A Wee Bit O' Travel Help, Please
I am so excited to be here at Uncork and Unwined today! Isn’t K just the duck’s quack? She’s always been one of my favorite reads, so I’m psyched that she asked me to guest blog for her!
I know many of you come here to read about her wonderful travels, so I thought this might be the perfect place to tell a little secret I’ve been keeping and ask for some advice.
Stonewall and I are going to IRELAND!
Whoooot! (I totally tried to write an intro to that announcement, but the suspense was just too much for me…)
About two weeks before Christmas I was perusing some travel sites (as I tend to do and dream…) when I saw a headline for one week in Ireland including travel and board for $600 per person.
Sounds a bit too good to be true, hm? I thought so too, but I clicked anyway just to see what was up. The travel site said the same thing: One week in Ireland, including round trip airfare, a car and B&B vouchers for $600 a person. So then I called the travel agency because I figured there had to be small print somewhere. Turns out I was right.
The small print said we had to leave from JFK...totally doable...and travel during certain dates…certain dates that we just so happened to have available…
Maybe I’ve inhaled too many poopy diaper fumes, but that sounds like a pretty good deal to me. So I booked it as a Christmas gift for Stonewall! Stonewall was completely taken by surprise. He knew I had gotten him a pretty big gift, but he was completely clueless. I wrapped smaller gifts as clues for him and put limericks (another clue!) on each gift. He didn’t figure it out though until he opened his final clue which was a scratch off map. I scratched off all the places we’ve been together and I included Ireland in the mix. Needless to say, he’s pretty stoked.
So like I said, I need some advice…
What should our itinerary look like?!
We fly into Shannon on a Thursday (we leave on Wednesday and our flight is overnight) and we have until the following Tuesday to get our butts to Dublin (we leave early Wednesday morning). We spend the first night in a hotel in Limerick, the next four nights in random B&Bs of our choice, and the final night in a hotel in Dublin.
The only thing I know I WANT to do is go to the greyhound races. I’m not seeing the races mentioned in many tourist sites/books, so I’m guessing it’s more of a local thing to do which makes me want to go even more.) They’re only held on certain nights, so I’m having a hard time deciding which day and stadium would be best. Right now I'm thinking Cork, but that means skipping the whole southeast portion of Ireland and I hear that's a pretty beautiful part to miss. There's also Limerick, but the races aren't until Friday evening, so that means two whole days in that area and that seems bit of a waste of valuable sightseeing time. Do you see my dilemma?!
Other than the races I’m at a loss. There seems to be so much to do and see. There are the typical tourist attractions, the Blarney Stone, various castles and famous natural attractions, but there’s also the best local restaurants, the pubs, shopping, all the cool local things most tourists skip. I don’t even know where to start. Add to it that I have no idea how long it will take to get from place to place…
So HELP ME! Tell me where to go, what to do, what we MUST see, what we can skip, and where the best place to find a pot o' gold is. Send the advice my way, please!
