Sunday: Leaving Falmore and Meeting David's relatives
Sunday morning we had a liesurely breakfast with Geordy, Diane, and Diane's other sister, Lori. And then David and I were off to drive all the way to Leitrim to meet some of his distant relatives. His parents have met up with them several times at this point, so they opened the door for David and I to meet them as well.
On the way out of town, we stopped and took some pictures of the tower that was down a bit from our cottage, as well as some pictures of the road up to the cottage. I need to include a couple of them here. Because you have to see what the road to our cottage really looked like! Check it out:
Ok ok...so not really. But each one of us who came up the way saw this dirt and rock road heading off to the left and thought "no way -- is THAT the place we're supposed to veer left to get to the cottage" and freaked out a bit. Geordy's reaction was "oh no...no way...I'm going back NOW." Jacqui's was "oh come ON, this can't be right!" Luckily, David and I were spared the freak out because Jacqui had met us on the road and we followed her.
Anyway, we headed off and hauled it all the way to Leitrim. We stopped briefly in Donegal town again and had a quick lunch at the coffee house. The trip down took a bit longer than we had estimated and we were unable to find a B&B before meeting his family.
We found them easily enough and they were warm, wonderful, welcoming people. Plus they had a beautiful black lab named Ranger. Susan, who is the matriarch of the family (at 82) was a spritely little woman with a heart of gold. Tom, the bachelor of the family (at a few years older than David) was an absolute sweetheart. They drove us around the area and showed us where David's relatives were from, including his direct descendents (his great grandfather and grandmother), Harry Deacon and Mary Coyle. Apparently Mary was the daughter of the constable and she fell in love with Harry, who was their gardener -- totally inappropriate for the time. They eloped and left for America. Interesting story and rather romantic! We also got to see where another relative of David's, Jenny Deacon, had lived. She apparently was never married. She was engaged, but he broke it off, and she never ever was with anyone else. Sad story.
We also made it over to Mohill, where Carolan was from, and saw the memorial statue that was put up not too long ago. Unfortunately, we didn't have our cameras with us for all of this, so we never got pictures.
After being shown around, we retired to Susan's place again, where she plied us with tea and cakes until we were stuffed and could have no more! Then a few other of his relatives showed up (a lovely couple -- Richard, who is a distant relative, and his wife Ann). We chatted for awhile and around 10pm, David decided we needed to head out to find a place to stay (unfortunately, at this hour, our only hope was the hotel in town). Well, Richard and Ann would have none of THAT. They offered us a room at their place, which we couldn't say no to. We headed off with them to their place and dropped our stuff off. I got to meet their dog Andy (who had gotten into a fight with some other dogs and tried to escape, only to run into a huge metal spike -- he had to have stitches...poor thing!).
They took us out to a local pub and there was this older guy with a schmancy keyboard singing all sorts of songs with a cheesy beat to them -- from old Irish songs to country songs. It was crazy fun. We chilled out and watched him and the people dancing for awhile. And then I stepped out to go to the restroom and when I return, David's on stage singing! I missed the fun and surprise. Bah. Richard and Ann gave a note to the guy apparently and he invited David up to sing. He chose Long Black Veil, because it seemed appropriate to the venue...and once the guy settled in and figured out the chords, it sounded great!
We ended the evening shortly thereafter and David and I had a lovely rest in their guestroom.
View pictures from Day 7.
Monday: Longford, Boyle, and Michael Coleman
We woke up at a decent hour and Richard and Ann served us a nice traditional Irish breakfast -- damn were we eating good on this trip!! After that, we headed off to Longford to tromp around for a bit. Our main goal in going there was to stop at Johnny Keenan's widow's shop. It was supposed to open at 11am, so we went there at 11am, then wandered around because it wasn't open, then back around 11:30am, still not open, and finally took one last drive by it around noon. She never opened. Oh well. In the meantime, David found a great tunebook and I bought a couple silly coasters (one with a banjo and one with a whistle).
We parted ways from Ann and Richard shortly after we got back to the house. And then we were on our way to Ennis.
But first...before Ennis...we had to head up to Gorteen to see the Michael Coleman Centre. It was a pilgrimmage of sorts (for those who don't know who Michael Coleman is, he was a great Sligo fiddler who left for Ireland, landed in NY, and made a lot of recordings in the middle part of this century).
