Up North (West), Day 4: Galway finale

Galway was the final destination of our road trip, and in some sense, our Ireland trip.  We had heard amazing things about its vibrancy, its artistic/musical subculture, its thriving downtown area.  While I'm sure Galway is an amazing place, this may have been the coldest, wettest, windiest day of our entire trip, which meant we didn't quite get to see it under ideal conditions.  I'm sure a warm sunny summer afternoon would have been *chef's kiss.*

After scraping the ice off the car with a kitchen spatula, we made our way to town and had a good time.  We saw many of the recommended sites/sights like the Christmas market and the bay, but we didn't *do* anything per se.  No museums, no castles, no gardens, no guided tours.   Mostly just people watching and store browsing.  We ended up heading home a little early to recover from our fantastically full road trip.

The B&B included Irish breakfast?  Yes please!

Galway Cathedral.  It is only 75 years old, making it the last of Europe's great stone cathedrals.  Also, free parking on Sunday if you dress like you are going to mass inside.  Half joking - it doubles as a public car park (the Irish term for parking lot).

One more Christmas market!  The girls commented on how it was exactly like the Christkindl Markt in Grand Rapids, minus the Ferris Wheel.  We explained the inspiration.

That's a lot of candy!

Warm chocolate-covered doughnut bites were a hit on this chilly day

Fun pub.  It seems Heineken is second only to Guinness in its advertising here.

The Wilde brothers.  Well, that's not quite true.  That's what most lazy tourist websites will tell you, but Eduard Wilde, right, is an Estonian writer who happens to have the same last name as Oscar, especially if you misspell it Wilde instead of his real name Vilde.  So people presume the statue is of brothers, but they are from different countries and never met.  Brothers in literary spirit is a better way to put it.  The bench was a gift from Estonia to Ireland.

When your bank is in a castle.  Well, the building is not actually a castle, but a medieval bank.  Maybe it was a castle before that.  Hard to see in the photo is the carving of a goblin eating a child to the left of the gold AIB.  But their ATM fees are great!

Festive streets.

Galway is known as the origin of Claddagh rings.  

We watched a "documentary" (marketing film in a jewelry store) on Claddagh rings.  Lily is kind of obsessed.

The Spanish Arch, part of the original city wall, on the bay.  The origin of the name is not clear, but there was certainly trade with Spanish ships in this area.  Fun fact: Christopher Columbus stopped here before going to America.

1588 was not a good year for Spanish ships near Ireland.  You may remember the churning water and sharp cliffs from previous posts.  Galway Bay is the middle inlet on the west coast (Wikipedia image)

We had some bad luck when we learned the City Museum was not open on Sundays during the off-season.

Lily commented that there seems to be few hotels in these touristy cities.  I pointed out they are well-hidden.

This was the first year with substantial snowfall in Galway since  ...  oh wait, Kate just told me that this snow was decorative.  Strike my previous comment.

These colorful houses on the bay are famous for being colorful houses on the bay.  Apparently they are on every Galway postcard.

Lily chose her trip souvenir.  We explained she could not wear it to school.  She thought maybe no one would know what Guinness refers to.

Our little angel...

...and Lily.

If you have made it thus far, thank you so much for reading our blog.  It has been fun recording our memories and sharing them with you.  This may be the last Ireland post, unless we write up some sort of retrospective or do something fun on the way to the airport (we are looking into museums).  But we are going to Egypt next for a few days, so I'm sure there will be new posts from there!!!