Ennis Evenings and Dublin Days

For Thanksgiving, we went into Ennis (15 kilometers from our cottage) for an evening of music.  We were not disappointed.  Not only did we befriend the greatest bartender ever (Lackey), but we were witness to the most fantastic session of music.

After only a few hours of sleep, we packed up Midge and made our way up to Dublin.  Once arriving, we took a quick cat nap and made our way out into Temple Bar.  It's the "cultural" burough of the city, and quite lively in the evening and early morning hours.  We found a great little place for dinner and then, with full bellies, made our way to find more music.  We ended up in a place so appropriately named The Temple Bar.  It had, like, 8 separate rooms, all with their own bars, some were outside with heat lamps, some were cozy with tables, and some were made for standing and shouting the lyrics to some chintzy bar song.  It was here that we met one of the more interesting characters from this trip.  He really wanted to chat with us because he's not allowed into the States due to a small run in with the law in the '70s.  This "run in" was apparently a smuggling of 250 machine guns into Northern Ireland.  No joke.  We've tried googling him, but with no luck.  Was he full of it?  Quite possibly.


We were walking up the street a little later on our way to a pub closer to our condo when we ran into a group of men.  I don't remember what the line was...something along the lines of "How do you feel about a pub crawl?  It's Lads Night but we want you to join."  How do you say "no" to an offer like that?  So, they toured us around and told us great stories.  We ended the evening dancing into the wee hours of the morning.  We walked (or roamed since we were lost) home during a thunderstorm, and woke up to snow!

Today we experienced Dublin in daylight and happened upon a 150,000 person rally.  It was really actually inspiring.  It was in front of the Post Office (which is pock marked with bullet holes from the Easter Rising of 1916) and the topic was the threatened economy, a topic that hits fairly close to home.  We felt transported back in time, and felt honored to see such passion from such peaceful people.

Tonight, we sail for Liverpool.  The crossing is about 8 hours, and we'll wake up on English soil.  We will find our way to the boat in the morning...and next you hear from us, we'll be nautical veterans.  Hopefully...we've learned new disturbing facts about the eels (things like how they don't have jaws and just latch onto fleshy surfaces).