Earache

Gonna take a break now. Will continue the trip later. Hope I haven't bored you to death so far...

Ended the night back at the hotel pub for, you guessed it, a couple more pints. If you don't like to drink, then don't go to Ireland as you're gonna be bored. All they do is drink...and lots of it. Little towns don't have a gas station, no food store, no hardware store, no restaurants....but they'll have four pubs. I like this place!

We had planned on walking all over the town square to check out places to eat, but of course, it started to rain like a cow pissin' on a flat rock. Ended up across the street at Murphy's Pub for beers and then down the street to the next pub for more beers and some pizza...

Back to the hotel and down the scary assed hallway to our room to get cleaned up and dressed for dinner....

Ya wanna talk "atmosphere"? How about the town drunks sitting in the middle of the square in the rain, drinking and fighting loudly about who can do the most push ups? Personally, I didn't think the fat old drunk bitch could do any push ups, but I was proved wrong once again when she busted out a couple of them....

Galway is an old sea port town and it looks it. Kinda rundown and in need of a couple of coats of paint, but it certainly isn't hurting for atmosphere. Great numbers of pubs, restaurants and shops along the town square area...

Long day riding, so I nip down to the hotel pub for some Nectar. Shitload of wood panelling in this place and teh oddest bar stools ever. Look how long the seat portion of the stool is. Not too comfy at all.....

Hallways had carpet stolen from some casino. I took this pic without the flash so you could see the LED lighting they had. Super bright pinpoints of light in a dark hallway. Creeped me out bigtime. I wasn't going out in the hall at night - no freakin' way...........

Enough with the castles, it's really raining hard now and we need to get our asses to Galway for a warm room and even warmer beer. Tonight we're staying at the fancy-schmancy Park House Hotel in downtown Galway. Old school luxury at it's finest, very cool old place. Judy went for the biggest suite they had (it's sooooo much less expensive when I travel alone - I'd stay in a shithole for 15 Euro a night, but she ain't having it). Three, count'em, three beds. Two twins and a queen. All in a row. Weird. I get the queen-sized! Nice sitting area, dining table, free wifi - I'm all set...

More of the surroundings...

Castle is surrounded on three sides by a peat bog / mosquito breeding ground. Makes it easy to defend but the number of bugs in the summer must really suck. Even on a cold day like today it smelled kinda ripe. Bet in mid-summer it smells worse than my old college roommate's bedsheets after a long week of sport fucking......

Another roof top to go out on - sweet! More holes for shooting people. The open slot by my foot is for pouring hot oil down on the trick or treaters that are trying to break down your front gate... Some more shooting holes located on the rooftop....

The top floor was occupied from 1946 until 1971 by Lady Christobel Amptill. Looks pretty gross to me, be she must've liked it. The place was a ruin when she bought it, so she was the one to restore it. Thanks Lady....

This was the Lord's office area. Pretty swanky, eh?

And of course lots of holes to shoot shit out of...

The banquet hall was recreated using drawings and descriptions from old books. This is what it would have looked like back in the 1500's. The interior walls woudl have been covered in plaster and painted white though - they weren't bare rock like you see here.....

Dunguare Castle was built in 1520 and is different becasue the current owners tried to recreate what it looked like back in the day with some antiques and props. Gives you a better idea of what it looked like instead of just seeing a big empty room like most castles have...

Ledge around the top of the wall once supported a wooden ledge that the archers would have stood on. They shot through the holes in the wall (kinda hard to see here)...

Another day, another castle. Only about 15 miles down the road from the Tower Castle is this one. This is cool in that a person lived here until 1971. Had to see that.....

Spiral stairs ended at a closed door. It wasn't locked and no one said I couldn't go in, so I did. Out onto the rooftop! Sweet! I could shoot my bow at people below and throw all sorts of shit on them if they attacked. But no one was round except us. Pity, I'd enjoy shooting some people from up here...

Could be made into a decent place to live - six small rooms with a larger room at the basement. All of the green and gary stuff on the walls is mold, hope you're not allergic....

The round holes are for muskets and the long slits are for bows and arrows to be shot at the attackers below.....

Colder than a well digger's ass in this thing, but it's pretty cool. These things were made for much shorter people back in the day as we (I'm 6'1" and Judy is around 5'11" tall ) smack our heads on stuff constantly. Should keep our helmets on....

Saw a sign that said "Tea Room Cafe" that pointed down a dirt road. Judy wanted tea, so we went down that way. About 5 miles down the road, we happen upon the tea place. And they have their own tower castle. We're the only people that have been there all week., so they unlock the castle and tell us to close the door on the way out....

The next day we're leaving Spanish Point and heading "oop norf" to Galway. Fuckin shit day; freezing cold, raining and 40 mph winds. Lovely. Great day to be on a bike......