Waterford Crystal Factory

We went to Waterford and saw how the crystal is made. Crystal has more lead in it than glass. Waterford crystal had 33%.

Crystal clock


Wood molds for NBA trophy and others they make the outside shape of crystal.


He heats it to 1400 degrees.









College football trophy.


Some pretty neat work.





























Notice the prices!

Cork. Get an automatic.

So Cork is beautiful. The streets are really narrow. There are steep, two lane roads, with parked cars on either side and taxis coming up the hill very fast. The roads are white knuckled driving. Come here in a manual transmission while going up hill against oncoming traffic while missing parked cars on a road that is 10 inches wider than your car. Then try to park.








Our B&B was nice

Cork.

We stayed night at a cute bed and breakfast. Cork is narrow roads. Hills. White knuckle driving. And actually a really cool city.

We stopped for dinner at a really cool burger bistro.








I got Bridget a new ring.

Blarney Castle

So if you talk to anyone who has been to Ireland, they will ask you if you kissed the Blarney Stone. I didn't know much about it.

This castle is amazing. It is huge and labels all the rooms. The Blarney Castle is on the must see list.















This picture does not do justice to how tall this is.


Strait down. That white speck is a person.









I hiked to the top!

King John's Castle

King John's Castle is located at the center of Limerick. It is a really neat place to visit. It was built by King James in 1220 I think. The Irish and brutish fought a bad war here in 1600s. This is one of the better tours we have been on and for only 9 euros.






This blacksmith was awesome! I got to wear a helmut. There's not a lot of room in there. This was really cool.


The walls are at least 10 feet thick.





Too of King John's Castle.

Castles, cliffs, and caves.

Dungohaire castle

We got up and left Galway. We passed several ruins on the way out. We stopped at several castles today. This was the first castle we explored, it was really cool. The courtyard was built to protect cattle at night from raiders and wolves. This castle was built in 13-1400s.






Next we went to the coast and saw the cliffs of Moher. If you spit here it goes to the Atlantic Ocean and ends in New York. So spitting here is like spitting on New York.

Cliffs of Moher





Don't do it Brian!!





Bumratty

We were driving to Limerick and ran into this really cool castle! It's name: Bumratty. We had a lot of fun with that. It is actually a medieval village.

Irish adventurers.

We found a cave tour with an underground river.
Randomly driving down road, we stopped at a global geology site. We got to ride in underground boats and look for Gollum.



























No Smegul anywhere.







We stopped at a pub/inn for dinner.



I had lamb leg and mash.



Across the street from our hotel was a castle and friary. The ruined friary was now a cemetery.























We slept good that night.