ireland 2025

enjoy the insights and pictures from our 18 days vacation in ireland (IE) from may, 22th till june, 8th. we've joined an organized journey with a nice travel group for the first 2 weeks and then spend 3 more days at a beach north of dublin 😀🍻🐏💖🍀

the sea, cliffs, green meadows, sheep ... any other cliché left out? 🍺🍀

as so often after our roundtrips, this blog is a combination of my mobile phone notes + the favorite pictures made by my wife. this time even decorated by 1 short video made by my wife. she is an artist, isnt she? maybe i'll upload few of my own pictures later. if not, you will see just many trees, flowers, animals, natural sites and only very few cities, buildings, castles, churches, pubs, you know? 😂

watch on youtube

let's start:

• the green island with 5M inhabitants in the republic of ireland (celtic eire, IE) and 2M more in northern ireland (part of the united kingdom aka great britain today (UK+GB)
• this formerly extremely poor part of the world mutated to a really rich one in the last 40-50 years. how was this possible? well, they first lowered their ecological and environmental standards in order to attract foreign industry (chemical, pharma) and later lowered their corporate taxes to attract big techs & co which earn their money in USA, DE, FR, CA, GB, IT, ES etc. and pay their taxes in ireland, if any
• as the population speaks english, many international operating companies have had their service & call centers in ireland .... and after the labor became more expensive, they've often moved these call centers to india, where the folks work for less and speak english, too
• the relation between england and ireland is really complicated, as you can imagine .... england ruled ireland for 800 years (till sovereignity over the republic of ireland territory in 1921), the most irish people forgot their native irish [= celtic, gaelic (gällisch)] language as less than 2% are native speakers according to wikipedia and the second most often spoken laguage after english today is polish due to immigration of polish work force after poland joined the EU in may 2004
• even the holy st. patrick of ireland was an englishman who babtised (taufte) the first irish druids in the 5th century a.d. ~ anyway, we all love the st. patrick's day celebration every march, dont we? 🍀🍀🍀
• the irish famine 1845-1852 due to potato blight (fäulnis) was especially brutal in western part of the island. out of the 8M inhabitants approx 1M died and 2M emmigrated abroad, mostly to northern america. well, the potatoes did not grow and the english landlords still asked for 'their' share of rent for the land, often more than the irish farmers could keep to survive. on top, ireland still exported food to england. there was no internet and just local news available then, so it took much more time to make the problem visible, you know? after such events like this famine there is almost never again a good relationship between such two nations possible, is it? the same issue have the jews with the germans, armenians with the turks+kurds, native americans + africans + australian aborigines with the european conquerors. just to give you a feeling how bad the famine was, england had at that time approx 15M inhabitants and today 57M. ireland then 8M and today 7M and there was poverty driven depopulation in ireland till the 1980s => can you feel the irish pain now?
• dublin + liffey river + trinity college + bleeding horse pub + temple bar
• cork + lee river in the south of the island. i liked the river port + sea port, the old streets, the working class character of the city, our old spa like hotel metropole, the crowded pubs on saturday evening, the quiet walk on sunday morning
• lake lough leane + the from inside beautiful traditional lake hotel with cheap beer below 7 euros per pint (= 0.5l) in killarney in SW ireland. there is a nice view over the lake to mount carrantouhill, wich is with 1038m the highest mountain in the country
• ring of kerry sightseeing route along the bays in the province of kerry in SW ireland. yes, they sell the yellow kerry butter in ireland, too ...
• the dingle peninsula, swimming in the surprisingly warm atlantic ocean (thanx to gulf stream? or was that feeling caused just by the cold weather so that the water appeared warmer than the air?) + the most western point of ireland (not the west of europe as this point is in portugal, if you've read my old blog post carefuly 😉)
• waterville ~ a cold + wet + windy place at a beach. i really wonder why came charlie chaplin so often here on vacation? maye because nobody else comes to a place like that and he had his rest here?
• the 200m high cliffs of moher in the west
• 5,000 years old tombstones somewhere in the west
• shannon river ferry ~ heaven & hell! there was no beer in the ferry kiosk, my dears
• medieval galway + the corrib river
• peat = turf = bog in connemara mountains ~ turf grows just 30 cm in 1,000 years, you know? robert from the dan o'hara farm tells the story of the quite rich and famous irish farmer dan o'hara who left his beloved connemara farm due to poverty in times of irish famine to new york as he couldnt pay his landlord. his wife and 3 out of 7 children did not survive the travel by the 'coffin' ships. all 4 remaining children went to orphan asylum homes (waisenhäuser). as he couldnt speak english, he used to sell matches in NY to earn some money. after 1 year dan o'hara died, most likely on sadness because of his broken family

