Day 13

Monday June 6

Our last day in Donore, Ireland. The first thing wee needed to do in the morning was checking in for tomorrow's flight. Kate and David had booked it for all 4 of us so she tried again to do it. Finally we figured out what the problem had been all along and Kate was so happy that it was solved and the boarding passes where ready.

James had looked into the pamphlets/brochures we had received at the Drogheda tourist office and surgested we visit the Battle of the Boyne today. We had seen signs to it many times.

It was 10:30 am by now and we were pleased to see that there were not that many cars on the parking lot.

When we arrived at the Oldbridge House where there was a museum inside we got a good surprise: it was free today and there was something happening at 11 am. The nice young man at the entry sugested that we go and have a coffee until then. Excellent idea.

There was still a little time afterwards and the volunteers were not ready yet so we did peek into the museum which we could continue afterwards if needed. The museum was excellent and the history is very interesting. Here are some samples.

The map shows King James II coming from the south (black pegs) and King William III (red) from the north.

I liked the quotes from King William and Louis XIV.

Outside, the volunteers had started and were explaining things. Tools, customs and happenings of that time. They were both excellent. The 'red coat' was a military man and talked about the weapons. The other one was a barber surgeon and explained a barber could bathe, cut hair, shave or trim facial hair and give enemas and because there could easily be blood while shaving he also could perform surgical procedures including bloodletting, cupping therapy, pulling teeth and amputation. 

They were very talkative and it seems that they had answers to any question.

After that we saw a movie explaining the battle and then we walked around the walled garden. 

It was very nice walking around there and the signs were interesting.

After 1 pm ... time for a bite to eat. Kate and David got the last scone with clotted cream and jam. 

James and I had an Irish pork sausage pasty each. Very good!

Could not resist and try to take a photo of the bird on the next table. Kate and David knew that it was a chaffinch. Very pretty.

Time to take a walk on the battle field.

Almost at the end of the walk we met a nice couple we had a lively chat with them. They were local and he was a magician. I asked whether he had heard of Pen and Teller and he replied that he had met them several times. He knew a few sentences in German. Very nice.

More people were now around. Close to the house on the lawn was a father with some children. He had a strange bat and of course I had to ask him what that sport was called. Like all other people we had encountered he was friendly and only too happy to talk to me. The Irish game is called "hurling". We decided it is a mixture of baseball and soccer, ha-ha. 

Well, we had walked a lot so we decided to head back. Such a lovely day. We sat in the back at the picnic table which had been moved because the grass had been mowed. We played our card game again. It's nice that every time somebody else wins.   

We had decided the day before that we would go out the evening of our last day here. We googled on restaurants and their menus and decided that Daly's was going to be it again. There was no comfortable table in the pub for us but David arranged that we could have a table in the adjacent restaurant. We didn't know that this was open on weekends and holidays. 

The 8oz sirloin was very nice. The brandy peppered sauce with mushrooms and onions were even better. Choose between door step or skinny fries. I had the door step.

Dessert: apple pie with custard. 

Back at the house we have to think about packing and how we are doing things tomorrow. We had been told at arrival that we should come 3 to 4 hours before departure and Kate had received several emails saying things like that. And we knew from the news that Dublin Airport had been in chaos lately. 

I had also asked James' sister in Windsor to please ask at Boots (pharmacy chain) whether they do covid tests for travel to USA and she let me know that they do but we needed to have appointments. We did manage to do that online but it was quite stressful. Boots in Windsor had no appointments for the rest of the week. We needed time on Thursday afternoon and found that in Richmond-upon-Thames. Another adventure.

Thinking about tomorrow we decided to leave the house not later then 3:30 am. Oh dear... not much sleep. Kate was worried about having to drive in the dark. 

This picture was taken at 10:30 pm when we went to bed. Still very light.

Alarm clock is set for 2:55 am. Please cross your fingers.