The Irish tooth fairy has come twice for our little boy, and he leaves Euro! So he has made 4 Euro this trip.
My 10 year old has lost 2 teeth on this trip. I thought he was done loosing teeth by now?!
Hook Lighthouse in Waterford, Ireland
Our last touring day in Ireland – I woke up early and headed to the gym for a workout followed by a swim with the kids. When we got back to the room at 10am Derek was STILL sleeping! Once we got everyone (and everything) together, we checked out and headed for the Hook Lighthouse. We made our stop at Aldi first to grab some snacks and breakfast items spending 16.16 Euro. The lighthouse is located on the tip of the Hook Peninsula in county Wexford. It is the world’s oldest intact lighthouse (800 years)! We decided not to take the tour the lighthouse, but we enjoyed the free exhibits, scenery, and the kids played a game of chess. The weather was beautiful (about 75 degrees Fahrenheit) with a nice breeze off the ocean. We heard one person make the comment that it was “too humid.” Haha! They wouldn’t last a day in south Georgia.
The Hook Lighthouse in Wexford, Ireland, the oldest intact lighthouse in the World!
The kids enjoying a game of chess at the Hook Lighthouse in Wexford.
A view of the beautiful Hook Peninsula
Curracloe Beach – Southeast Ireland
After enjoying a coffee, some snacks from our Aldi purchase, and some relaxation we started toward the Curracloe Strand beaches. The beach is one of County Wexford’s most popular beaches sitting on the Celtic Sea. Of note, this beach served as the Omaha Beach in Saving Private Ryan. The sand dunes are huge, and there were children using their boogie boards to slide down the dunes :-). The water was….COLD! There were lots of children and adults playing in the water though despite the temperature, and again someone commented about the warm temperature. Interestingly, at least to me, there were no umbrellas on the beach… just some of these plastic wind shelter things (see the photo). The kids enjoyed playing in the sand and getting their feet wet while I enjoyed relaxing on the beach in the sun.
The sand dunes were huge and hard to climb over. On the way back to the car we found the boardwalk.
A view of the beach looking down from the sand dune
Yay! We are at the beach…but the water is Freezing!
Selfie!
The kids enjoyed some time at the Curracloe Strand beach in the Celtic Sea.
Driving from Wexford to Dublin
We planned on stopping for lunch as we left the town, but there wasn’t anywhere to stop so we enjoyed more of our already purchased snacks. The drive to Dublin took about 2 hours and then we were stuck in city traffic trying to get to the hotel. I was sleeping, no surprise there, but woke up trying to figure out why we were in the city when our hotel is at the airport. My husband was wondering the same thing, but we presumed it was the fastest or most direct route that the GPS was giving us. We saw our hotel, after driving in the bus/taxi only area for about 1 mile, but we couldn’t get near it to park or get out.
After driving around sometime we just parked in the closest deck we could find (my daughter had been complaining of needing to use the toilet for about 1 hour by now). We unloaded the car and walked about 1/2 mile to the hotel…to find out that it was the WRONG hotel :-(. We used the restroom and lugged all of our luggage back to the car and headed for the correct hotel. Much to my husband’s relief, it was out of the city and much closer to the airport. We checked into the hotel and put our stuff down. We decided that we would return the rental car that night to decrease the stress and time required in the morning (and hopefully get a little refund). Wow, we are glad we returned the car early as the airport and car rental return were difficult to navigate! We returned the car, but didn’t get a refund :-(. After taking the shuttle back to the airport to catch the hotel shuttle, we walked to a local Italian restaurant for dinner. My husband and I shared salmon with a baked potato with a meatball appetizer, it was so delicious! The kids had lasagna and spaghetti and a squash drink, and the meal cost us 27.85 Euro. Our waitress said she came to visit Ireland from Kazakhstan for 1 week and stayed for 7 years! Hmm, I was tempted.
My daughter enjoying double squash, from what we can tell it’s like a Crystal Light packet added to water.
This poor boy is tired from 2 weeks of touring Ireland and staying up late.
We got back to the room and re-packed our things for airplane travel and charged all our electronic devices before heading to bed. We need to be at the airport at 8:00am in the morning for our flight, luckily our hotel has a complimentary breakfast.
