Some Mountains, a Broken Bus, and the Perfect Pint

This weekend I went with my fellow au pairs on a tour of Wicklow and Kilkenny. I got up super early on Saturday (at 5:30!) to get the bus into Dublin and then get on the bus that would take us on the tour.  Our first stop was the national park in Wicklow, which is in a beautiful county south of Dublin where parts of PS I Love You and Braveheart was filmed!  It was pretty interesting to see areas that I recognized from these films.  

Wicklow National Park

In front of the PS I Love You lake!

Even the park's visitor center was gorgeous

Wicklow Mountains

The park is also home to this monastic city

Part of the monastery

In front of the bell tower

The mountains were beautiful!

The old abbey

At 11:00 we piled back on the bus to reach our next stop... or so we thought.  About a half hour after leaving the Wicklow National Park the bus came to stop in the road.  I thought we were stopping for a photo op until I realized there was smoke pouring out the back of the bus!  We waited about an hour on the side of the road for a new bus.  Luckily we had a beautiful view while we waited!

Even a broken down bus didn't ruin the view!

The broken bus.

Wicklow Gap

Our new bus arrived after an hour and it was on to Kilkenny!  Kilkenny is small city that is in the southeast of Ireland. It isn't very large for a city, but it has a beautiful castle and cathedral.

St. Mary's Cathedral

Kilkenny Castle

It only took us about half an hour to see the castle and cathedral which are the highlights of the city.  We still had two hours to kill in Kilkenny so we ate some lunch and then went on the search for a pub!  Kilkenny has a brewery which brews Kilkenny Ale.  We decided there would be no better place to try a Kilkenny than in the city itself!

On our hunt for a pub I found my two favorite flags hanging in the window!

The search was over!

I loved this retro sign in Syd's!

Enjoying a Kilkenny in Kilkenny!

It was the perfect end to a great day!  We got back on the bus at 5:30 and arrived back in Dublin around 7:00.  After a quick trip to Carroll's (the Irish tourist shop) to buy sweatshirts we headed home.  I was exhausted after such a long day but it was definitely worth it!