Day 1: Arrival in Tinahely
We awoke to a glorious sunny day on Thursday, May 16 in Bray. It was not to last however as the fog rolled in, but we enjoyed it while we could! Our train wasn’t departing until past checkout time, so Mike and I took our suitcases down for storage to Mirabella (an affiliated hotel) and had a very nice latte looking out over the beach (think Irish stone beach). Then we headed back to the hotel to pick up the rest of our stuff and checked out. We met up with Dan and Suz for breakfast and then sauntered around Bray. I picked up a tooth fairy box for Jade at a cute little shop and a bday card for Michael. We headed to the Mermaid Gallery where there was a pathetic art ‘Horse’ exhibit…we didn’t get it.
We caught our train to Rathdrum at 2:22 right on time and the rest of the gang were onboard waiting for us and the adventure began! It was a raucous reunion as is typical. We all slipped right into the comfort zone with each other. The other passengers on the train were a bit taken aback at our rowdiness, with varying degrees of accommodation. A couple of people moved seats to allow us to sit together, but not everyone. It didn’t alter our enthusiasm however.
After a quick drink in Rathdrum our transfer to Tinahely arrived to collect us and we arrived at Madeline’s. As the next day was Michaels 65th birthday, I managed to source some Irish whiskey and a can of spray whipping cream at the local shops for Irish coffees. The cook at Murphy’s very kindly offered to store them for me and make them with real fresh whipped cream in the morning. In the end we had dinner at Murphy’s and I arranged for a post dinner birthday celebration for Monty around the table. They didn’t even charge for the coffees and even returned the remainder of the bottle. So I tipped the waitress and the cook, I hope generously enough. The accommodation at Madeline’s provided lovely rooms but there was nowhere convenient for the boys to play cards. So they played in the hallway outside our bedroom door on an ironing board as a table. They were more than a little noisy, but fortunately we were the only ones staying on that floor.
The next day was finally the start of hiking :-)! Unfortunately the breakfast voucher restaurant didn’t open until 9am., so we were to get a late start. It did allow time for lunch shopping prior to breakie at least as the shops opened earlier than breakfast!
