Day 2- Westport House/ Westport/pub!!

Sunday, March 12:

*We slept hard Saturday night, thankfully… I didn’t wake up until after 8 am, which for me is super late!! It rained and rained all night. I was so tired, and the sound of the rain on the roof was perfect for sleeping. 🙂

Westport House

*The morning plan was to eat breakfast and then head out for a tour of Westport House, a famous, old local attraction here. It’s the fancy home of a wealthy and famous family that was built on the site of pirate Grace O’Malley’s old castle and dungeon (from the 1500’s).

The boys each wanted a picture with the house in the background:

We had an awesome tour guide!! She was so funny, and really passionate about the history of the house/this region of Ireland.

We toured all the rooms and learned a lot about the history.

Great marble staircase and ME! 😁

The home owner brought this angel statue from Rome. It’s supposedly good luck to touch her hand as you walk by, so of course, we did that.

Loved the fancy dining room:

Check out the library- I would LOVE a room like this in my house!!

Have to add this, for memory’s sake… this one room was a sort of memorial to a bunch of famous Irish people (artists, musicians, etc.). These are wax people, and they were CREEPY!!! We were all cracking up- the guide had warned us in advance that the one room with all the dead looking people in it tends to catch people off guard. 🤣

The basement had servants quarters, other exhibits and then… the old dungeon!! (Like I said, the home was built on the site of an old castle and dungeon. Not sure I would choose to incorporate a creepy dungeon into my mansion, but, hey. To each rich person their own.)

After our tour, we drove into Westport for the afternoon.

Westport- Lunch and pub

*We were HUNGRY after our tour, so we parked in the city center and looked for a place to get a light lunch. (We had dinner reservations for later with the whole group (my sister/husband/their kids and all of us- the little kids weren’t with us for the house tour part).

Vegetable soup and bread for lunch, plus tea.

Asher got a fancy hot chocolate and shared a panini with Ivan:

We wanted to explore some more of Westport after lunch, but it was raining quite heavily. So, what to do?? Go to the pub! Haha.

Some pics of Westport:

I hope we can go back into Westport, because there’s a lot more we didn’t get to see/walk around due to the weather.

Inside the pub, it was toasty warm though. We got a perfect table right by the roaring fire.

This is a super popular pub, known for live music. It’s really adorable.

We sat next to an old Irishman who was a total character! He chatted with us and then stood up and recited off a little Irish riddle (which I got on video). I’ll remember him!

We were going to do a little pub hopping, but then found out that some open mic/live music event would be happening in a little while. So, we stayed and waited for the music.

This wasn’t exactly a tourist show type music event- in fact, it was mostly locals who gather the 2nd Sunday of every month to share their Irish heritage through music, song and poetry. You could just sign up to perform, if you wanted. I said no thanks when the guy walked around looking for volunteers. 😆 My brother in law did borrow a guitar and played a very fun Irish tune, though!! We were all impressed.

Finally we had to go- to make it to our reservation for dinner. We were at the pub quite a long time, but it was a really fun and enjoyable afternoon. I am a big fan of the cozy “pub” atmosphere.

We had a fantastic dinner at a restaurant my sister and her husband like (pink “tavern” above). It was really yummy! We didn’t linger too long as the little kids needed to get home for bed, and it was a bit of a drive back to their house.

The rest of the evening we mostly just hung out- I read to the girls before bed and we chit chatted in the living room by the wood stove. I think my sister made some popcorn at the boys’ request.

The day was a great mix of some touring around, good food and drink plus good company. I’m already feeling so grateful for this trip and whole experience!