Touring the emerald isle

I'm not a fan of staying in one place too long. Perhaps a controversial statement given that I've always lived in Nottingham, although to be fair to me I have moved house 3 times in the last 5 years, so maybe the statement even holds in that regard. Mainly though, it's about my holiday habits. I like to go away atleast once a month (as you probably know by now) and I almost always choose long weekends or pit stop city breaks over long beach holidays. My least favourite kind of holiday is a week in Brits-abroad hotel that no one leaves to explore the local area. When it comes to my absolute favourite trips though, those are the ones where I tour around a few spots in the country I'm visiting to really get a taste for it. And that's exactly what we did on our recent family trip to Ireland!

Our flights were to and from Dublin so our Irish tour focussed on the south east side of the island and we started off by travelling down the coast to a beachy spot called Cahore Point. We were so blessed with the weather as it was beautifully sunny and so we had a little coffee pit stop admiring these incredible views. Something I definitely noticed early on when travelling around Ireland is why it's known as the emerald isle - it's SO green and luscious and it made the long driving spells so much prettier and more enjoyable than it would be in the UK!

We had all our hotels booked ahead of time so we knew our general itinerary for each night, but any other pit stops or how long we spent in each place was up for grabs. It was a really nice way to do it as it allowed us to just go with the flow based on how much there was to do in each place. The next stop we chose was a town called Wexford, although we didn't exactly explore much of it! We essentially found a cute little pub with outdoor seating, ordered a round of Guinness and the rest is history. Well, we knew rain was forecast for later in the week and so we were quite happy just enjoying the weather, a few drinks, and some fish and chips to share. We did all end up with comedy sunburn from this little drinking session though!

The first night was the only one where we weren't really staying in a town, it was more of a destination spa hotel. We were close to New Ross but having assessed that there wasn't much there anyway, we stayed at the hotel for the evening. We enjoyed some sunset cocktails on their front garden area before getting ready (in green of course, you'll notice a theme to this holiday wardrobe) and having a lovely dinner in the hotel restaurant, accompanied by a saxophonist playing in the background!

After the most outrageously good hotel breakfast ever (they had homemade white chocolate banana bread!), we were on the road again and our first stop was a town called Waterford. This was one of my favourite places that we visited as it was just such a vibrant and cool place! It had cool architecture, a pretty church, and some cool history spots (including a metal piece from the 9/11 attacks). Although they're actually famous for their glass so we naturally had to stop and have a look around this pretty glass shop and design studio.

My favourite thing about Waterford though was all the street art. I love places like this, and when driving in, we accidentally took a wrong turn and ending up going down all the side streets and discovering loads of cool pieces. Serendipity eh?

I'm a big advocate for stopping for a little treat with extreme frequency; a concept my grandma really struggled with, as like most pensioners, she normally just eats like one meal a day. The rest of us are used to pigging out though so I went with a black cherry and chocolate gelato, while Aidan got these outrageous treats from a chocolate-focussed Italian bakery. Amazing.

The next leg of our trip from Waterford to our destination for the evening was one of the longer stretches of driving, so we broke it up with a little lunch stop at a seaside town called Dungarvan. I wouldn't go as far to say it was like a must-do for tourists but it was very quaint and pretty and the sunny weather certainly helped too. We just sat in a pub garden having a few drinks, a light lunch and lots of laughs.

And then we arrived in Cork! One of my core personality traits (very very important) is my love of rooftop bars, and I will seek them out at every single opportunity. So I was very excited to find that there was one just opposite our hotel called Sophie's where they offered fabulous cocktails and gorgeous city views. Well, the views should've been gorgeous; there was a lot of construction going on in the city that kind of dampened vibe but even a mediocre rooftop bar experience is still pretty great in my opinion.

Another of my core personality traits is my love of eating late; usually 9pm at home and even later on holiday. Not only did this clash with my family's normal schedule, but it also clashed with the timetable of the city of Cork. Most of the restaurants had already finished serving food or were fully booked when we were checking at like 8:45. But the crisis was averted when we found this amazing Mexican place called Cafe Mexicana, where they made the most amazing spicy margarita and an even more amazing mixed classic sharer platter. Because obviously all that food was not just for me! We finished the evening at a cute little theatre-esque bar for whiskeys, where I managed to successfully (yet blindly) choose one of the most expensive ones there, coming in at €18.50 for a single. It's a skill honestly.

Cork was one of the more famous places on our itinerary and yet it was one of my least favourites. The bad weather on our day in Cork probably contributed but just generally speaking, Cork seemed to lack some of the charm and magic that the other spots had. It was too cosmopolitan to maintain it's small-Irish-town vibe but not cosmopolitan enough to feel like a big vibrant city with lots going on. It didn't feel all that different to Nottingham honestly, as it was very shopping centric and had all the main chain stores you'd expect in any city of a certain size. I did enjoy the coloured buildings though and they certainly knew how to make a sweet treat - the bakery we stopped at was amazing!

For lunch, we were torn between heading to Limerick or Tipperary and despite all singing along to the famous song in the car, we chose Limerick. And I'm so glad we did, as it was so lovely there! The weather had transformed into sunny blue skies with occasional downpours (we can all agree that grey skies and drizzle is the universal worst weather right?), and we had a lovely pub lunch by the water. We also then drove through Tipperary on our way to the next stop and while it was nice to see, it wasn't as pretty as Limerick so we made the right choice!

