Tea room at the Famine Museum

Off to an early start this morning, and on the road a little after 8:30. Our first stop was the Famine Museum in Strokestown. Lots of interesting information here about the economic and social conditions that made the failure of the potato crop so catastrophic. Not a lot of artifacts, as one might imagine, but the story was captured very fully, and it was an interesting stop.

The next stop was to be Newgrange — a 5,200-year-old passage tomb, older than Stonehenge. Built by Stone Age farmers, the mound is 85 metres in diameter and 13.5 metres high — an area of about an acre. A 19-metre passage leads into a chamber with three alcoves. The passage and chamber are aligned with the rising sun at the winter solstice. It’s all surrounded by 97 large stones, some of which are carved with megalithic art. Sounds amazing, right? And we were really looking forward to seeing it. 

The thing is, there was a fatal crash somewhere on the road ahead of us, and the Garda (Ireland’s version of our RCMP) closed the highway. So we had to take a complicated detour that cost quite a bit of time. 

Cute town on our detour

So eventually, we had to make the decision to save this experience for another time. If we had only known, we’d have gladly forgone the Famine Museum, but there you have it. It’s another very good reason to come back.

So on we went to Dublin to check into our B&B in the suburb of Swords. To our delight, there is a castle here, so we had a look through that. Not quite as exciting as Newgrange, but it was something!! 

Swords Castle (more of a palace than a fortress) was built by the Archbishop of Dublin in 1200 as a residence and administrative centre.The chapel has been undergoing reconstruction, including the addition of a new oak beamed roof. New tiles made using traditional methods were based on those found during the 1971 excavations. New windows have also been inserted.

Those excavations revealed that the castle was built on a graveyard that dates from the 11th century. They found the remains of 17 people, and most of them were adolescents. They are hoping for more information once radio carbon dating is done.

Our B&B is close to the airport, so it will be a relatively stress-free exercise in the morning to drop the car off and get to our flight. One very welcome feature at this B&B is a kittycat named Mr. Biggles. He hopped up on the bed and cuddled with me for a bit, purring like crazy as I scritched him under the chin. Pssst Caitlin, don’t tell Sasha!