On the way there, we passed by the Boyle Abbey and decided we needed to stop and check it out. Absolutely lovely place. We took some gorgeous pictures of the Abbey, felt sad that such a place of beauty had been disbanded and then turned into a military barracks, and then we were on our way.
We tromped around the Centre for a little while. I bought a few more CDs, as did David (and he also bought another tune book). We were still disappointed though that they didn't have the Breathnach tune book he was looking for (volume 5 in the series -- he already has 1-4). But we did get a lot of great stuff!
We also visited the monument they had put up in Coleman's honour. And while I was there taking pictures of it, David suddenly said "We have friends." The "friends" were two beautiful and super friendly white dogs who fell all over themselves to get attention from us. The smaller one was prone to rolling over to get belly rubs, the bigger one was prone to jumping on you to get attention. They were adorable and SO sweet. They ended up following us to the car and so we had to distract them in order to get out of there and not hurt them. I did manage to take a couple pictures of them and it turns out that David took a few pictures of me playing with them. Oops. I don't want to see those pictures!
From there, we stopped by the replica of the cottage he would have lived in, took some pictures even though we knew it wasn't the REAL cottage. The guy that was there who was working on the visitor's center, said that the real one was down the road and off to the right. We think we saw it, but it was too hidden to take any pictures. Oh well. We did see some signs to Killavil (a couple famous tunes are named for Killavil) and so we decided to just drive through there since it was only 1k away. And what did we find? A memorial to Fred Finn, another great fiddler. How strange that we should stumble upon that!
And then, finally, it was time to head off to Ennis, our last stop on the journey (*sniff sniff*). The drive there was fairly easy since we were on major roads all the way through. It only got a bit hairy when we arrived in Ennis and headed to town centre. But we survived that easy enough. After driving around a bit, we found a lovely bed and breakfast (which we drove past and then David insisted we should turn around because that place was our "destiny"), and headed into town for dinner. We ended up at the Old Ground Hotel, which the woman had recommended, and had a lovely dinner of fried plaice and salmon. David got his last couple beers in Ireland and then we headed off to wander the town a bit. We did FINALLY manage to find a session going on, but of course, our instruments were in the B&B, so we didn't go back to get them. Sadness. But on the good side, we found Custy's shop, so we knew where to return to the next morning!
We headed back to the B&B around 10pm and crashed for the evening. Our last night in Ireland. It was very sad. But David and I got very mushy and sweet and chatted for a bit about how wonderful the entire trip was.
View pictures from Day 8.
Tuesday: Ennis and the trip home
Ah...our last morning in Ireland! *sniffs* We woke up, well-rested, and had our very last traditional Irish breakfast out in the dining room. The food was fantastic and we got chatting with a nice couple from Australia who seemed to feel a little too sorry for Bush.
We packed up everything, cleaned up the inside the car, and then headed back into Ennis. Our first stop was Custy's shop, where I bought a couple more CDs and David finally found the Breathnach book he was looking for. We eyed some lovely instruments -- a beautiful deep-shelled bodhran and some lovely banjos. And then were on our way wishing we had a lot more money than we do!
We ended up at the Ennis Friary and took a lot of beautiful photos. And then, sadly, we had to leave Ennis to head to the aiport. *sigh*
The drive down was easy and we marvelled at how different we felt coming INTO the airport than we did going out just 8 days earlier. We dropped our car and bid it a sad farewell.
And then we took our last breath of Irish air and were into the airport.
The lines were a bit long and we felt a bit rushed, but we managed to get onto the plane in good time. The trip felt REALLY long this time, but it wasn't a bad flight overall. We listened to some music, edited some photos, and were generally terribly mushy (no doubt to the annoyance of those around us).
We landed at 4:30pm and were greeted by David's parents who were nice enough to come pick us up. And then we were back to Vermont, where we had a nice light dinner and went to bed very very tired and rather sad to be home.
The next day we went on a fruitless search for a CD and then drove back to Syracuse. We spent part of the evening with my parents -- the presents were a big hit, then went out to dinner at Kitty's (of course!), and spent some time with my roommate before collapsing into bed.
I have to admit the one thing that amazed me both coming and going was that the jet lag just never affected me. I changed times easily, so now I know I won't have a problem the next time we go...which might be next year. ;-)
View pictures from Day 9.
Thanks everyone for reading all of this if you did! It was a truly magical trip and one David and I won't ever forget.
