Williamsburg Innkeeper Blog

We left Dublin Saturday morning and drove through the midlands to the west coast for a wedding of family of friends. With it’s craggy mountains, sandy beaches and network of lakes laced together, Connemara exemplifies the peaceful solitude and rugged beauty of The West of Ireland. 

On Sunday we boarded a bus, with all of the other wedding guests, for over an hour treak to the Ballintubber Abbey in County Mayo.  Talk about a destination wedding, this 800 year old abbey was quite impressive. Ballintubber takes its name from St. Patrick-Baile tobair Phádraig – the townland of St Patrick’s well, where Patrick baptized his converts.  Did you know that as a boy of fourteen or so, Patrick was captured during a raiding party and taken to Ireland, orginally from Scotland, as a slave to herd and tend sheep. This was in the days of the Druids and pagans and therefore he took their language and practices.  He turned to God as a child and prayed until he escaped in his twenties and returned to Scotland, studied for the priesthood, was eventually ordained a Bishop.  He then returned to Ireland where he preached and converted all of Ireland for the next 40 years!  They say that he drove all of the snakes out of Ireland also!

If you are in IOM for the TT race make sure to book everything well in advance, after all, it is an island and the ferries sell out rather quickly.  We flew back to Dublin and then stayed at family of our friend’s house in Malahide, that truly is how hospitable the Irish are.  Malahide has a great village atmosphere, although the town is quite large, and it is located by the sea.  If you are not fortunate enough to have friends of friends that live there I recommend the Four Star Grand Hotel which is right in the heart of Malahide.

Monday was a bit rainy and visibility was a bit challenging as we ventured north through the Killarney National Park, over the Glanaruddery Mountains, and into Limerick.   It may look like a highway on the map but beware, the roads are narrow and a bit challenging at times.  Our next stop was the Adare Manor, located in Limerick.  You can’t go to Ireland without staying in a Castle.  It was an amazing resort.  The town was a bit sparce so I would recommend staying at the Manor and golfing.  Off to Dublin Tuesday to catch the ferry to Isle of Mann.

We left the farm house and drove through Bantry, which  had no available accommodations due to 2 weddings in town.  We had a reservation at a Bed and Breakfast that I think was called the Drum Loc House.  We couldn’t get by the smell as we were going up the driveway.  I honestly thought we were driving into the dump.  We were told by a local B&B owner in Bantry that Glengarriff was nice and had several B&B’s  On our way out of town  we passed the The Ballylickey House, which is were we remained for the next two nights.  Locacted just outside the town of Bantry, in County Cork, the Ballylickey house is a lovely estate home,  built about 300 years ago as a shooting lodge by Lord Kenmare.  The Graves family took over around 1940 and it has recently been totally restored and splendidly refurbished to its period. The house has a number of elegant suites with fine views over the grounds but we chose to stay in the garden cottages, which overlook the pool.  Ah, to relax in such a gorgous place and sit by the pool eating pizza and drinking fine wine. 

On Sunday we stopped in Glengarriff for gas and tea then spent the day touring the Ring of Beara on the bikes, driving all the way to Garnish Point. Lunch at O’Sullivans in Eyeries Village was fun, then through the Healy Pass back to Bantry.  The cliffs, narrow roads, passages, roaming livestock, sharp turns with steep slopes made the adventure more breathtaking in more ways than one.   The roads were initially carved out for horse and buggy so they cover only the most magnificent coastline and mountain passes.   I read up a bit before choosing the Ring of Beara over the famous Ring of Kerry and I am certainly glad I did.  I hear the later tends to be a bit crowded in the summer.