The Ring of Kerry, a Stroll Through Killarney and an Irish Ceilidh Evening

On October 6, 2026 By Barbara GreenstoneIn IrelandLeave a comment

At this point, I must say something about hotel breakfasts in Europe. They are far better than those in American hotels. “Full breakfast” doesn’t seem to mean the same thing in the U.S. Most mornings in Ireland I have had the usual eggs and sausage, but also grilled tomatoes and mushrooms, and a wide variety of fruit. And nowhere have I seen those awful waffle makers that cause crowd control issues at the buffet.

This morning our bus took us around the Ring of Kerry, a 112 mile route around the Iveragh Peninsula. We started in Killarney and traveled anti-clockwise (counter-clockwise to us) as most of the tour buses do because the road is narrow and two huge vehicles passing could be difficult. Our first stop was Macken of Ireland, a lovely shop with Irish jewelry, woolens, and other items of interest to tourists. As we entered, we were offered Irish coffee (coffee with whiskey, brown sugar, and cream. We eagerly accepted because it was 5 o’clock somewhere. It was delicious.

Our next stop on the Ring of Kerry was in Waterville where we went on a quest to find a statue of Charlie Chaplin who vacationed there for several years in an attempt to escape the paparazzi.

Unfortunately, the fog was thick and we were unable to get pictures of the great water views one sees on sunny days.

We stopped for lunch at the Scarriff Inn where we had fish chowder that was okay. From there we took a long drive along the Ring of Kerry while James, our guide, pointed out interesting sights we might see if it wasn’t foggy and told stories about the history of this part of Ireland. He also played Irish music and songs with some connection to the area. Finally we stopped at Ladies View to take some photos. The area got its name when Queen Victoria visited and her ladies-in-waiting saw the view and declared it beautiful.

We returned to Killarney and had some free time to explore the town. This is definitely a town that caters to tourists. We stopped in a few shops and then found Murphy’s and had some delicious chocolate whiskey ice cream. (Thanks to my friend Jill for recommending it.)

This evening we were treated to an Irish Ceilidh, a social gathering with traditional music and dancing at Kate Kearney’s Cottage. We dined with new friends from Mississippi and Chicago and had some great conversations. The band and dancers were excellent and everyone declared it “craic.”

Tomorrow we head for Limerick. I may be inspired to write one.

Blarney Castle & Gardens and Killarney National Park

On October 5, 2026 By Barbara GreenstoneIn IrelandLeave a comment

Our second bus tour day began with a long ride from Kilkenny to Blarney Castle. This morning’s journey allowed me to see some lovely Irish countryside full of cows, sheep, and hedges and gave me time to finish the New York Times crossword puzzle. When we arrived in Blarney our guide politely suggested that not everyone needs to kiss the Blarney Stone. It’s at the top of the Blarney Castle tower and getting there involves climbing through narrow passages and up many stone steps of uneven height and depth. We took one look at the stairs and decided the gift of gab was something we didn’t really need in our old age. Instead, we stood on the ground and looked up at the tower where we could see the more adventurous tourists bending over backwards to become more eloquent.

We spent most of our time exploring the gardens. Comprising about 60 acres, Blarney Gardens offers numerous walkways and paths through woodlands and garden plots including a poison garden and a fern garden and along several little streams and a lake. Paul had his trekking poles so we managed to visit a large portion of the gardens before we felt the need for a rest and some coffee.

Back on the bus, we headed for Killarney where we opted to take an optional jaunting car (horse cart) ride through Killarney National Park. Dennis and Henry, our driver and horse, took us along streets and narrow paths in the park, artfully dodging joggers and walkers, as Dennis pointed out flora and fauna including red deer and white tailed deer. It was a pleasant way to see some of the park.

After checking in at our hotel and resting a bit, we enjoyed dinner with two new friends from Florida with whom we discussed music, sports, children, and just a bit of American politics.

Tomorrow we visit the Ring of Kerry. We’re hoping for good weather.

A Day of Irish History, Manufacturing, Sport, Music, and Beer

On October 4, 2026 By Barbara GreenstoneIn IrelandLeave a comment

Our Trafalgar bus left Dublin bright and early this morning as we set off for our “Best of Ireland” tour. Our first stop was New Ross where we visited the Dunbrody Famine Ship Experience. The Dunbrody is a replica of an 1840s emigration ship that sailed to America with Irish folk who were escaping the potato famine. Our host was energetic and funny but respectful of the sad history of this ship and its passengers. The conditions on the ship were horrible, but remarkably a large percentage of the emigrants managed to survive the journey and start a new life in our country. The exhibits also celebrated the contributions the Irish have made to American culture and politics.

