May 5th will be another full day with visits to Connemara, an area of mountains, bogs, heaths, grasslands and woodlands. It is also the home of the Connemara pony.
Our third visit this day will be to Celtic Crystal in Moycullen, County Galway. Many visitors to Ireland will visit the world famous Waterford Crystal and tour the factory. Our tour at Celtic Crystal will be more personal. You will have the opportunity to purchase crystal if you would like. Some of it is quite reasonably priced ( and some is very expensive)
May 6th will be a free day for you explore Galway on your own.
On May 7th we will visit the Aran Islands.
The three islands are Inis Mór (Big Island), Inis Meáin (Middle Island) and Inis Oírr (East Island). We will visit Inis Mór.
I do not know which ferry we will take to the island but the ride over may take an hour or so. In 2008 we had a rather smooth ride; however in 2009 it was quite rough. It seemed like quite a few people got sick but only one of our students got seasick.If you have a tendency to motion sickness and the day is windy you might want to consider taking something before we arrive at the ferry. The ride over was nice and smooth in 2010. We will have a tour of the island in a van or a pony cart, including the very impressive ancient fort, Dun Aengus. There will be some free time to explore on your own.
Click here for a website with good information about Inis Mor including an interactive map.
On May 8th we will travel a few miles east of Galway to the village of Athenry to visit the Athenry Heritage Center, which is in the ruins of the Medieval St. Mary's Parish Church. Our ‘Medieval Experience’ will include dressing up in medieval costume.
We will also visit Clonmacnoise in County Offaly. This is an ancient monastic site founded in the 6th century by St. Ciaran. County Offaly is also significant because my ancestor Patrick Caughlin came to the United States from this county in the 1840's at the time of An Gorta Mor (The Great Hunger - more usually referred to as the Great Famine). County Offaly is also the home of Brian Cowan, the current Taoiseach (Prime Minister) of Ireland who is from the town of Clara in Offaly.
May 9th will be another free day. the last one until we arrive back in Dublin. You ought to decide what it is you want to do on your free days before we get to Ireland, so that you will be better able to take advantage of the opportunities available. There is lots to see and do in the area. Last year some students visited the village of Claddagh where the ring of the same name originated.
Here is a link to a YouTube site that has some video of scenes from Galway as well as a song I really like "The Galway Shawl"
