Galway - A gateway to Cliffs of Moher

The cliffs as seen from the Ferry which ran parallel to it for good 45 minutes

Galway was the next destination mainly as it was the Gateway to the Cliffs of Moher. I had read that main things to see towards Galway in Ireland were the Cliffs, The Doolin Village, Connemara and Aran Islands. The Ring of Kerry was a little distance away.
It was a nice and pictureque train travel from Dublin to Galway. The train started from Heuston Station at around 10 AM and we were in our hotel at Galway by 12.40 PM. The tickets had been booked on Irish rail website (www.irishrail.ie) from India itself and once at the station, we had to put in the booking code to get the tickets from the ticket dispenser.

The train station was just 10-15 minutes walk away from our 'Residence' hotel. The hotel was bang in the middle of all the action as they had their own popular pub called the '1520' in the middle of Latin quarters. The pub was actually that old - set up in the year 1520. The rooms were above the pub and though this area was very busy, noise was not that much at night. The entire street was full of pubs and shopping and one could go up and down the street till the famous landmark 'The Eyre Square' several times a day. The park at Eyre square is actually called the John F Kennedy park due to admiration that people of Ireland have towards the ex American president.

The 1520 Pub

Our evening would start from 1520 pub and then we would go and explore other pubs. 

My first impression about Galway was that of a vibrant little town full of music and culture. Each pub had some great music bands playing and you could say that  music was in the air. It was in the pubs and on the streets and the crowds were participants in joining them during popular numbers. The spontaneous dancing and appreciation kept the musicians going till late at night. Galway is just the holiday town that you could wish for. It has a lovely pedestrian only cobbled street which is full of pubs, shops and restaurants. It all looks very colourful and bright. There are many excursions you could do from the city and the river and sea are all close by.

There are 2 festivals which are extremely popular and people travel from different countries at that time to join the fun. In July each year is held the 'Galway international arts festival' and in September it is 'Galway international Oyster festival.' It was not surprising to learn that Galway will be the European capital of culture in 2020 and is considered to be the cultural heart of Ireland.

The street would be for shopping during the day

But would be taken over by revelers after dusk. 

Music would be the highlight of any pub. Popular groups would attract much appreciation. 

 The Aran Islands

UK was having a very wet summer with a few WC cricket matches being washed away without any results. Ireland was also expected to have similar weather. But we did have to do what we had come to do so we booked a day long trip to Doolin, Burren, Aran Islands and the Cliffs of Moher. We kept fingers crossed for rain to keep away. The early morning pickup didn't suit many in our cousins group but then they had no choice in the matter. We were picked up from hotel at 8 AM, transferred to a bigger Bus with several other tourists and set out for a lovely drive towards the village of Doolin. The scenery was breathtaking and one felt like asking driver to stop to admire the landscape at several places. Several tourists do come and live in Doolin and reading their description about the stay is very interesting as they are literally cut off from the world.

Aran Islands were really picturesque and charming

It is on reaching Doolin at the ferry station and getting off the bus that the 'cold' hit us. I was personally not fully equipped for it as my jacket didn't have a cap to cover the ears, and that is where the cold winds were hitting. As the ferry got delayed we decided to hide inside the bus till it was time to board the Ferry. The Ferry took us to the smallest of Aran Islands located in the middle of  'Wild Atlantic Way.' We walked a few hundred yards on this scenic island to get to a pub to have a drink and an early lunch as we were recommended by our guide to take a ride on a tractor trolley around the island. This was a wise thing we did but it was still pretty cold as we sat in open and admired the island and its landscape. The good thing was that it wasn't raining and there was some evidence of sun trying to break through.

A lot of information about the island, its culture and its people was imparted by our driver of the tractor trolly

This island called Innis Oirr (Inisheer) had a population of around 300 people and it had a limestone landscape. A castle on top of a cliff and a shipwreck sight are the highlights. But for us the highlights were the millions of rocks neatly piled up looking like labyrinth of mini walls as you can see in the picture below.  These walls were all over the island.