• clifden
• kylemore abbey ~ originally a castle built in the 2nd half of the 19th century. today a abbey operated by benedictinian nuns
• killary fjord
• what a nice swimming at the mullaghmore beach in northern part of ireland
• the medieval city and castle of donegal + river eske (eask). it was saturday evening and thus a duty to go to a pub. i've met a nice irish couple at the bar counter and yes after many many beers, few irish whiskeys and a wonderful conversation i was back home at 2:13 a.m. as my wife told me and all the fellow travellers full of pride next morning 🤣
• ---> irish - great britain border without any control. well, we could have ignored this stupid online esta travel certificates, couldnt we?
• medieval city of derry (londonderry) at the foyle river surrounded by city walls in northern ireland, which is still part of great britain. wall paintings abt the 'troubles' with the british in 1970s (IRA + irish people vs GB. it is not just catholics against protestants, if you asked me)
• bushmills whiskey destillery
• giant's causeway ~ the unesco heritage with its mostly hexagonal basaltic (lava) cliffs
• belfast + the lagan river ~ whole northern ireland belongs to GB. the protestant (british) and catholic (irish) neighborhoods are still divided by a wall and gates which get closed every night. there is a beautiful british town hall, many old houses, the titanic museum as the ship was built here in 1912 + much more ...

• what about the countryside? there were almost no natural forests here. we have seen many green meadows with green gras and sheep + cattle on it, many many lakes + rivers, much of bald green waste lands + peat lands, small mostly bald hills, few man made spruce plantations (fichte) and everywhere stand some castle and church ruins. of course there are also beaches + cliffs as ireland is an island in the first place
• compared to western europe quite few villages / cities / people. just see what meta's AI answered 2025-06-02:
• Ireland has a population density of 75.5 inhabitants per square kilometer, while Germany has a significantly higher density of 232.9 inhabitants per square kilometer. To put that into perspective, Germany's population is roughly 15 times larger than Ireland's, with 83.28 million people compared to Ireland's 5.308 million ¹.
• - *Ireland Average age*: 40.2 years
• - *Germany Average age*: 46.8 years
• ---> great britain - irish border. again no control
• sinead o'connor = daughter of connor in irish (btw, it would be MacConnor in scottish) sings a cover version of prince's song much much better than he in the original version

• when irish music, then we cant skip bono + his U2, can we?

• bru na boinne ~ the unesco heritage site with the 5,200 years old neolitic graves at the boyne river close to the town of drogheda in SE
• the organized journey is over, our group at the airport and we arre going to stay 3 more days at the beach in rush, some 20 minutes north of the dublin airport by our rental car
• our trips fom rush: howth harbour + cliff walkway, skerries with 2 windmills + 1 watermill + bakery + swimming in the 12°C cold irish sea with 3 local ice swimmers who swim all year through, even in the winter months at temperatures at about 6°C. ardgillan castle with beautiful flowers in the garden, malahide castle + gardens via a guided tour where we were quite disappointed by its gardens which consist mostly of a monoculture of grass + few trees standing around, swords castle, portrane pizza + beach and then back to our 'home base' harbour pub + beach in rush
• as our guided tour in the skerries mills area was so special, here few more details: water mill from early 16th century (with documentary evidence approx. 1525), wind mill 1460 (before columbus), windmill ca. 1800 (before napoleon), bakery 1840. any additional insights? DO NOT order their breakfast menus in the historical cafe out there or at least ask for a half portion of eggs. why? even such a heavy eater (or a scoffer indeed?) like me could not finish the whole meal 🤣
• my favorite beer brands in ireland? my absolute #1 was smithwick's red ale, than probably kilkenny draught and all the quite light (approx 4% alcohol by volume) lagers: rockshore, harp, belfast lager, coors ... pls dont wait for guinness! that taste is really not made for me 🍺 ... [anyway, let's look up wikipedia: Smithwick's brewery was founded in Kilkenny in 1710 by John Smithwick and run by the Smithwick family of Kilkenny until 1965, when it was acquired by Guinness, now part of (the british company) Diageo]
• anything else? a lot of rain ☂, often short rainy periods many times per day. a lot of trash in the streets and at the beaches. really expensive beer and on top whiskey + gin + rum where not cheep either due to special taxes on alcohol. very kind and friendly people, just 1 example: the tesco guy at the counter scanned his club card just to make our purchase cheaper for us 

