The Bradleys Go to Europe- Week 1: Ireland

We landed in Ireland bright and early (and exhausted) to find out that it was a big day in Dublin. The top 2 Gaelic Football teams (Kerry and Dublin) were facing off at 3.30. There's nothing like a big game to add energy to a city. We took a nap and then headed out to the pubs to catch the game.

Dublin won and there was lots of celebrating to be done.

The rest of our stay in Dublin included touring the Viking museum,

and visiting Kilmainham Gaol, a famous jail. We did plenty of walking, getting lost, and being thankful for GPS on our phones. Then it was off to the country.
Our week in Ireland continued with daily meals in pubs and multiple pub crawls. We spent a night in a castle,
and met a knight.
Ensuring it was an educational trip the girls learned about canons while exploring castles.
We stayed in Galway for the last two nights of our visit and took day trips driving North and South. While driving out to see the Cliffs of Moher we stopped to play on the rocks and enjoy the scenery.

(Yes I know my eyes are closed but it was the best scenery shot!) That evening we left the girls with a sitter and went out to celebrate Arthur Guiness's birthday. We ended up on pub row in college central. It was mayhem but a lot of fun.
The next day we stumbled upon a gorgeous castle (turned fancy hotel and golf course),
and then explored an old Abby and graveyard in the nearby town.

After some more driving we got a true Irish experience. Rain, and lots of of it. We stopped at Kylemore Abbey looking forward to exploring the castle, it's gothic church, and walled garden.
It was sprinkling when we left the car, lightly raining heading into the castle, truly raining on our walk to the church, and full on downpour on our way back to the entrance. At this point we were soaked so we decided to visit the garden as well. Why not, we were already as wet as could be. Then the wind started up and we were wet and cold. The garden visit was impressively short (on a sunny day we would have spent a good hour there). We managed to keep up the smiles.
The fun wasn't over, we still had an hour drive home in sopping wet jeans. An added bonus, we got to pack all that wet clothing into our suitcases the next morning for our flight to Munich. Hooray for being a tourist. On to Germany!