Reflections on Ireland

Before our adventures in Ireland are overshadowed by our new Scottish leg of the journey we thought we would summarise our Irish experience:

First up the Irish people are exceptionally friendly and helpful and they value tourism as an important contribution to their economy and go out of their way to provide top service in every respect.

We mostly ate in traditional style pubs and chose traditional hearty type fare like Beef and Guinness Pie and vegetable and lamb casserole, serving size was always generous and our meals never dissapointed us. Most of the pubs were cosy and had character. While Irish music was often advertised to be at the venue, it never started before 9.30pm, often later.

Signage on roads, particularly in Dublin was lacking or hard to read due to size (both English and Irish names included on signs except for the Connemara area where only the Irish name was given). Round-abouts are plentiful and okay to negotiate except for double configurations that often require a second attempt. Roads are constantly surprising in that they can change readily from double carriage highways to country roads to narrow laneways. Travelling through towns frequently requires pulling over to allow another vehicle to pass due to parking on both sides of the road impinging on travel space. Stone walls are everywhere.

Parking is pretty much non existent in popular towns and then there is no such thing as free parking. Their roads are very much multipurpose if necessary. On Sunday we waited for some time at what we thought was a hold up on the road only to realise that we were in fact waiting behind a stream of double parked cars outside the church. 

We came across quite a few 'clean up Ireland' sessions where people of all ages and gender were dressed in high vis vests and worked in groups on the sides of roads with garbage bags and gloves. 

We were always assured of our safety even within the biggest cities of Dublin and Belfast and we never had any reason to feel anything but safe and secure. In Dublin and Cork we walked past a number of silent beggars, mostly on bridges.

We were both surprised by the variety of landscapes we experienced. Expecting green to feature everywhere we were fascinated to see so much of the grey rocky and barren mountain areas. Gorse bushes were everywhere and currently in flower (yellow). Daffodils and Tulips were bright and cheery in many towns and pale yellow primrose grew wild in many areas. Flowering cherries were doing their thing. 

Many of the towns we travelled through had a maze of streets with tightly packed colourful buildings on both sides of the road.  Never any verandahs or porches and mostly two or more stories high. 

We thoroughly enjoyed our stays in both the Republic and Northern Island. We would gladly return to expand on what was merely a sampler.

THANK YOU IRELAND FOR YOUR EXCEPTIONAL HOSPITALITY.