July 23 Limerick, Ireland

After a warm night, we put our luggage out at 6:45 am and went to breakfast. We were on the road at 8:00 am and headed for Galway on the highway.  It was a 2 hour drive through rolling hillsides that  started out pretty brown due to the drought, but got greener as we drove West.  We had a couple of hours in Galway, a cute town that had a nice pedestrian  shopping street.  We picked up a few souvenirs and had lunch at a pub outside to people watch. A BLT for me and seafood chowder for Michael which we swapped halfway through.

Then it was off towards Limerick with a stop at Bunratty Castle & Folk Park.  We had a guide for the castle and then wandered the grounds.  Every menu here lists 14 possible allergens and then each item shows the corresponding numbers.  I didn't know there were celery and mustard allergies.

Our hotel for the night is a lovely old one called Castle Oaks House Hotel outside of Limerick.  We're on the 2nd floor, which is actually the 3rd since Ground is the bottom floor. Our room is in the back overlooking the grounds and has 3 beds.

This evening we went to a Medieval Castle Banquet which sounded a little hokey, but turned out to be great fun.  And we discovered that mead (a honey wine) is very good!

One of our travelers is having a kidney stone attack so skipped the afternoon activities and went to the doctor with help from the hotel and our guide.  Apparently they took him to the hospital overnight for observation. He's had these before so knows what to expect.  Yikes!