From New Ross we traveled on to Waterford where we visited Waterford Crystal. We learned about the history of crystal production in Waterford and then took a tour of the factory where we watched the highly-skilled glass workers creating their art with our guide describing each step of the process. Waterford creates extraordinary pieces from the little bird we held in our hands, to the beautiful cut glass vases and stemware, to huge chandeliers, and even the ball that drops in Times Square on New Year’s Eve. When Paul and I were married we received a Waterford cut-glass decanter as a wedding gift from our best man. That decanter came to a tragic end, but that’s a story for another time.

After we left Waterford Crystal (without buying anything) we had a couple of hours to walk around the city of Waterford and explore a little.

From Waterford we traveled to Stonyford for the Malzards Pub and Hurling Experience. We began in the pub with pints of Kilkenny beer while our host introduced us to the sport of hurling.

I had never heard of hurling as a sport, but he explained to us that hurling in Ireland is not the same kind of hurling we Americans might do after too many beers. After learning some of the terminology and rules of the game we were invited to go out to the field and try some hurling ourselves. Paul and I stood on the sidelines with the other cheerleaders while the more adventurous (and younger) members of our group tried to pick up some hurling skills. Hilarity ensued.

Returning to our beers, we were treated to some Irish music which some of our fellow tour members contributed to. It was all great fun, and the beer was pretty good too.

We are now in our hotel in Kilkenny where we had a lovely dinner and enjoyed the company of two new friends from Mississippi. Tomorrow we head to Killarney.

The National Gallery and EPIC (Every Person is Connected)

On October 3, 2026 By Barbara GreenstoneIn IrelandLeave a comment

Day 3 in Dublin began with a visit to the National Gallery of Ireland. We didn’t have much time so we decided to concentrate on the third floor where we saw a lot of European Art including a room titled “Caravaggio and His Circle“ in which I saw one actual Caravaggio and a lot of paintings in the style of Caravaggio. We wandered through several other rooms of paintings from the Renaissance through the 18th century with a few 19th century impressionists thrown in. After an hour or so we felt the need for another dose of caffeine, so we headed for the coffee shop.

John Singer Sargent’s “Bead Stringers of Venice”

The coffee shop was crowded, so when a women asked to join us at our table we readily agreed. Her name is Eileen and she ‘s a retired educator from Dublin where she taught languages. We chatted for quite some time, and Eileen and her friend who joined us later gave us lots of advice about things to see and do in some of the areas we will be visiting on our tour. We also talked about politics and Eileen shared her dismay about what is happening in the US these days. It saddens me to hear how Europeans see us now.

After the gallery, we caught a bus back to the hotel. I really like the Dublin city buses. They’re clean and easy to find (with the help of Google Maps) and they run often. The people riding the buses have been extremely polite and accommodating. More than once a rider has given up their seat to us so we don’t have to stand, and everyone says thank you to the driver when they get off, even if they have to shout it from the doors in the middle of the bus.

Our Trafalgar tour began this afternoon with a sight-seeing drive around the city and a stop at Phoenix Park where we visited the People’s Gardens and Ashtown Castle. From there, we rode to Epic The Irish Emigration Museum We started at Bakehouse where we were treated to drinks and finger food, and then made our way through the various exhibits that told the story of Irish emigration and how Irish people contributed to the culture of the countries they emigrated to.

Sculpture Depicting How the Irish Emigrated By Sea and Air

Tomorrow we board the bus and head to Waterford and Kilkenny.

Rock ‘n’ Roll, Old Books, and Classic Theater

On October 2, 2026October 2, 2026 By Barbara GreenstoneIn IrelandLeave a comment

Our second day in Dublin was a long and exhausting one. After breakfast, we took a bus and a short walk to Temple Bar and the Irish Rock ‘n’ Roll Museum . Our tour guide was an adorable young man named Reese who is very passionate about Irish rock music and we learned a lot from him. I now know the true origin of the band name “U2” and it’s probably not what you think. I also learned where Bono’s name came from. The tour was excellent although it involved a lot of stairs as we moved through the museum and the Temple Lane Rehearsal Studios. If you’re interested in Irish rock stars or Michael Jackson’s pajamas (really!) this is the place to go.

A tourist trying out the drum set in the U2 room

From the museum, we made our way to St. Patrick’s Cathedral for a presentation about the cathedral a hundred years ago, in 1926. The presentation was informative, although I wish I could have turned on the captions as I do when watching a British or Irish TV show. The presenter had a lovely Irish accent that required a level of concentration I just didn’t have today. The cathedral itself is beautiful and worth seeing.

