Ireland, Day 4

Day 4's itinerary:  We thought we would stay a little closer in, and have a short day.  We had driven through Limerick on our way to Blarney, and it looked like a neat town.  So we decided to go back and explore a little the next day.  Limerick had a castle and a cathedral, so we thought we would check them out.

We woke up to some blue sky...but it was still cold!

All gathered up and ready to go!  All of the houses in Ireland had beautiful rock walls and entry gates.  Our house was no exception...it had pretty rock walls with a large iron gate, and the name of the house on the wall.  Very neat!

Uh-Oh...no lines!!  We had quite a system of classifying roads before the week was over, ranging from Primary to Secondary, all the way to Sixth-dary!  This was a "Fourth-dary" road! : )

Peat!  PaPa had seen a show about how they "harvest" peat and use it as a fuel.  He was hoping to find some, and we just happened across this as we were driving to Limerick.  A quick u-turn, and we stopped for some pictures.  We later saw them using these peat blocks in all the fireplaces in the restaurants!

Walking up to King John's Castle.  I don't remember who this guy was...but it wasn't King John!

MiMi & PaPa with Little R in front of "unknown man" statue.

Little R was a HUGE fan of the cannons out in front of the entrance!!  T...not so much!

Firing the cannon at Mommy!

A quick pit stop for lunch!  More REALLY good food!

King John's Castle.  Inside they had some videos telling the history of the castle, and of Ireland.  It is a bit of a sad story!!  Ireland seems to have been "conquered" by just about everyone throughout the years.

Why do we do these silly pictures??  I don't know, but we ALWAYS do!!

More silliness...T said it was hurting her head!!  I said "Well, duh!  That's the point!"

Little R fit just perfectly!!

Big R...not so much! : )

And they even dragged me into the nonsense!!  Then the girls thought it would be funny not to get me out when we were done with the picture!!  Not nice, girls!  Not nice!

View from the top of the castle.  Pretty! 

More pretty views.  And yes, this is the River Shannon!!

MiMi tackled the cannon, too!  The funny part of it was watching her climb up, with R trying to help, and MiMi refusing his help and telling him to get away!!

MiMi & PaPa like cemeteries, so we all ventured into this one.  The girls thought it was creepy!!

I thought it made for some pretty pictures of my pretty girls!

MiMi & PaPa with all 3 grandkids this time!  I loved this door!!

A very rare picture of all 5 of us together!!

My blessings!!

A beautiful house in Limerick!!  Living in Germany, we see a lot of meticulous yards...the Germans take pride in their yards.  But I think the Irish may have them beat!  We saw SO many perfectly manicured yards...they were beautiful!

St. Mary's Cathedral

Inside St. Mary's Cathedral.  They had lots of stained glass, which was amazing!  They still hold services in here!!

T was more amazed by the piano than anything else!!

After exploring the castle and cathedral, we planned to go to an indoor playground I had read about in Limerick.  We thought it would be just the right medicine for a little boy who had been confined to airplanes, vans, and "do not touch" castles and cathedrals for several days.  After some difficulty finding it (it seems the Irish have no use for street addresses), it was well worth the effort!!  Little R and A ran and ran and played, and then played some more!!  It was just what they needed!!

MiMi & PaPa used this time for a quick nap!  And T caught up on some reading...imagine that!

Little R had a blast!  He told me "thank you for taking me to the playground" numerous times that evening and the next day.

 R asked a worker at the playground for a restaurant recommendation, and off we went to dinner.  Again, with some difficulty finding the place because they didn't have a street address for us to enter into the GPS!!  But we finally found it!!

Finnegan's for dinner!  It came highly recommended, but was probably our least favorite meal of the trip!

On the short drive home, R thought he would outsmart the GPS and go the way he "knew", which he didn't actually know at all.  The GPS had to re-route us, and we ended up going down a road that we had no business going on!!  It was completely DARK, narrow, with grass growing in the middle of it!!  And if we had met a car, I have no idea what we would have done!!  It was scary!  I was having a silent panic attack in the front seat, certain that we were never going to make it back to the house!! I could see the headlines reading "Dumb Americans Get Lost in Irish Forest Driving a Big 'Ol Van on a Tiny Little Trail.  Found 3 Days Later by a Sheep Herder."  But the GPS didn't let us down, and after a scary, silent drive, we finally made it back!  WHEW!!  Our "short" day turned into one of our longest days yet!!