Wednesday in Ireland

Yesterday was another awesome day in Ireland! We went to Cahir, a town close to Clogheen for lunch and to do some souvenir shopping. Cahir is the home of Cahir Castle, which was constructed in the 13th Century and was used to film the movie, Excalibur. It's a spectacular castle!

The streets of Cahir were alive with activity, as a movie was being filmed at Cahir Castle and there were lots of interesting costumed characters on the streets. Also, it was the day of the "deb's ball," which is Ireland's version of Prom. We saw a bunch of teenagers all dressed up and preparing for their big night out.

We went to a pub for some soup and met up with Neil, one of Martin's buddies from his days in Oxford, and his girlfriend, Rachel. We made plans to meet up with them again in the evening and headed to the souvenir shop. They had ice cream there, and Martin shared a cone with Grace. Grace ended up with it all over her face, but she enjoyed every bite!

We headed back to Clogheen, and Grace and I had a nice nap. We awoke to the most amazing smell...Mam's famous pork dinner! We had a truly delicious meal together with Mam, Dad, Caroline, Willie, Liam, and Melissa. Martin was in heaven since his Mother's pork dinner is "his favorite meal ever." I must admit that it knocked my socks off too, and Grace was thoroughly impressed as well.

After dinner, we had a visit with Sharon, Martin's sister, her husband, Tom, and Conor and Michelle. We gave them their gifts and hung out for a bit before heading out for the night. Grace stayed home with her Aunt Caroline, cousin Liam, and grandparents and had a great evening playing with them. Meanwhile, Martin and I met up with Neil and Rachel in Cahir for beers. Later, Eamon, another of Martin's good friends, met up with us, along with his daughter, Tara, who I befriended on Facebook awhile back and finally had the pleasure of meeting. We did a pub crawl to three of Cahir's pubs, enjoying beer and cider at each. We had a really wonderful time hanging out with good friends and experiencing Ireland's nightlife.

My favorite thing about pubs in Ireland is that people can stay and drink past closing time. The pubs closed at 11 PM last night, but we were there until 1 AM. You arrive outside a pub, and it looks deserted from the outside, but once you're inside, you see that the party is still rocking on :-) No nasty bouncers throwing you out at closing time like in the States...gotta love that!

All in all, it was yet another brilliant day! That's all for the moment :-) TTFN!