View of St. Patrick’s Cathedral from the Choir

After the cathedral (and an ice cream cone) we had a short walk to Trinity College where we saw the Book of Kells and enjoyed the Book of Kells Experience, a self-guided tour. The tour ends in the Long Room of the Old Library where most of the shelves are empty due to an ongoing restoration project. It’s still impressive.

The Long Room of the Old Library, Trinity College

We decided to have dinner at a nearby, very noisy pub. Many of the pub’s patrons were watching a cricket match and cheering enthusiastically. I do not understand cricket; I barely understand baseball.

We ended our day at the Gaiety Theatre for a production of Eugene O’Neil’s A Moon for the Misbegotten. It’s a lovely old theater, but our seats were in the very last row of the balcony, so again we had many flights of stairs to climb because the theater has no lift (elevator). The seats were cheap though, and the production was excellent.

The view from the cheap seats at the Gaiety Theatre

Tomorrow we will visit the National Gallery of Ireland in the morning and meet up with our Trafalgar tour in the afternoon. Planning and transportation will be out of our hands for the rest of our Ireland adventure.

We’ve Arrived in Dublin

On September 30, 2026 By Barbara GreenstoneIn IrelandLeave a comment

Here’s a travel tip for all my more mature friends: Walk with a cane! As you age and acquire some mobility issues, you suddenly become a privileged character in airports and on planes, trains, and buses. Paul sometime uses a cane, and he decided to bring it with him on this trip. At Logan Airport, the TSA agents looked at us and immediately waved us over to the old folks line where you don’t have to remove shoes, or take anything out of your carry-on bags, or go through the full-body scan. We got early boarding on our plane with no questions asked. At customs in the Dublin Airport we were told to skip the lines and go directly to the customs officer in the “accessibility” booth. On a crowded bus, a woman saw the cane and immediately gave up her seat to us. There are some advantages to old age.

I can never sleep on planes and so, as I write this, I have been awake for more than 36 hours, When we arrived in Dublin, it was too early to check into our hotel, so we stored our luggage and set out to see the city. We began at the fascinating National Museum of Ireland at Kildare Street which houses the museum’s archeological collection. These artifacts tell the story of the Irish people from prehistoric times through the rise of Christianity. The most fascinating may be the bog bodies, well-preserved remains of of Irish people from the Iron Age, between 400 BC and 200 BC.

We wished we could spend more time at the museum, but our energy was waning and the sun was shining, so we decided to take a stroll through St. Stephen’s Green, a lovely park in the center of Dublin. Hundreds of other folks had the same idea, so we had plenty of company.

By the time we left the park we were definitely suffering from jet lag, so we decided to go and check into our hotel. On our way to catch a bus, we encountered two protests, one pro-Palestine and the other pro-immigrant. They seemed very intense but peaceful.

By the time we checked into our hotel, we were exhausted, so we rested a bit, found a pub for an early dinner, and called it a day. Tomorrow we will visit the Irish Rock ‘n’ Roll Museum, St. Patrick’s Cathedral, and Trinity College before dinner and an evening of theater,

By the way, I used to think the nicest people in the world were the Canadians, but after one day in Dublin, I believe it’s the Irish.

And This Time, It’s Ireland

On September 29, 2026 By Barbara GreenstoneIn IrelandLeave a comment

When I retired, a friend said, “You’ll have your go-go years, your slow-go years, and then your no-go years.” That was nine years ago and we have to admit that, as we each passed the 3/4 century mark, we both noticed that we were definitely moving slower. Normally we try to avoid tour packages when we travel (except that lovely Viking cruise in 2017) because it’s cheaper to travel on our own, and we like to be independent and flexible on our journeys. But because we are now slow goers, we booked a Trafalgar bus tour for our visit to Ireland.

We’ve never been to Ireland other than a few hours of layover time in the Dublin Airport, but we’ve always wanted to see the land of the leprechauns. Joining a tour means we will see a lot of the countryside, without having to rent a car and drive on the wrong side of the road. We also won’t have to schlepp luggage or try to figure out public transportation in various cities, something that was much easier when we could still run to catch buses and trains.

Our tour is called “The Best of Ireland” (Who can resist that?) and takes ten days. We’ve booked two days in Dublin before the tour starts so we have time to explore the city a bit and recover from jet lag. Our tour starts in Dublin and will take us to Kilkenny, Killarney, Limerick, Galway, Sligo, Swords, and back to Dublin.

