April 14--Clifden to Shannon

After a lovely breakfast of eggs benedict and other treats, we checked out of The Quay House and headed east to Galway City and then south toward Shannon.  We took a "not so short detour" to visit the Cliffs of Moher, a stunning natural phenomenon of shear cliffs along the extreme west coast of Ireland.  We had not been able to include a visit to the Cliffs when we were previously in Ireland and we really wanted to see them, enough to drive a couple of extra hours in order to do so.

We were not disappointed.  Our only surprise was the crowds.  Given it was Monday in mid-April, an astonishing number of motor coaches and an even more surprising number of tourists were there.  During our two and a half weeks in Ireland, we had largely been spared significant crowds, expect for the big cities, but the Cliffs of Moher were an exception.

Returning to the car, where we ate the last of our picnic foods for lunch, John decided to take up his violin and play a few trad tunes.  We were faced away from the main parking area but, nonetheless, a few folks ducked around to see where the music was coming from.  

On route to our Shannon Airport hotel, we drove to the airport to check out where we would come the next morning. We gassed up, and we checked into the Oakwood Arms where we would spend the night and have dinner.  John's dinner toast was to "Fiddling around" and mine was to "the Connemara ponies," descendants of the Spanish armada horses that swam ashore when the high seas and winds destroyed the Spanish fleet in 1588.  

We repacked--one last time--and settled down to sleep.  It was our last night in Ireland.