Mon 12th - Fri 23rd Mar Dublin/Kilcock (-10hrs Aus time)

The cheapest flight I could get into Dublin for St Patrick's Day at this late notice actually arrived the week before. So I stayed with Joan (aunt) in Kilcock, about an hour by bus out of Dublin (but actually in a different county - Kildare). Joan has a great appartment, really comfy and best of all it has a tv with english channels on it (in France I resorted to watching reruns of Friends badly dubbed into French but I'd already seen them so I knew when to laugh)!

We went shopping in a big shopping centre called Liffey Valley (the river running through Dublin is the Liffey) and I finally got myself a mobile phone (I'd left the old one in Aus). We also went to see a movie.

On St Patrick's Saturday Joan and I went into Dublin by bus early to find a good spot for the parade. I think we got there around 10.30am and the parade was due to start at 12pm. However, a combination of it starting late and where we were standing meant that it didn't get to us until almost 1.30pm. However, once it had started it was well worth the wait. you can tell just by the number of photos I took that it was a long, bright, active parade with loads of bands (loads of American college bands as well as Irish ones), strangely dressed creatures and banner-waving.

Saturday night I caught the train to my aunt Helena's place (also an hour out of Dublin) because she'd invited me to a Paddy's party. That was great fun, loads of food, and ended up with kareoke (yours truly managed to listen only!) Helena was in great form and her son Jack (8yrs old) is a darling. I stayed at her place that night and met their gorgeous new King Charles puppy (less than 4 months old) called (wait for it) Princess (named by Jack). She reminded me a lot of Chanel (my dog in Aus) and I missed her.

The next morning I went back into Dublin to meet Joan. We entered a Treasure-hunting competition which was great fun and a great way to get some excercise and see the city. We didn't win though. After the treasure-hunt Joan wanted to show me the oldest pub in Dublin (or Ireland, I can't remember). It's called the Brazen Head Pub and it's supposed to be built in the 1800's sometime (I wrote it down but left the paper at Joan's place). I had Guiness and beef stew for lunch and the guy sitting beside me let me borrow his Guiness for a photo (pic). The pub was really full and we shared our table with an American couple who were great fun and we ended up chatting for hours. That afternoon the weather was really weird. For the parade the sun was shining, although it was cold. Then the sky went grey and we expected rain. There was a little of that, but then there was hail, and even a little snow. Later on the sky cleared but there were gale force winds. Around 6pm we headed back into the centre of town to the Liffey where there was supposed to be fireworks at 7.30pm. Unfortunately they were cancelled due to the bad weather. I went back to Helena's for the night.

Monday was a Bank Holiday (public holiday) and so Helena, Jack and myself headed to a place called Bree for a funfair which was set up along the seafront. That was great fun, and we all went on a few rides (pics). The weather wasn't too cold although there was the occasional out-of-the-blue hail shower.

The next week I also spent at Joan's place, doing a little exporing around Kilcock, and the larger town down the road called Maynooth, as well as an afternoon or two in Dublin. Then Joan and I headed down to County Clare and Newmarket-on-Fergus.