It’s been a couple of years since I’ve contributed to this blog because this is our first international trip since Berlin. I hope to post daily and share our adventures, but that depends on internet access and my energy level at the end of the day.

So we’re off to Boston today to catch an overnight flight to Dublin. I hope my friends and family will enjoy following along as we cross one more place off our bucket list. See you on the interwebs!

The Journey Home from Berlin

On June 5, 2024 By Barbara GreenstoneIn Berlin1 Comment

We said auf wiedersehen to Berlin for the second time yesterday as we made our way home from this beautiful city. We had eight days filled with music, art, and history in a city that has so much to offer, and we made some new friends along the way.

We left our hotel at 6:00 am. (midnight EDT) and arrived home at 10:30 pm. after traveling on a U-Bahn train, a bus to the Berlin airport, a flight to the Dublin airport, a bus from the plane to the terminal, a flight to Boston, and a bus to Portland where we picked up our car and drove home. It was a long day, but we arrived home to find the huge rhododendron in our front yard had bloomed profusely in our absence.

I still have many photos to upload to this blog, and I’ll do so over the next few days. You can find them in the Berlin section of the Photos tab. We’re happy to be home, but already thinking about our next adventure.

Thanks for following our journey and we hope to see you again, in person or on the interwebs.

Memorials, Tiergarten Statuary, and Philharmonix

On June 3, 2024 By Barbara GreenstoneIn BerlinLeave a comment

Today was our last day in Berlin, so we tried to visit a few places we missed when we were here in December, or that were too covered in ice and snow for us to appreciate at that time. We began this morning in the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe. This installation consists of 2711 concrete blocks of different heights, placed on uneven ground and meant to reflect a feeling of uncertainty. Unlike most memorials, it’s a quiet place to wander, and reflect, and bring your own meaning to the experience. The number of blocks is not significant; it’s merely the number that would fit into the space. There’s also an underground exhibit beneath the memorial, but it was closed today (and every Monday). We also visited the Sinti and Roma Memorial remembering genocide of these groups during Nazi rule, and the White Crosses memorial honoring those who died at the Berlin Wall during the Cold War.

Getting around the Tiergarten area was tricky today because many streets were blocked off in preparation for the FIFA World Cup and the European Football Championship. We managed to find the Soviet War Memorial and the Beethoven–Haydn–Mozart Memorial and several statues including Amazon on Horseback and some animal sculptures by Rudolf Siemering that are copies of sculptures around Siemering’s equestrian statue of George Washington in Philadelphia. There are many other statues in the Tiergarten, and we would have tried to find them all if we had the time and energy.

This evening we had dinner in an Italian restaurant (as one does in Berlin) and then went back to the Berliner Philharmoniker to hear Philharmonix, an ensemble composed of members of the Berlin Philharmoniker and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra. It was a fun concert with a mix of classical, jazz and pop tunes played by some highly skilled musicians.

Tomorrow, we say goodbye to Berlin and head home via Aer Lingus.

Furturium and Flames

On June 3, 2024June 3, 2024 By Barbara GreenstoneIn BerlinLeave a comment

Today was the first day in Berlin when we left the hotel without jackets, though we did take our umbrellas ensuring that it would NOT rain. We began our adventures at the Futurium or The House of Futures where the central question is, “How do you want to live?” It’s one of those exhibits where you wear a bracelet that collects data as you answer questions throughout and gives you a summary of your answers at the end. The focus was on how human lives will change in the coming years due to environmental and political factors.

Solar Panels on the Skywalk of the Futurium

Our visit ended with the Skywalk where we strolled around the perimeter of the roof to admire the view of Berlin and a huge array of solar panels.

After our visit to the Futurium we took a walk along the Spree River and waved at the tour boats that went by. Then we caught a bus to the Deutsche Oper where we had an early dinner before attending the last of our four Ring operas, six hours of Götterdämmerung.

The Orchestra Gets a Bow in Götterdämmerung

This one had everything you could ask for in a Wagnerian opera: weddings, potions, swords, a beheading, fire, and a lot of angst. The ending was glorious as Valhalla went up in flames and the ring went back to the Rhine. Actually, the whole thing ended with a woman sweeping the stage, as if say, “We’ve told you a story and now it’s over.” This “play within a play” concept explains (maybe) the omnipresent piano that characters occasionally pretended to play and other directorial choices in the production.

Tomorrow is our last day in Berlin. It’s our last chance to visit the sights we’ve missed, and in the evening we will go to our final event, a Philharmonix concert.