April 15 - BOTHY and the Coloradoans rescue some silly girls from L.A.

April 15 - BOTHY and the Coloradoans rescue some silly girls from L.A.

On Monday we had a voucher for a free harbor cruise on the Killary Fjord, so we were looking forward to that. We slept until 9 or so, had a yummy breakfast at the hotel (They had porridge! I was so excited) and then drove off to check out the Connemara National Park visitors center and go to the cruise. The visitors center was small but nice, and we decided to come back and hike later in the day if we had time. I had woken up with a sore throat and wasn't feeling 100%, so we decided not to hike then and there. We arrived at the pier in plenty of time for our 12:30 departure, and got on the boat. The cruise was given to us by the travel agency that we used to book our hotels, and it was really nice of them to give it to us. When we got our tickets we found that the price would have been 22 euro's per person, so we were pretty excited that it was free! The cruise went down the Killary Fjord (Ireland's only fjord, btw) to the mouth of the ocean. It was really beautiful and the weather was good, only a little cloudy and no rain. We saw lots of fish, sheep of course, and possibly an otter. We had hoped to see some dolphins, but they must have all been swimming in a different area. We really enjoyed the cruise, but would we have paid 45 euros for it? Probably not. Maybe if it had been a really sunny day.

After this we went to Kylemore Abbey. The lovely building was originally a castle, but has been home to the only order of Benedictine Nuns in Ireland since the early 1900's. It was amazingly beautiful!!! In addition to the castle there is an exquisite small neo-gothic church, as well as a beautiful walled garden. We went into the house first. It was a little disappointing because you can only go into about five or six rooms of the house. Making up for this is the fact that the rooms that you are able to go in are absolutely beautiful! They also do a really great job of telling you the history of the castle.  I definitely recommend reading about it online if you are interested. After exploring the rooms we walked about a half mile through the forest to the lovely little church. Seriously, it was breathtaking! The wife of the builder of the house contracted dysentery in Egypt in the late 1800's, and died. Upon returning to Ireland he built this church as a memorial to her. It was so peaceful inside, and really simple. I'll try to post some pictures on Facebook later. We then walked about 2 miles to the walled gardens. Along the way we stopped at the tea house for a snack. Everything sold is made by the nuns, and I had a really yummy scone with cream and raspberry jam with a cup of earl grey, while Brandon had a slice of cheesecake. At this point we were rather hungry because we hadn't had lunch, and it was 4:00. After finishing this we went into the huge walled gardens. Covering a really large section of land, the garden had many different sections as well as about 4 greenhouses. The cottage that the head gardener lived in has been wonderfully restored, so we strolled around there. Then we saw a sign for something called a "Bothy." Not knowing what this was, Brandon went to check it out while I read a sign. I saw that he had gone into a building, and I just KNEW that he was going to try to scare me! I carefully walked into the little building, looking around corners. When I saw him in an inner room,  he yelled out "BOTHY" and I jumped even though I knew he was there!!! Oh man. Classic!

When we left the bothy (which was apparently a little cottage for the under gardener) we saw a sheep happily grazing away on some bushes within the garden. We saw a worker nearby, so assumed that the sheep was a welcome part of the garden. We then walked out of a little gate into the woods and walked a little way. When we turned back towards the garden, we saw another sheep run in through the gate. All of a sudden about three workers started yelling at the sheep, trying to shoo them out! The sheep ran past us, baa-ing loudly. We're not sure why it was ok for the first sheep to be in there and not the second, but seeing sheep run is so funny that we didn't care!

