Day 1 - Kilkenny

Before we go any further, we have to show you a feature in our hotel room.  The bathroom has a beer cap removed afixed to the wall.    Can you find it in the picture?  (It's above the counter and just below that plug)!  You know they take beer seriously, if that's standard hardware...in the bathroom!














We mapped out where we wanted to go, since it was now 3pm local time and we wanted to make the most of the daylight left since Chris had his camera ready to go!  We decided to find a pub and get that first Guiness!  We looked in the book LouAnna had bought (4 years ago) and brought, Ireland for Dummies (IFD), and found that there was a pub that had won Best Pub for many years, so we went there!  We watched the bartender at Langtons Bar pour the pints, which looked like chocolate milk at first, let them sit and form into black goodness!  Wow, the beer tasted so clean!  It's hard to explain, but like drinking bottled water over tap water...cleaner!  Chris isn't a beer drinker; he likes whiskey.  The beer didn't sit well with his stomach, so LouAnna drank hers and a couple drinks of his (with a plan for Chris to taste some Irish Whiskey tomorrow)!

Before

After!  YUM!

Then, we strolled through a couple of little shops there on John Street.  One of them was a wine shop.  We bought two Rieslings...one from France and one from Germany.  We decided to save the one from France to drink on our 1st anniversary with the top of the yummy wedding cake!  The German one would be tasted tonight, once we returned to the hotel.



We had passed a beautiful church between our car and the pub, so we went back to St. John's and took pictures.  Wow, that church is beautiful!  What do you think?

Next stop was Kilkenny Castle.













Then, we decided to grab some dinner and decided to refer back to the book (IFD) and headed over to Cafe Sol for some 'new Irish' food.  The menu was limited and we didn't see any lamb on there, so LouAnna went with Chicken tagine, marinated chicken breast, apricots, Israeli cous cous, buttered greens, toasted almonds and Chris got the Char-grilled 10oz Kilkenny sirloin of beef, dauphinoise potato, buttered greens, garlic butter.  Chris said he's never had a better sirloin before and they cooked it perfectly medium rare.  He ate every last bite of food on his plate and had a happy belly!  LouAnna's chicken wasn't very flavorful, but the greens and cous cous were VERY flavorful and tasty!  The cous cous had a bit of tang to them...imagine a mixture of bbq and teriyaki mixed together...YUM!

On our way back to the car, we saw part of the St. Patrick's Day Festival where they "Green" the city!

With full bellies, we decided to grab a couple things at the local market and head back for the evening.  LouAnna started our blog and Chris downloaded the pictures.  Then, it was off to dreamland for these two world travelers!  ;)