Early morning today. We had to have our bags out by 6:45 am. Left about 7:45 so we could meet the ferry for the ride across the River Shannon.
After the ferry ride, we rode through very pretty rolling hills. We stopped at the Cliffs of Moher. This is quite the stop. The visitor center is built into the side of the hill. There are two paths you can take to look at the cliffs. We went up to the top and got some great shots of the cliffs. Back in the visitor center you can wander through some interactive displays. Of course when you are finished you get dumped out into a gift shop. Of course I was was among them, but seriously some of these people act as though they haven’t been allowed in public much. Got back on the bus and noticed there were some other shops that had been built into the side of the hill as well.
On our ride into Bunraty, Patrick (our driver/guide) put on some music for us to listen to. Whenever we had long stretches of driving he liked to do this so we wouldn’t have to listen to ourselves think or so some people could just sleep.
We arrived in Bunratty and our hotel was right across from the castle. We all went across the street for a Medieaval banquet at the castle. This sounded really neat when I first heard about it but when we got there not so much. They ushered us up a winding staircase just like the one they had us go up at Blarney castle. We walked into the main hall and they gave us a glass of mead. Nasty tasking stuff this is. We milled around and had some entertainment until everyone had arrived. After they made us walk down the same stairs and into the dinning hall just below us. The room was entirely too small for the number of people they were trying to cram in there. We all got sat down at long tresel tables and were told we were eating just like they did in that time. There were finger bowls on the table along with a glass for either wine or water. We had a wood plate, bowl and only a knife. We were served in three courses. The food really wasn’t bad but after having used a fork and knife my entire life it was a little unnerving to eat with just a knife and fingers. This wouldn’t have been bad except the food was extremely hot. This part would have been more enjoyable had there been less people in the room.
After we went back to our room and chilled out a bit.