We arrived in Kilkenny to a cute surprise from our hotel (our whole Ireland trip was to celebrate my Grandma's 80th)! I wouldn't say that Kilkenny was one of my favourite places we visited, but this was definitely my favourite evening. We went for dinner at this really cool pub who specialised in American smokehouse cuisine with a New Orleans twist, and they had these really cool stain glass ceilings. My favourite part about it though was they offered Whiskey flights, and a whole "whiskey bible" (as dubbed by them) to go with them. Me and Aidan had great fun reading about their whole selection and ordering a flight each, where you got 3 different whiskeys to try and some information about the tasting notes of each. As you can see, it was really just me and Aidan who immersed ourselves in the Irish drinks selection (Guinness and/of whiskey every day) - the others just ordered what they normally do! My second favourite thing about this pub was the live music in the bar section at the front. After dinner, we had a few drinks and sang along to as many songs as we knew; by the end of the evening, everyone in there was up dancing!

Like I said, I loved our evening Kilkenny but Kilkenny itself didn't have a whole lot going on. We did have a lovely morning wandering around the castle grounds and stopped at a cute cafe for coffee. Then we did something horrendously touristy but very fun and we caught this little train that took us round the town and had a voiceover tour guide calling out some of the main spots and their history. I'm staunchly against things designed solely for tourists but even I have to admit this was quite good.

And then we had our final driving stint as we arrived in the final leg of our trip; Dublin! I've been to Dublin once before and loved it so I was excited to return and explore some more of it. Our hotel, the Riu Plaza Gresham, was gorgeous and we were ideally located right near The Spire.

Up until this point, we'd been spending all our time together as a group. But by this day, Grandma desperately needed a rest from keeping up with us all, and it was mum's birthday so her and dad went for a few drinks to celebrate, leaving me and Aidan to explore Dublin as a duo. We saw the NYC portal (before it got shut off the very next day)He'd had a recommendation from a friend for a seriously good toastie place, so we headed there to grab a late lunch (we saw the NYC portal en route, before it got shut off the very next day). I would concur that this toastie was seriously amazing; mine was harissa, smoked cheese and chorizo and it was amazing. The sun was trying to fight its way through at this point so we were able to sit outside enjoying a couple of Guinnesses! We also explored the George's street arcade (Ireland's first ever purpose-built shopping centre) which was very cool.

Everyone knows that going to Dublin means going to Temple Bar. It's a rite of passage. More than that, it is a must-do, because it is good fun. Although after my experience this time, I would say definitely go in the day! When I went last time, we went to Temple Bar as a late night option and got there around 11pm. The bar was a crazy riot, the drinks were ridiculously expensive and the whole venue was like a mosh pit. Which was fun, and obviously it depends on your preference, but going in the day meant being able to snag a table, getting table service and having chilled live music playing. The drinks were still ridiculously expensive (£20 for 2 Guinness) but they put the prices up higher the later it gets, so you're better off going earlier for your wallets sake as well.

That evening we were doing something VERY touristy and manufactured, but still very fun. With how not-hidden-gem it was, you can presumably work out that it wasn't my choice; we took it in turns to pick places for fairness and mum naturally got her pick on her birthday. So we were off to a place called Celtic Nights, which was a music, dinner and dance show! The food was very traditional Irish fare (stews and hotpots) but it was the music and dancing that you really go there for. It was incredible! The Irish dancers were so unbelievably talented and my toxic personality trait is watching them and believing that I could do it too if I gave it a try. It was just so much fun and such a good atmosphere, and we finished off the evening with a few drinks in a pub on the way back.

The next day was our last one to explore the city and so after some coffee and pastries, we headed off for a little wander around. We started at Trinity college which was super picturesque and pretty, especially with the sun shining down on us!

Then we went and saw the Molly Malone statue (you know our society is weird when we've taken to groping statues for "good luck"), and the Stags head pub. As you can probably tell, our favourite thing to do is basically to sit in the sun for a drink so we found this lovely little spot and stopped for a cocktail.

Pizza is a very big thing in Littlehales culture. We're not Italian or anything, we're just very into pizza and take its consumption very seriously. So when everyone said that's what they had their heart set on for lunch (despite the fact it's not Irish in the slightest), I was on research duty and set out to find the perfect place. And find one I did! Little Pyg was this amazing hidden gem in this giant inside-outside conservatory sort of building. The whole vibe of the place was amazing and the food was even better; we got a pear, walnut and gorgonzola salad and then shared some different pizzas and everything was incredible. 10/10 no notes.

And then we finished the trip the way that all good nights out end; with whiskey. Specifically whiskey with an 'e' as we were doing a tour and tasting at the Irish Whiskey Museum. Not only was it a super global tour (we were the only Brits and the other people were from America, France, Belgium, Italy, and Sweden), but it was fascinating too. They basically did a very theatrical history lesson on where whiskey came from and how it came to be what it is now, with some funny stories and the origins of phrases like 'saved by the bell' thrown in too. Then we finished up with a tasting of 4 different whiskeys, all of which were very good. We had booked the premium tour which included a blending masterclass supposedly, but it was really just a case of them giving you a a glass pipette and saying "have at it" with the extra 15 minutes of time you get. We didn't mind as our tour was perfectly timed for getting to the airport afterwards and the standard one wasn't offered at that slot, but if you're stuck between the two just be warned that I imagine there isn't actually very much difference. Overall though, it was the perfect note to end our Ireland trip on. We had an incredible time and were blessed with much better weather than we'd perhaps been expecting. If you're considering a trip to the emerald isle, I'd say rent a car and get touring.