2004 Europe

Aboard the Moon River on the Shannon



June 20 – Up early today because we’re headed for Sligo in the North of Ireland and then an excursion to the Beleek Pottery Factory in Northern Ireland. It’s just across the border back into the UK. But our first order of business is a cruise on the River Shannon. We boarded the ‘Moon River’, a 55 foot cabin launch for the cruise. We were served tea and scones with homemade berry preserves and clotted cream (above). They were delicious.



After reboarding our bus we stopped at St. Columba’s Church to see the grave of W. B. Yeats, the Irish poet. He’s buried there with his wife, Charles. The church graveyard has a great Medieval High Cross. These Celtic crosses were carved with scenes from Bible stories and were used as a teaching tool.



After crossing into Northern Ireland, we took a tour of the Beleek Pottery Works and, of course, visited the showroom. Diana had great sales resistance but did buy a shamrock vase as a memento. After that stop we took a scenic drive through the county side back to Ireland and our hotel in Sligo. That’s their ‘Irish Rose’ basket on the below.



June 21 – Today is the longest day in the year and we will be in Galway for sundown. We stopped in the village of Westport, a picturesque place of very colorful shops. Then it was on to some overlooks of the bays leading out to the Atlantic Ocean. We stopped for lunch at Kylemore Abbey (below). It’s now a boarding school. The setting is beautiful. There’s a small lake in front of the Abbey and it is set right in the forest. After that we spent some time in Galway before heading out to the golf resort for the evening.



We got a Galway Bay view room at the golf resort and were able to watch the sun go down on Galway Bay. It was a pretty nice sunset (below). Unfortunately there were two flagpoles in the way and some bird guano on the window but I did a little editing in Photoshop to make them less visible.

(c) 2004 Rod Longenberger