We walked the couple miles back to our car in a light rainstorm, and the woods looked so pretty with the rain falling! The abbey is built right into the mountains, and there is a lake with peaks behind it as the front yard. Once we got in the car we headed back towards Clifden and a road called the "Sky Road." In addition to hearing that this road was absolutely beautiful, I had read about a ruined castle off of it, Clifden Castle. Brandon kindly indulged me, and off we went on a castle hunt. We saw the castle from a higher road, and drove a little way down a pretty rocky and rutted farm lane.  We realized pretty quickly that our teeny car had no business on a road like this, so we parked at the top and walked down the mile or so to the castle. When we were almost there, we came upon an obviously distressed lady and a little car that really had even less business than our teeny car being on that road. We asked the lady if she was ok, and she said that she and her four friends had driven down to see the castle, and were now stuck.  Now, dear friends, let me set the scene for you. We're in Ireland, in country. It's raining. This is an unpaved, rocky, rutted, muddy road with huge potholes and big scary rocks. There are pastures on either side (one of which had a lovely horse that I bonded with) and there is absolutely no room other than the one lane that is between fences on either side. No room to turn around, no shoulders, no pavement, no nothing! The lady told us that they were from L.A. and asked where we were from. When we said Colorado you could literally see the relief on her face!!! She told us that they had been stuck for about 20 minutes, and didn't know what to do. I mentioned my reluctance to drive as it wasn't my rental car, but they all kept saying "we have full insurance" and asking us for help. I hopped into their little stick shift car (it was pouring rain by now) and Brandon prepared to guide me. All of the girls got out but one, and she stayed in the passenger seat. With Brandon guiding me, I backed up the teeny farm lane and turned around in a pasture that we just happened to find an unlocked gate into. The horses that were next door were clearly not impressed with our follies. The car only got a little stuck in the mud once, but with everyone pushing and me gunning it we got out no problem. After Brandon's expert guiding, the car was now facing up the little farm lane, but there was a really small gap that it had to squeeze through, with barbed wire on either side. I asked the driver to get back in at this point, as if something got messed up I didn't want it to be my fault! We got them back on the road around the gate no problem, and the girls were all euphoric! One of them even called us their guardian angels.  They also kept saying how smart we were to have left our car on the main road and walked down. After big hugs and profuse thanks, all five of them piled back into the little car, and tried to get started up the hill. They had a few false starts where they just rolled backwards, but finally the driver realized that you really had to gun it, and we saw them pull up the hill.

We then continued on our original mission and started to walk on towards the castle. At this point, who did we come upon? The farmer whose property we were on, of course. He asked us who's permission we had to be there, and we played a little dumb and said we hadn't realized it was private property. Once he realized that we were on foot and only wanted to look at the castle, he was really nice and told us to go ahead. He asked us what the deal was with the car, and we told him that the girls had foolishly driven down and gotten stuck. He asked us where they were from and when we told him California, he actually rolled his eyes!!! It was hilarious. He asked where we were from and when he heard us say Colorado, he said "ah, so you're used to mountains!' Even Irish farmers think California girls are silly (sorry dear friends from Cali, you KNOW we love you!)! What a laugh. We then spoke with him for a few more minutes, and he told us to enjoy the castle views and mind the cow that was down the lane by the castle.

We then strolled around the castle for a few minutes, you couldn't go in because it was in such bad shape, but it was lovely nonetheless. Facing out onto the bay it had some seriously beautiful views. After this we walked back up the lane towards our car, still laughing. It was raining pretty heavily now, and I was having a blast splashing around puddles in my wellies. What an adventure!

When we got back to town we were pretty hungry, so headed off in search of dinner. We went to a really great fish house called Mitchell's. Brandon had another really good carrot soup to start with, and I had some seriously delicious seafood chowder. Then he had a fish pie (think shepherd's pie but with fish) and it was so good! The fish was flaky and the sauce was creamy and the mashed potatoes were perfect to soak it all up, and I had some chicken stuffed with blue cheese and garlic served on tagliatelle. It was amazing! It had this wonderful buttery garlic sauce, and the garlic and blue cheese went great together. Brandon had some ice cream for dessert, and we spent some time talking with the owner.

After this we lumbered back to our hotel, full and happy after our exciting day. So, we didn't end up hiking in Connemara, but we did our good deed for the day and had a good laugh. I can pretty much guarantee that those girls will never drive down another road like that!

When we got back to the hotel we spent some time in the library room where they had wifi. Sadly, this is right when the marathon bombings happened and we started to see the news notifications popping up. I have the CNN app on my iPad, so I always get notices when new headlines are available. We spent a long time reading things as they came up, and were just in shock at what we were seeing. When we went back up to our room we watched the news for a long time. There is a lot of coverage here in Ireland about this, and there is a very somber mood today because of it. At dinner tonight I spoke with the barman and a few other customers for a while while Brandon was getting something from the room, and they all expressed their shock at what had happened and extended their sympathies towards the people affected.

As lovely as the Irish countryside is, nothing can compare to how kind and wonderful the people here are. In addition to being hospitable and friendly, they are so caring and kind. They truly understand the tragedy that hate attacks bring, and the news is filled with people expressing their sympathies and sending love and prayers to those affected. Brandon and I join them, and hope that you and all of your loved ones are safe tonight.

We love you!

Linds and Brandon