Sunday morning we had a liesurely breakfast with Geordy, Diane, and Diane's other sister, Lori. And then David and I were off to drive all the way to Leitrim to meet some of his distant relatives. His parents have met up with them several times at this point, so they opened the door for David and I to meet them as well.
On the way out of town, we stopped and took some pictures of the tower that was down a bit from our cottage, as well as some pictures of the road up to the cottage. I need to include a couple of them here. Because you have to see what the road to our cottage really looked like! Check it out:
Ok ok...so not really. But each one of us who came up the way saw this dirt and rock road heading off to the left and thought "no way -- is THAT the place we're supposed to veer left to get to the cottage" and freaked out a bit. Geordy's reaction was "oh no...no way...I'm going back NOW." Jacqui's was "oh come ON, this can't be right!" Luckily, David and I were spared the freak out because Jacqui had met us on the road and we followed her.
Anyway, we headed off and hauled it all the way to Leitrim. We stopped briefly in Donegal town again and had a quick lunch at the coffee house. The trip down took a bit longer than we had estimated and we were unable to find a B&B before meeting his family.
We found them easily enough and they were warm, wonderful, welcoming people. Plus they had a beautiful black lab named Ranger. Susan, who is the matriarch of the family (at 82) was a spritely little woman with a heart of gold. Tom, the bachelor of the family (at a few years older than David) was an absolute sweetheart. They drove us around the area and showed us where David's relatives were from, including his direct descendents (his great grandfather and grandmother), Harry Deacon and Mary Coyle. Apparently Mary was the daughter of the constable and she fell in love with Harry, who was their gardener -- totally inappropriate for the time. They eloped and left for America. Interesting story and rather romantic! We also got to see where another relative of David's, Jenny Deacon, had lived. She apparently was never married. She was engaged, but he broke it off, and she never ever was with anyone else. Sad story.
We also made it over to Mohill, where Carolan was from, and saw the memorial statue that was put up not too long ago. Unfortunately, we didn't have our cameras with us for all of this, so we never got pictures.
After being shown around, we retired to Susan's place again, where she plied us with tea and cakes until we were stuffed and could have no more! Then a few other of his relatives showed up (a lovely couple -- Richard, who is a distant relative, and his wife Ann). We chatted for awhile and around 10pm, David decided we needed to head out to find a place to stay (unfortunately, at this hour, our only hope was the hotel in town). Well, Richard and Ann would have none of THAT. They offered us a room at their place, which we couldn't say no to. We headed off with them to their place and dropped our stuff off. I got to meet their dog Andy (who had gotten into a fight with some other dogs and tried to escape, only to run into a huge metal spike -- he had to have stitches...poor thing!).
They took us out to a local pub and there was this older guy with a schmancy keyboard singing all sorts of songs with a cheesy beat to them -- from old Irish songs to country songs. It was crazy fun. We chilled out and watched him and the people dancing for awhile. And then I stepped out to go to the restroom and when I return, David's on stage singing! I missed the fun and surprise. Bah. Richard and Ann gave a note to the guy apparently and he invited David up to sing. He chose Long Black Veil, because it seemed appropriate to the venue...and once the guy settled in and figured out the chords, it sounded great!
We ended the evening shortly thereafter and David and I had a lovely rest in their guestroom.
View pictures from Day 7.
Monday: Longford, Boyle, and Michael Coleman
We woke up at a decent hour and Richard and Ann served us a nice traditional Irish breakfast -- damn were we eating good on this trip!! After that, we headed off to Longford to tromp around for a bit. Our main goal in going there was to stop at Johnny Keenan's widow's shop. It was supposed to open at 11am, so we went there at 11am, then wandered around because it wasn't open, then back around 11:30am, still not open, and finally took one last drive by it around noon. She never opened. Oh well. In the meantime, David found a great tunebook and I bought a couple silly coasters (one with a banjo and one with a whistle).
We parted ways from Ann and Richard shortly after we got back to the house. And then we were on our way to Ennis.
But first...before Ennis...we had to head up to Gorteen to see the Michael Coleman Centre. It was a pilgrimmage of sorts (for those who don't know who Michael Coleman is, he was a great Sligo fiddler who left for Ireland, landed in NY, and made a lot of recordings in the middle part of this century).
