Every other car seems to have a surfboard or a bike affixed. It feels like life hasn’t changed much out here for decades.
Achill is a destination for mainly Irish tourists, but it’s still only sparsely populated. Houses dot the landscape, but mainly what’s out there is nature. High green cliffs descend sharply into the Atlantic Ocean to a wide sandy white beach.
Beach life is leisurely. Our choice of activities was eat, hike, walk the beach, or nap. We sampled all of them equally. I was also introduced to the “99”, a soft serve ice cream cone popular with Irish. Like San Franciscans, they will not hesitate to eat ice cream on a cold blustery day. I’m normally not a big ice cream eater, but I gobbled down a huge cone like it was a contest. It was delicious.
It turns out Pure Magic is quite popular and we hadn’t booked in, so our second choice, The Chalet, served up an array of locally-caught seafood. The wild salmon was mouth watering and their house wine was quite good as well.
The next day we headed to the even more remote Keem Bay a little further up the coast. The road ends there and it feels like the end of the earth. A small beach with a surf shack surrounded by green rolling hills and nothing else but sheep. No signs of civilization in sight. I like beaches, and this one was especially picturesque and charming.
But we couldn’t stay long. Anthea had booked us a seaweed bath appointment in Strandhill near Sligo along the northern coast. We had a little problem though. We were relying on Google maps for directions everywhere on this road trip. I had brought my car iPhone charger to keep us juiced up, but it turns out American cigarette lighter jacks are different than Irish ones. So we were rationing battery power for the whole trip. We made a couple of wrong turns along the way, but the back roads we ended up on were a highlight. Tiny and gorgeous. It only added to the adventure.
We arrived to the Voya spa in the nick of time to make our appointment. The spa prepared us each our own personal bathtub and steam room. The tubs were filled with warm water and natural strands of the abundant local seaweed. I never had a bath like this before. After a steam to open my pores, I slid in under the seaweed and rubbed it all over my skin. It was surprisingly gelatinous. It was a little strange at first but it did feel like it was somehow good for me. It must be, right?
After an hour of alternating between hot steams, cold showers, and more bathing, we emerged relaxed and walked a few steps to Shells Cafe next door that came highly recommended. I had a “hot pot”, which I guess is just a general term for a hot bowl of something. Their hot pot du jour was beans and chicken in a tasty broth. It really hit the spot. Although our weather was still holding up reasonably well, I can imagine on a cold stormy day, a delicious hot pot like this would be a more than welcome sight.
The following day would be relatively leisurely. A drive up the north coast of County Donegal. But a big storm had blown through the night before. The radio reported severe widespread flooding and the clouds were still looming. A coastal drive would be pointless if we couldn’t see anything. But just as we came to the crossroad to make a decision, the sun came out and we headed for Slieve League Cliffs.
The cliffs were majestic and relatively quiet of visitors. It was a place to have a peaceful hike and gaze at the sea. Anthea was grateful the weather had cleared. She had never seen this part of the country before.
Our destination that night was Ramelton, where we had another B&B reservation at Frewin House, another welcome recommendation. But this time, our luck with the map and battery had run out. Our battery died before we arrived in town. It was a delightfully charming little village, but a cursory drive around bore no obvious signs of our destination. So we stopped at a local pub and got directions. The nice thing about small towns, is everyone knows where everything is. It was only a few doors down the road. But we may never have found it on our own.
The house and grounds were magical. An iron gate off the road led down a gravel path to a large stone house surrounded by lush greenery. We buzzed and no one came, so we just walked in. The old house was incredibly charming and full of art and knick knacks. A formal dining room overlooking a back garden. A library full of comfy couches and books. After poking our heads around for awhile, the keeper emerged and seemed puzzled that the buzzer hadn’t worked. Maybe the storm had broken something.
We settled in and then drove up to the nearby lake big enough to have a beach of its own, then ate at the Rathmullen House for dinner. This would likely be our most upscale meal of the trip and we were both excited. The grounds around the place were heart-melting. It seemed like an obvious choice for weddings and the like. I felt a little grubby for this place. It seemed like it could easily be stuffy, but, like everyone else I’d cross paths with on this trip, the staff was exceptionally friendly and hospitable. They greeted us and seated us on a couch in the lobby for a cocktail while they prepared our table. They even took our order ahead of time, so our food would be ready soon after being seated. Apparently we lucked out by walking in without a reservation. It’s normally booked quite solid.