This picture has the shipwreck as well as the loose stone walls

Our tractor trolly driver explained to us that this was a way to create arable land on rocky windy islands. According to an estimate the 3 islands having an area of 18 sq miles have a whopping  1500 miles of these walls ! Sheltered from the wind due to these walls, the small scraping of topsoil stayed in place and began to accumulate—a process helped by the islanders drying soil-enriching seaweed on the walls.
We spent a couple of hours on this island enjoying the beauty and hiking a bit - then it was time to get on to the boat for the visit to the cliffs.

The Cliffs of Moher

The highest point of 214 meters where O'Brian tower is located. 

They looked really magnificent standing tall in Atlantic ocean as our Ferry moved towards these 14 km long cliffs which go up to a height 214 meters. We were all on the upper deck of the boat to look at this magnificent sight for which millions visit this part of the world each year. Thankfully some sun was out and temperature had reached a sort of comfortable 11 deg C. These cliffs are again a geological wonder formed over millions of years on the mouth of rivers which deposited their stones before entering the sea. While several films have been shot here and used the cliffs as the rugged background - the famed Harry potter and the half blood prince was also shot on the cliffs. 

The cliffs are not just rocks and stones - the area above is lush green full of cows. 

Having had a good view from the ferry as we ran parallel to it for quite some time, we were transferred to a bus on shore which climbed up the cliffs to the visitor centre. From there one could walk to the highest point at O'Brian tower for the best views. At this place you can spend a day hiking to different parts of the cliffs. The visitor centre had all the necessary information about formation of cliffs and from there we got the must needed snack and hot coffee. 

With my brothers Kunaal and Amit at the cliffs

By the time we reached back to our hotel it was 7.30 PM. It had been a long and tiring day but the sights had been wonderful. It was then time to freshen up and start our evening pubbing at the 1520 bar. The guide on bus had given us names of several good restaurants of Galway so we decided to go to a place serving Chinese and Thai food. After visiting a few pubs - we were lucky that the restaurant agreed to give us food as we reached well past their last order time.

A relaxed last day

The plan was to visit Connemara and a few other famous places but my family absolutely refused to get up early to go anywhere. A consensus was built to enjoy Galway on the last day. We had seen enough beauty, the cliffs and the islands. No one was in a mood for anything strenuous or organised.

So we got up late and roamed all around the city and also walked the Salthall promenade - the 2 km walk ending at the famous wall which you are supposed to kick as per the tradition. We saw the sign board of 14 merchant families known as 'Tribes of Galway' which had ruled Galway a few centuries ago. We had pints of Guinness, tried a famous sea food restaurant 'Mc Donag's'  and went shopping at big stores located around Eyre square. In the evening we tried some more pubs and settled down at 'The Quays' which was having the best band that evening. The bar man introduced us to several Irish whiskies as our Irish whisky experience had been limited to 'Jamesons' till now. Actually the bar man at 1520 had also been introducing us to some Irish whiskies so during the trip besides Jamesons we had 'Tullamore', 'Dead Rabbit', 'Teeling' and 'Red breast.' The bar man told us the story about the rise, fall and resurrection of Irish whisky. Once upon a time it had 60% of world share which dropped to just 1% in 1980's with almost all distillers closing shop. However, since the year 2003 the Irish whisky is booming and the growth is phenomenal. It is a comeback story which must be studied in detail.

Our Irish trip thus ended as we took a bus to Dublin on Saturday to get to Manchester for India vs Pakistan game on Sunday morning. We took the bus and not the train to Dublin as bus was going directly to Dublin Airport. Instead of coming back to Dublin we should have actually taken a flight from Shannon International airport which was closer to Galway.  At the time of booking I didn't know that Shannon was a good international airport and it was so near Galway.

It didn't appear from outside but Dublin was quite a large airport. We really had to walk a lot inside the terminal to get to our gate. With the Irish holiday done, sitting in the flight to Manchester there were just 2 things I was wishing for at that moment : 

1) that the rain keeps away from the big match the next day, and

2) Hope that India wins the clash for which we were so enthusiastically travelling. 

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