wanna hear how the celtic language sounds? here we go 

the next watch on youtube as the owner restricted the access from other websites recently😇

... and now all the pictures 😀

mr. seal meets mr. me

belfast

unesco heritage giant's causeway

belfast, huge sympathy for palestinians  & gaza because 

of similar fate of the irish and palestinian nations

there are so many castle + church ruins. this one in northern ireland

hotel eccles in glengarriff since 1745? SW ireland

a small flower island garinish, SW. trees + flowers planted by (a scottish?) family

two goblins in our travellers' bus

dublin

dublin, the beautiful fish + seafood seller molly malone

dublin, st. patrick's cathedral

donegal (?)

two of us

the killary fjord

turf - bog - peat in connemara

dublin

the skerries mills, SE

cliff walkway, howth, SE

mr. seagull in the harbour of howth, SE

mr. me in the harbour of howth, SE

belfast

5,000 years old graves somewhere in the west

mrs. butterfly

few of my pictures:

dublin, st. patrick's cathedral

dublin, st. patrick's cathedral

the trinity college right and a government building without windows

as the british implemented tax on window size ("day light robbery")

dublin the temple bar

dublin, camden street

dublin. the bleeding horse pub is much nicer + better than the temple bar 🍻

dublin, bleeding horse pub's toilette

dublin

cork, south ireland

cork, south ireland

cork, south ireland

ferry over the shannon river

connemara in the west is the most rainy part of the island

robert explains the turf bussiness and the irish famine 1845-1852

 at the dan o'hara farm, connemara, west ireland

dan o'hara house was the bigger one and above average at that time

dan o'hara farm, connemara, west ireland

donegal castle

donegal + river eske

donegal, old castle pub, #1

donegal, mc cafferty's bar (#2)

donegal, mc cafferty's bar (#2)

donegal, the forge bar (#3)

the new dublin, harbour area at liffey river accommodates 

all the googles, apples, amazons, big banks & co. today

dublin, half penny bridge some time ago

wall of fame

dublin, the blooms hotel. i'm not familiar with the book / story,

 but it seems to have quite a lot fans worldwide ...

dublin, oscar wilde's monument in the park adjacent to his house

dublin, oscar wilde's house, the red one with the white addition

cork, hotel metropole

cork + lee river

cork

cork

kilkenny castle

kilkenny

kilkenny, the smithwicks brewery, the place where my lovely red ale comes from

kilkenny, the smithwicks brewery, the place where my lovely wife waits for me

lake lough leane

waterville

celtic steps show

derry - londonderry, northern ireland

the EU funded peace bridge in derry ~ londonderry, northern ireland, UK

dunluce castle, northern ireland

belfast, town hall (guild hall)

belfast, town hall, queen victoria

belfast, town hall

museum inside the town hall

belfast

belfast, university

olympic + titanic from white star line

belfast, the crown bar

crown pub

belfast's oldest pub McHugh's close to the river (since 1711) 

mchugh's pub, belfast

bru na boinne ~ the unesco heritage site with the 5,200 years old neolitic graves

malahide castle was owned by the (hugenot) talbot family for over 800 years

ardgillan castle + really beautiful gardens

swords castle

skerries mills

skerries

skerries, the oldest church

our airbnb room in rush

rush, harbour bar + the harbour

the howth castle

howth

howth

howth cliff walk

rental car area at the dublin airport

dublin airport

good-bye, dear ireland and our studiosus tours trip to 🇮🇪 💖🍻🐏🍀

all uploaded pictures here (the best shots from my 2,866 pictures, too 😎)

eof