We arrived back in Southhampton early. We said our very sad goodbyes to Shelly and Eddy and made our way to London to catch a flight to Dublin. Once we collected our hire car we drove straight down to Galway, about a 2 hour drive.
We checked in to the hotel which was right on Quay Street which is the main street of the Latin Quarter and it was buzzing at 7pm. We walked up Quay Street and there was music coming out of every pub and people everywhere.
Next we found the noisiest pub, The Quay, and were lucky to find a seat! It was packed and Irish trad playing. We were hoping to have dinner too but the restaurant was fully booked so we booked for the following night. For dinner we decided on the famous family owned McDonagh’s for fish and chips. It was a beautiful, fresh and huge meal! We had to do it. I even added the salt and vinegar to my chips.
It had been a long day so we headed back to the hotel to recharge and after seeing the energy in Quay Street we were going to need it.
The next day we started with McDonalds brekky. It sounds Irish… just like McDonagh’s!
We were tossing up whether to do the Hop on Hop off bus so went to check it out. We had just missed it and they only have one bus so it was going to be over an hour wait. So we did our own little tour.
We found a few important Galway historical monuments.
We walked through Quay Street all the way to Eyre Square past all the souvenir shops, pubs and buskers. The buskers were amazing. Galway is well known for its traditional music and I just love the lively tunes and the sound of the accordion and violins together. It creates such a fun and happy atmosphere.
One of the suggested places to visit was the Spanish Arch which was part of the town wall built in medieval times. It’s called the Spanish Arch because it’s where Spanish galleons would dock for trading. It is located beside the Corrib River and is a popular spot for the locals to meet up.
There were other historical buildings and museums to visit but it was time for a world famous Irish coffee from Garavan’s Bar.
For lunch we found The Seafood Bar down one of the lane ways. Galway is known for its seafood and especially its oysters being a coastal town.
After lunch we went to get ready for dinner and our first real Irish pub experience. And an experience it was! We went back to The Quay pub for dinner and dancing with the locals.
It was a great way to start our Ireland trip and a great way to finish our time in Galway. (But we didn’t think so the next day 😂)