Day 11 - Galway and Athenry

A windy rainy food tour

Galway is known as an arty town. Lots of festivals through the summer. We headed out for our food tour and into....rain and wind. There were 12 of us on the tour. All from the US. Our guide’s name was Ashlying. We'll list the foods we tried in order: coffee, croissant, chocolates, Irish stew, mussels, oysters, a local IPA, fish chowder, pumpkin salad, red or white wine, 2 cheeses, 2 meats, whiskey, poitin, apple brandy, and ice cream. Quite the list. Sadly we did not get good photos of all of them. 

Our food tour guide

Raspberry croissant

Pumpkin salad

Seafood chowder

Waiting for Irish stew and mussels 

Various drinks. We enjoyed small samples. 

The tour took us to 6 different places in Galway where we sampled the above foods. Most were local businesses who use locally sourced or processed products. Coffee, for example, is not grown in Ireland, but the beans are fair trade and then roasted locally. It was a fun way to see and learn about a city.

The winds really picked up as we headed out of town. Since our trip to the islands was canceled, we decided to head to the Medieval town of Athenry, just east of Galway. After arriving, we did a brief walk through the town. The Athenry Priory was a Domincan Priory built in the 13th century, inside the city walls which was unusual for that time. Another interesting and unusual fact was that the priory survived the dissolution, but was eventually sacked by Oliver Cromwell in 1652.






Also located in town is Athenry Castle, built in about 1235. Nothing historically significant happened at the castle, but it does contain a museum which we hope to visit tomorrow, weather permitting. Also, 70% of the castle/town walls still exist, the most in Ireland.




The town also contains the oldest market cross, in its original location in Ireland.  A Market Cross marked the site of medieval markets in market towns. 




The town is also known for its medieval street layout, which we started to walk before the rain and wind caused us to scamper back to our hotel, where we enjoyed some time in the hotel’s cozy bar.



Tomorrow we will take in a few more sites in Athenry before heading to Westport.


For those that are curious, it is Storm Amy we are trying to get away from. This came across Heather’s feed. We have seen some high water and experienced lots of wind and rain but thankfully have remained safe. Our hotel tonight warned us that the power and hot water may be intermittent due to the storm. 



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