Ireland: Day 5

Welcome to Day 5 of my Irish adventure when we visited the Bunratty Castle and Folk Park in County Clare, Ireland. We spent a long time there, so that's the majority of this post, though later on we did get "durty." Plus you can always stick around afterwards to read about the interesting observations I made while shopping. 

Before I start all this, though, I should warn you the walkways around Bunratty castle might be "slippy." If that word doesn't win the cutest Irish colloquialism award, I don't know what does.

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Bunratty Castle and Folk Park

Bunratty Castle and Folk Park is a living museum with over 30 reconstructed buildings from over a century ago. There are many houses, a church, a mill, an animal farm, as well as a village street with fun old-timey shops. The park reminded me of Williamsburg, Virginia in its intent. Kind of a step back into the past, Irish style. All the kids said this was their favorite stop on our trip. You'll soon see why.

The main attraction is Bunratty Castle, the last of four castles to be built on the site. Finished in 1425, this three-floored structure was an important stronghold of the O’Briens, a powerful clan in Munster, and later Earls of Thomond, during the 16th and 17th centuries. It’s furnished mainly with things from the 15th and 16th century to reflect the style and period of the Great Earl. Here are some photos for you to check out.

You might have noticed from the pictures that the Main Guard is now filled with tables. It wasn't back then. The tables are for medieval banquets held nightly. (Reservations are recommended. Book now!) Back in the day it was where soldiers protecting the castle slept and entertained themselves. Located on the first floor, it's the first room that greets you when you visit...or when you attack. The docent pointed out a line along the floor which divided the room in half. Officers slept on one side with soldiers on the other. One side had a fireplace. Guess which side the officers slept on? :)

But the castle is only one small part of the Bunratty experience. We had a great time exploring this 26-acre park. So with no further ado, may I present another slide show featuring other things we saw.

Plus there was a donkey. A cute donkey hanging out in a field. Summoning my inner Annie Leibovitz, I spent at least ten minutes trying to get a perfect shot. And I did -- at least I thought. I mean, come on. This looks pretty good, right? 

Then I later scroll through some photos my sister, Heather, took that day and I see this:

I had clearly been out-Annied. How cute is that?

After we'd had the full Bunratty experience, we strolled over to Durty Nelly's, one of Ireland's oldest and most famous pubs. It has a history that dates back to 1620, and a tasty beef and Guiness stew to boot. To mark the occasion, we wrote our name on a one dollar bill and had our server staple it to one of ceiling beams.

After that, we drove on to the next town we stayed at: Ennis, also located in County Clare. It's quite charming with a variety of shops that closed soon after we arrived at our hotel. Sob! No worries, though. A Dunnes was nearby and they stay open late but I'll tell you more on that...well, now.

Shopping

While we were in Ireland we did a bit of shopping, both the touristy kind and the oh-my-god-food-is-so-expensive-where-is-a-grocery-store kind, too. I'm going to focus on the every day kind of shopping because we all know what a tourist shop looks like. As for an every day stores, that's more interesting -- which is why I have absolutely no photos of any I entered.

Well, that's not exactly true. While we were in Dunnes (like a Super Target but with more of a department store feel), my son spotted a photo booth fail. I took a picture. You can see a sliver of what the store looks like on the left.

Dunnes was our go-to place for groceries and other essentials. It had a nice feel and was open after regular business hours. Unlike in the States, most shops close around 5 p.m. so their owners can have a life.

Now for some reason, my younger son really wanted to visit Tesco, the Wal-Mart of Ireland. He said he'd seen so many videos where Tesco was mentioned, he'd feel he wouldn't get the full Irish experience if he left without seeing one. So Rick took him. He said, though it looked different than the Wal-Marts at home, it had the same underlying feeling of human despair. 

I also shopped at Spar, which is grocery store chain.I loved the cereal aisle, with all it's "different" cereals, like "Frosties" (Frosted Flakes), "Mini Max" (Mini Wheats), and "Cocoa Pops" (Cocoa Puffs). 

At the end of this post, I've got a slide show with other grocery products that interested me -- some from Spar and some from other places.

Coca Cola's "Share a Coke" campaign was in full swing, prompting people to share a Coke with a friend. In the stores we saw bottles with tons of names -- proper and otherwise. We looked for a bottle with a distinctly Irish name. I think we found one:

We also noticed the candy offered in the stores was smaller than those found in the States. Perhaps that is one of the reasons we are so dang fat. In the picture below, the top bag of Skittles is from the States. The lower one is from Ireland. Strangely, though, there are only a few less Skittles in the Irish bag.I guess it's all about packaging. Still, the Irish Skittles were twice as expensive, in part due to our not-so-great exchange rate.

In Ireland, getting something with your magazine is all the rage so many of them are sold in bags. With this month's copy of Cosmopolitan, readers got sunglasses and a pack of Mentos. Yee-ha!

Though this didn't happen often, I did find some of the store names to be rather odd -- like this junior women's clothing store I found in a mall.  The name kind of made me giggle.

And ala T.K. Maxx, may I present Eddie Rocket's. Perhaps he's Johnny Rocket's younger brother?

Still, I must admit the strangest thing I saw was on the ferry coming home from the Aran Islands (a story I will tell later.) Among the things they sold at the bar, they was Guiness, Bulmer's, and America's finest beer...

Coors Light?  Something is seriously wrong...

And that's shopping in Ireland -- at least the shopping I did. If you've got time, here are a few more products I found interesting. If you don't, I'll catch you later with Day 6. See you soon!