Ireland- Day 7 Galway to Adare to Kenmare

Leaving Robin's place to head to Adare and then onto Kenmare was tough. It's always hard to leave a good friend that you know you only get to see once a year(ish).

Katie, Robin & I have been friends since we were little little and lived in New Fairfield, CT. We remained friends even after we moved to New Hampshire. We have some of the funniest photos of us from when Robin and her mom made the trek up to Lancaster, rounding out some really great memories from all corners of the world together. Although we lost touch for many years, the graces of social media brought us back together back in the day of MySpace or something crazy like that.

We've since reconnected in Ireland (three times!), New York City and Los Angeles. Katie and I remain grateful that we've gotten back in touch with Robin and consider her to be one of our dearest friends. It's amazing how easy it is for us to pick back up and be in each other's company. But regardless of how much or how little time we spend together, it's always a great time. And Robin was a gracious and fun host for the little bit of time spent in Galway. 

While we would have loved to take her with us, Robin has an upcoming trip with her mom to look forward to, and couldn't get the time off from work. We spent a little more time together this morning before saying our goodbyes and heading out.

Today's journey was from Galway to Adare and then onto Kenmare where we're spending the next two nights. I'm excited about our accommodations- a really nice looking guest house just on the edge of town, Shelburne Lodge. 

I've heard great things about Adare and it's known for being Ireland's prettiest village in Ireland. In fact, Robin and I were going to head to Adare on Saturday, but changed our plans and went to Fanore instead. Unfortunately, when we got there, Katie and I felt like we'd been duped. While it was sort of pretty, I would by no means consider it to be the prettiest village in Ireland. Unless we missed the main attraction (and I'm fairly certain that we didn't), I'd have to disagree with that title.

Making up for that, however, was our drive through the first part of the Ring of Kerry in Killarney, a visit to Ross Castle, checking out the Ladies View of the Lakes of Killarney and then our first romp around Kenmare- which is shaping up to be one of my favorite places in Ireland. 

I've been to Killarney before, on my very first trip to Ireland, but Katie and I had a bit more time and I'm a much better photographer than I was 12 1/2 years ago, so it was more enjoyable this time around (sorry Kara). Although it was raining, we got some great photos of the boats for hire around Ross Castle and the Ladies View before heading into Kenmare.

We checked into our very very lovely home for the next two nights and were greeted with delicious apple cider and pear butter cake (as good as it sounds) before we went back into town to walk around, take some photos and grab a bite to eat. We had just about an hour left before it got dark outside and wanted to take advantage of the blue skies and good lighting so we could check out what Kenmare was all about.

Kenmare reminds me a lot of Dingle in its brightly colored buildings and the hustle and bustle of activity in town. There were lots of options for places to eat, but we opted for Coachman's which, in addition to having good food, was having traditional music starting at 630pm (about 3 1/2 hours earlier than most places in town).

After a nice meal, it was back to Shelburne Lodge for an early night in bed catching up on email, blogging, photo stuff and just enjoying being in a really comfortable bed and big bathroom!

Tomorrow we're off to explore the Ring of Kerry.

Here's what today looked like in pictures: