And Today's Castle Is...

Tuesday ~ We drove to Clifden for a bit of shopping, then on to Kylemore Abbey. Although some of the online reviews said, "Just take a picture from the road. Don't bother to pay the admission and go in," we loved it here and wished we'd had more time. But we like history, and might be somewhat unusual in that way. We started by eating lunch and browsing the gift shop for souvenirs. After finishing, we headed up to the abbey.

Kylemore Abbey

The soups in Ireland are largely pureed. Very flavorful, but I didn't like the consistency.

At night, when the Henry's would host a party, the castle would be lit up in the water's reflection. It must have been absolutely spectacular!

Margaret and Henry Mitchell honeymooned in Connemara and fell in love with the region. When Henry inherited a sizable amount of money from his cotton merchant father he left his career in medicine. He and Margaret built Kylemore Castle between 1867-1871, along with the gardens. It took one hundred men four years to complete and has 33 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms, 4 sitting rooms, a ballroom, billard room, library, study, school room, smoking room, gun room and various other offices and domestic staff residences for the butler, cook, housekeeper and other servants. It was a sort of experiment, to reclaim bogland and to encourage others to do the same, during the time when locals were recovering from the Great Potato Famine. He provided work, shelter, and later a school for his workers' children. He represented Galway in the House of Commons for 14 years.

Tragically, Margaret died in 1875, at the age of 50, after contracting a fever on a visit to Egypt. Henry was heartbroken and built a church to memorialize her. 

Margaret's church

Don refuses to build a church for me upon my demise. What a cad!

Isn't this angel's face, well, angelic?

In 1903 he sold the castle to the Duke and Duchess of Manchester. They only stayed at Kylemore Castle a few years, but in that time they made extensive changes, including changing the magnificent ballroom into the kitchen. Their lavish lifestyle was financed by the Duchess' father, American businessman Eugene Zimmerman. 


 The property was heavily mortgaged due to gambling debts that were incurred and on the death of Zimmernan in 1914 the property was taken over by a London banker. It lay dormant until 1920 when Benedictine sisters who had been forced to flee Ypes, Belgium in World War I, purchased the estate. Here are some more shots from in and around the Castle/Abbey.

These are GIANT azalea bushes!

Unfortunately, there wasn't enough time for Don and I to see the Victorian walled garden. I would have loved to see it as, you know, I loved THE SECRET GARDEN, and I've never seen a garden of that type. But...I did see this bird in the parking lot. Isn't he cute? 

I shall call him...Charlie!

After this we left for Ballynahinch, our own castle for the night. Here are some more pictures of it.

I have to blow this up really big so you can fully appreciate the way the sun made the ivy leaf glow!

When we arrived at Ballynahinch the coach

driver had to take the bus through this opening. He slowed a little bit, but there was literally an inch on either side. If he had even wavered a little...  One thing about Irishmen, in my experience, is they drive like madmen. Martin, our black taxi tour driver in Belfast went up over a curb at one point, and when we came back that direction he stopped, got out of the car, and returned with the hub cap that had fallen off when we hit the curb. Gotta love it!

On that note...will we survive another harrowing journey tomorrow (I guess you know, since I'm writing this, but shh...) Tune in tomorrow for more adventures on the Emerald Isle!

Got Moher Fun For Ya!

Monday--We board the coach and head north to see the Cliffs of Moher. Rising 700 feet above the Atlantic, the cliffs are impressive. The thing that cracked me up, and I'm not sure why I didn't expect this, was the fact that they looked exactly the same as the picture on my cover for DAMAGE DONE. 

I guess I thought that there'd be several viewpoints for the cliffs, but it is obvious this picture was taken from the same spot we were, where the Visitor Center is. 

Artistic shot with grass in foreground! Ooh!

'Nother artsy shot!

I told you I was obsessed with openings!

Picture to prove we were actually there.

We ate lunch in the Tourist Center ~ pre-made sandwhiches, which were awesome! Mine said chicken salad, but it wasn't what I expected. It had slabs of chicken. From here we headed to Galway to see the youngest of Europe's cathedrals--only 50-years-old. 

We then saw what was some of the most interesting landscape in Ireland, The Burren. When Cromwell's forces landed here he said something to the effect of, what is this country? What's the good of it? There are no trees to hang anyone from, no water to drown them in, and no earth to bury them in.  He was a real sweetheart. Some people describe this area as being like landing on the moon. We stopped along the road and our tour guide scrambled up the rock, calling for us to follow. It was a challenge. We climbed through this crevice and he would tell you where to step. "Left foot, there, to the right a little." Coming down was even more challenging. He was like, "Now just drop." And I was like, "Dude, that's a long way down. Maybe not for you, but for me. My legs are too short!" 

And this is what it looked like, as far as the eye could see!

I found a flower, though! :)

We traveled on through Connemara and stopped at the bridge from the John Wayne movie, "The Quiet Man." Maureen O'Hara, co-starred with him and just passed away at the age of 95 (Dublin native). 

We traveled on to our hotel, Ballynahinch Castle, truly one of the highlights of our trip. Not only was the castle nice, the grounds were amazing!

The view from our room!

Our room was called Elephant's Walk because at one point during the castle's history an Indian prince owned it.

I loved the mist rising over the water!

Love the reflections in the water!

We went to the bar to get drinks and they told us they'd bring them to us. Happy hour, castle-style!

So when I went to bed I tried not to think about the fact that we were in a castle and it was probably haunted, and I fell asleep fine. But in the middle of the night it sounded like someone was in our room stepping on stiff wrapping paper. Crinkle, crinkle, crinkle. It was so close! I held my breath and listened. And after a few seconds I heard the flush of a toilet. 

I'm pretty sure ghosts don't use toilets and that the sound I heard was the paint crinkling on the ceiling as someone walked above. But, since I was awake, I got up to use the bathroom. On my way back to bed the bathroom door swung to with a loud, creepy creak. I ran the last several feet and launched myself over Don and into bed. Luckily I was able to fall back to sleep pretty quickly and had a good night's sleep...