On the way there, we passed by the Boyle Abbey and decided we needed to stop and check it out. Absolutely lovely place. We took some gorgeous pictures of the Abbey, felt sad that such a place of beauty had been disbanded and then turned into a military barracks, and then we were on our way.
We tromped around the Centre for a little while. I bought a few more CDs, as did David (and he also bought another tune book). We were still disappointed though that they didn't have the Breathnach tune book he was looking for (volume 5 in the series -- he already has 1-4). But we did get a lot of great stuff!
We also visited the monument they had put up in Coleman's honour. And while I was there taking pictures of it, David suddenly said "We have friends." The "friends" were two beautiful and super friendly white dogs who fell all over themselves to get attention from us. The smaller one was prone to rolling over to get belly rubs, the bigger one was prone to jumping on you to get attention. They were adorable and SO sweet. They ended up following us to the car and so we had to distract them in order to get out of there and not hurt them. I did manage to take a couple pictures of them and it turns out that David took a few pictures of me playing with them. Oops. I don't want to see those pictures!
From there, we stopped by the replica of the cottage he would have lived in, took some pictures even though we knew it wasn't the REAL cottage. The guy that was there who was working on the visitor's center, said that the real one was down the road and off to the right. We think we saw it, but it was too hidden to take any pictures. Oh well. We did see some signs to Killavil (a couple famous tunes are named for Killavil) and so we decided to just drive through there since it was only 1k away. And what did we find? A memorial to Fred Finn, another great fiddler. How strange that we should stumble upon that!
And then, finally, it was time to head off to Ennis, our last stop on the journey (*sniff sniff*). The drive there was fairly easy since we were on major roads all the way through. It only got a bit hairy when we arrived in Ennis and headed to town centre. But we survived that easy enough. After driving around a bit, we found a lovely bed and breakfast (which we drove past and then David insisted we should turn around because that place was our "destiny"), and headed into town for dinner. We ended up at the Old Ground Hotel, which the woman had recommended, and had a lovely dinner of fried plaice and salmon. David got his last couple beers in Ireland and then we headed off to wander the town a bit. We did FINALLY manage to find a session going on, but of course, our instruments were in the B&B, so we didn't go back to get them. Sadness. But on the good side, we found Custy's shop, so we knew where to return to the next morning!
We headed back to the B&B around 10pm and crashed for the evening. Our last night in Ireland. It was very sad. But David and I got very mushy and sweet and chatted for a bit about how wonderful the entire trip was.
View pictures from Day 8.
Tuesday: Ennis and the trip home
Ah...our last morning in Ireland! *sniffs* We woke up, well-rested, and had our very last traditional Irish breakfast out in the dining room. The food was fantastic and we got chatting with a nice couple from Australia who seemed to feel a little too sorry for Bush.
We packed up everything, cleaned up the inside the car, and then headed back into Ennis. Our first stop was Custy's shop, where I bought a couple more CDs and David finally found the Breathnach book he was looking for. We eyed some lovely instruments -- a beautiful deep-shelled bodhran and some lovely banjos. And then were on our way wishing we had a lot more money than we do!
We ended up at the Ennis Friary and took a lot of beautiful photos. And then, sadly, we had to leave Ennis to head to the aiport. *sigh*
The drive down was easy and we marvelled at how different we felt coming INTO the airport than we did going out just 8 days earlier. We dropped our car and bid it a sad farewell.
And then we took our last breath of Irish air and were into the airport.
The lines were a bit long and we felt a bit rushed, but we managed to get onto the plane in good time. The trip felt REALLY long this time, but it wasn't a bad flight overall. We listened to some music, edited some photos, and were generally terribly mushy (no doubt to the annoyance of those around us).
We landed at 4:30pm and were greeted by David's parents who were nice enough to come pick us up. And then we were back to Vermont, where we had a nice light dinner and went to bed very very tired and rather sad to be home.
The next day we went on a fruitless search for a CD and then drove back to Syracuse. We spent part of the evening with my parents -- the presents were a big hit, then went out to dinner at Kitty's (of course!), and spent some time with my roommate before collapsing into bed.
I have to admit the one thing that amazed me both coming and going was that the jet lag just never affected me. I changed times easily, so now I know I won't have a problem the next time we go...which might be next year. ;-)
View pictures from Day 9.
Thanks everyone for reading all of this if you did! It was a truly magical trip and one David and I won't ever forget.
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