Day 5 of 21 "Train from Dublin to Tullamore"

Today we took a train from the Irish railway station in Dublin to Tullamore. There was a 15-minute delay due to a technical glitch (they apologized several times and assured us all was well...train engineers like to keep a tight schedule!), but we were soon on our way. It's only an hour to Tullamore with one stop in between, and it didn't take long to see green pastures filled with sheep, horses, cows, and the deepest brightest fields of yellow flowers. Not sure what the flowers were, and I didn't get a picture. 

We walked a few blocks, easily wheeling our luggage, from the train station into downtown Tullamore to the tourist center to find out the best way to get to the Tullamore Distillery. We had reservations for the 3:00pm tour.  A 15 euro taxi ride got us there in plenty of time. 

There was one glitch in our plan. Lunch. We had hoped the distillery served food, but they didn't, and we didn't have time to eat lunch in Tullamore, so we dug into our snacks and ate crackers, just enough to hold us over until dinner, which meant we would do the whiskey tastings on a less than full stomach. Oh well!

The Tullamore tour was AMAZING. We learned how to make an Irish Coffee, got to drink the Irish Coffee, saw tens of thousands of barrels of whiskey stacked 7 barrels high in the warehouse (no pictures allowed), sampled more whiskey straight from a barrel in the warehouse, and then enjoyed three more samples in the final tasting room. ALL the world's Tullamore whiskey comes from this one distillery. To be called an Irish whiskey, it must be made in Ireland. That's the law of the land. 

We also learned what the DEW stands for in Tullamore D.E.W.  A young stable boy began his career with Tullamore whiskey at age 14. After ten years, he became the lead distiller at Tullamore. His name was Daniel Edmund Williams (D.E.W), and it was right there all along, hidden in plain sight, his name and signature on almost every label.  I may have to do some family heritage research to find out if I'm a descendent of this Tullamore dynasty. 😜

But wait, there's more.....

Several months ago, I told Patrick that I wanted to stay in a castle somewhere in Ireland on my birthday. Well, Patrick found one just a short taxi ride from Tullamore in a town called Kinnitty, and that's where we are now, at Kinnitty Castle. We are definitely "not in Kansas anymore."  When I saw the castle from the road, sitting on a hill with acres of green pastures as its front lawn, I had what may have been a similar reaction that Elizabeth Bennett had in "Pride & Prejudice" when she saw Darcy's castle, one of complete disbelief, but we are really here and we'll be here for the next 3 nights and 3 days.  

🏰🐎🐑🦌 🍀

I'm not sure who I'm making this blog for more.... me, Patrick, or for you, our friends and family who are traveling with us. It's not even the first week, and choosing this Ireland experience is, by far, one of the best decisions I've ever made, next to marrying Patrick. 😊 He's making this trip very easy and fun.


                                                      Breakfast in Dublin



                                      Train to Tullamore departs 11:25am on Platform 8 "On Time" (almost)


                                                             Irish railway station in Dublin  


                                                                  Welcome to Tullamore (still no rain!)


                                                  The yellow building is the Tullamore tourist office.


                                                Before the tastings....




Fun fact: The Buena Vista in San Francisco CA makes the most Irish coffees in the world.... over 2000 Irish coffees every single day.

How to make an Irish Coffee:  1) always use glass  2) preheat the glass with hot water 3) pour out the hot water 4) add 1.5 ounces of Tullamore whiskey 5) add one tablespoon of natural sugar (brown) 6) add coffee 7) shake whipping cream a Boston shaker until thickened 8) pour thickened cream over the back of a spoon so the cream sits on top of the coffee.   When done correctly, it'll look like a Guinness pour!




                                                                (Our room circled)










                                                Goat Cheese Salad and Chicken Spicy Pizza


                                                                         Dining Room
                    
                                          The official welcomer.... "Boots" the castle cat.


                                       He shows up everywhere we go outside.  ;) 


                                                         Kinnitty Castle pickleball court 

Popular posts from this blog

Day 1 of 21

Image
  We've been talking about going to Ireland for a long time. We had hoped to go in 2020. And then the conversation went to "Ireland in 2022," then "maybe 2023," until this past fall when we said, "It's Ireland May 2024! Yes, let's do this....while we're young!" Friday morning, we'll fly American Airlines to Chicago, IL and begin our Ireland experience aboard Aer Lingus on a non-stop 8-hour flight "across the pond" to Dublin Airport. We'll arrive Saturday at 6am local time, but it'll be near midnight to us. The five-hour time difference will take a bit of an adjustment, so we'll try and stay awake as long as we can, or at least until our room is ready at Wren Urban Nest . The hotel is within walking distance to Trinity College, the Tourist Center (we'll need this), Temple Bar District, and many other places to see and experience in the days ahead. Three nights in Dublin will help us adjust to the time change, fi...
Read more

Day 21 of 21 "Last full day in Ireland"

Image
 There is still so much to see and do in Dublin that we had to narrow it down to just 3 places:  St. Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin Castle, and the Winding Stair Bookshop and Cafe.  We ended up walking six miles to make a total of 101 miles this entire trip. Again, the weather was free of rain, cloudy and slightly windy, pleasant for the amount of walking we did. We left Wren Urban Nest at 12:30pm and returned at 5:00pm. The trip feels complete. We'll rest up before dinner tonight, again at the Wren, fully pack for the plane ride home tomorrow, and hope to get a good night's sleep tonight. Tomorrow will be a very long day. Here are a few pictures of today's adventures. I will probably post more after we get home, so for now, I'll call this the short version. A big THANK YOU! to everyone who traveled along with us. It helped me stay accountable to the blog and keep track of all that we did these past 3 weeks. It was also fun to stay in touch with texts. Technology is so...
Read more

Day 19 of 21 "The Queens University of Belfast"

Image
 We have one more full day in Belfast, and since we've either passed by or went into several of the famous landmarks such as The Europa Hotel, The Crown Bar, Titanic Museum, Game of Thrones movie studio, among several others, we chose to see The Queens University, Botanical Gardens and the Ulster Museum because they are all in one place and they were recommended by the teachers we met several days ago on the train north from Dublin to Belfast. The Ulster Museum was filled with the history of Ireland, from medieval days, all the way up to the civil unrest between the Protestants and Catholics. Some of the conflicts are as recent as ten years ago. We walked out into another bright sunny day.  The taxi driver who brought us from the Belfast airport to our Airbnb yesterday warned us that when it's sunny and the temperature rises above 60 degrees the shirts come off, lots of clothes come off. As we were walking to the university, we saw a group of three teenagers. The girls were we...
Read more