I was quite surprised to detect a party of several older Texan folks in the lobby with us. They were the stereotypical loud Americans. I thought to myself, “how did they find this place?” I could never have found this place on my own. I sipped my Irish coffee and tried to quiet my judgements, replacing them instead with thoughts of my aged Irish ribeye to come.
The food and service were lovely, of course. It was a special place - the whole region, really. There was nothing that was not beautiful the entire drive into and out of Donegal. Mostly expansive, green ranches with grazing cattle or loose horses - short stone walls separating properties. Of course, we were still beating the odds on weather. Rain had only come overnight, and for a little bit of the drive.
In the morning, on the way out of Donegal, we stopped at an ancient stone ring fort at the highest ground in the region. When I saw the pictures online back home, it didn't seem all that exciting. Just a round ring of stone. But when we arrived, I could imagine back to the period when it was built - around the time of Christ. The most strategic location around, you could see 360 degrees in every direction. If someone was invading your kingdom, you could see them from there. I imagined the king being ushered into the fort, only twenty yards across, and guards hurling arrows and spears at invaders from the fifteen foot walls above. One would not want to be backed into that type of (albeit round) corner. It seemed like a hideaway of last resort.
The good weather again gave us a spectacular view of the countryside that may not look all that different than I imagine it did a thousand years ago. Patches of green farmland, wild hills and river valley. It was somber. I appreciate that this landscape still exists, devoid of most traces of modern life as far as you can see.
The rest of the day would be ambitious. We’d leave Donegal and head across the border into Northern Ireland. Anthea had some sites in mind and then had some relatives she wanted to visit while we were in the area. Her parents were both born in Northern Ireland and many aunts, uncles, and cousins live there.
It occurred to me that I didn’t know much about recent political developments in Northern Ireland. When I saw that we’d be heading over the border, I wondered if it was safe to travel there given the violence I grew up watching on television. Referred to as “The Troubles”, the major problems are mostly over now. There are no more bombings and no more armed guards at the border. It’s safe now, but not entirely without division. Historically Irish but now part of the United Kingdom, buildings in villages fly flags, some Irish and some British. Ending in the late 1990’s, The Troubles are far from forgotten.
The largest city in Northern Ireland, I had always imagined Belfast as kind of bleak or gritty. But far from it, as we landed in the city center to the boutique Malmaison Hotel, my first impression was of a crisp, energetic city reminiscent of Portland, Oregon.
We met some more cousins out for drinks in the Cathedral Quarter, an up and coming neighborhood that feels a lot like the Mission District in San Francisco. There has clearly been some recent investment in stylish new remodels of old buildings on par with London and New York. I’m not sure how far it extends into the rest of the city. But I did find myself wishing I had more time there to hang out for awhile.
The catch was, I wasn’t exactly invited to the wedding. So while the rest of the group ceremonied and dined, I got some much needed rest in our room. I’d join them for drinks and craic in the bar later on, but for now I’d make myself scarce.
My main logistical difficulty was food. I had planned to just get some room service, but this wasn’t a hotel per se. Their only food service was catered for wedding guests, and the estate was in the country, far from any restaurants or groceries. I’d have to drive somewhere.
But I never drove a right-side steering car before. I’ve driven a motorbike on the left side of the road in Asia, but never drove a stick shift car. This was another level. But I was hungry.
I got behind the wheel and was immediately confused. I felt like a teenager, awkward and uncertain. I made it to the main road and took a deep breath. I didn’t want to go too far, because besides being awkward and unlicensed, I might get lost. I didn’t have a map, nor did I know where town was.
Luckily I didn’t have to go too far before I saw a pub that advertised food. I grabbed some fish and chips to go and felt lucky to get back to the estate without making a fatal mistake on the highway.
I felt truly accomplished.
I slipped in to the party later on. Dancing and socializing ensued. I don’t always enjoy weddings. But this one was good fun. A great group of people, good music in a nice setting. It wasn’t the three day Irish wedding I’ve heard some people have, but I was glad to be there.
The seafood is fabulous and is largely caught in the neighboring sea. The staff is folksy and friendly and proud of their offerings. On a nice day, you can walk up the road and into the wild hillside and peek over into Dublin Bay for a full view of the south side.
It was a whirlwind tour. But I was so grateful to see so much and meet so many great people from different regions and walks of life in such a short time. The Irish folks I met along the way did not disappoint. Their culture of fun and hospitality was exactly what I hoped to find.
I'm grateful for the opportunity to visit Ireland this way and pleased with myself for taking it. Anthea made the journey possible for me and did most of the planning. I couldn’t have had this experience without her.
Thank you, my dear.
