January 4th and 5th in County Clare

Steven and I are sitting in the “common room” of the Orchard House B&B with the owners, Mr. and Mrs. Murphy watching talking about all things Irish. http://www.guideireland.com/showdetails.php?id=1152.  One of the best aspects of staying in people’s homes is the contact with the local population.  Staying in a hotel I often only meet other travelers.  We spent yesterday in the town of Galway. It is right on the Atlantic Ocean and the B&B we stayed at faced the harbor.  It has a medieval street running through it with old stone streets and buildings they have been there for hundreds of years. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galway.  We stopped at a castle on the way out of town, when we opened the car door and little dog ran out to us and we became fast friends.  He loved Steven and even jumped into the car with us to get warm.  We have met so many great animals here.  We now carry a bag of apples to fee the donkeys and horses we meet along the road.  Although we no longer try to feed the sheep (see video).  hahaha We headed out early to the Burren County Park an area with many Mesolithic monuments and then made our way to the Cliffs of Moher.   We drove up to the cliffs and opened the car doors.  It was like being in a wind tunnel. The three of us made our way out on the stairs leading up to the cliff’s edge.   The wind blew through the car and actually blew one of Steven’s lenses out the door and down the walkway. I actually threw myself into the wind and it held me in the air.   The earth is truly powerful.  We covered a lot of ground today in the car.   Steven is being a great driver and I am the navigator.  I am most excited about the next few days.  I have booked a literary pub crawl in Dublin and the Writer’s Museum is beckoning me.  We ate lunch in a little pub in the town of Adaire.  I had bacon and cabbage it was amazing, although there was enough food on the plate for an entire family.

Tomorrow we head out to Blarney for mom to kiss the Blarney Stone at Blarney Castle.  The photos for tomorrow’s blog should be great!