Onami

Glad you liked the homeland! I was born in Belfast, but came to Canada when I was 3. My daughter is dancing there in the fall so we are making a family vacation of it. Can't wait!

Rinty

Time to bump Greg's thread with some more Ireland pics;

Belfast: buildsite of the Titanic:




County Antrim: the Giant's Causeway:




Donegal: a nicely restored 544. This brings back memories:




Drumcliffe,County Sligo:




Village of Cong, where the Quiet Man was filmed:




Ring of Kerry:




A happy County Kerry sheep:




Blarney Castle:




Glendalough, Wicklow Mountains:




Lough Tay, from Sally Gap. You can see one of the sets for "The Vikings" in the lower left hand corner:




I strongly recommend a trip to Ireland!

Gregster

weather looked great!

same shot but yea....


I stayed at my friends place in Dublin 4 right around the corner from Google Ireland. Lot's of great pubs and such in close walking distance...


The chariot ride back to Canada

Sniffer

Indeed - someone got lucky!

I don't see rain in any of those pictures - amazing!

From the locations you mention Rinty you must have done an entire lap of Ireland?

If so you`ve seen more than I have and I lived there! (5 minutes from the "Giants Causeway" actually)

Rinty

We had three weeks of good weather - incredible, really.

Yes, we did a 12 day tour, and then a cross country drive from Dublin to Kinsale.

Lucky you! I'd love to live there, even with all the rain.

Receiver

Thinking of moving there for a year and spending some time touring Europe. Have tons of family in the Cork area.

Gregster

That's sorta how I ended up visiting... One of my best friends (Irish Citizen through descent, you must know of this) moved to Dublin with his GF last year. He works in IT and she works at Google. They go somewhere practically every weekend thanks to CHEAP intra Europe flights... They haven't used a single vacation day either, They have something like 2 months off from OCT-DEC and will fly to Asia. Too bad they'll be back in Montreal for the Holidays, it would have been cool to meet them in Singapore or such for NYE

Ireland wasn't really on my places to "visit" but I am glad I did go, what a great place.

Sniffer

Thats a major plus with living there

I once paid the equivalent of $73 RETURN to fly half ways across Europe for a sporadic trip. Even the more expensive flights really weren't when I look back, it just seemed that way relative to the really cheap deals

19VFB19

That was my first time driving on the opposite side and experiecing roundabouts.
Driving from the airport to my hotel in Bangor was interesting.
My peripheral vision and sense of my position in the road lane was slightly askew.
I think I bumped the curb a couple times and at one point the guy behind me flashed his headlights probably thinking I'd had a couple Guinness.
After awhile roundabouts became 2'nd nature and you could really tell the newbies tryin to navigate through them......

Receiver

I do have an Irish passport as my mother was born there. Took me about a day to get used to the left hand driving last time I was there. Pretty cool after you get used to it except when a tour bus approaches on a road only big enough for the bus. Bus usually wins.

Gregster

I was fine with driving but I did find myself always driving on the painted lines while on the motorway or drifting towards it. Those country roads were a tad nerve racking though, what I thought would be fun roads ended up being somewhat of a nightmare thanks to the all caravans and such. I will take driving in the alps back roads any day!

Rinty

From Cork it's just a short drive to Kinsale, a very pretty seaside town:




There are lots of interesting boats in the harbour:




Another short, fun drive to the west brings you to Old Head, the nearest point of land to where the Lusitania was sunk:

Gregster

How did you find the 2er Grand Tourer?

Rinty

I really liked it. The build quality is excellent, the seats were comfortable, and the cabin was quiet on the Motorway. The ride is nicely damped, but the car handled well in corners, although I couldn't push it too much. First Gear describes the handling as "lively, neutral, even playful". Fuel economy is impressive, as we drove all the way across Ireland and back on 2/3 of a tank. One review I read reported 67 mpg (Imp).

I had never even heard of the 2 series before Europcar gave us this car. I can't recommend these guys highly enough. (no affiliation)

Here's the car from another angle.


We should have gone to the Lusitania Museum, which is just down the road, but ran out of time. The whole area around Kinsale is just incredible. We could easily spend a month there.