World Traveller: 7 Continents, 90 Countries, 871 Days Overseas
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Tuesday 29 February 2000
Highlights: Royal Shakespeare Company’s performance of Macbeth
We set out to explore Chester in a good mood but it was quickly dispelled when we couldn’t find anywhere to put our backpacks which resulted in us taking them with us everywhere which was far from ideal. As a result we just ended up visiting the Chester Cathedral.
Monday 28 February 2000
Highlights: Bath Abbey, Roman Baths, Walking tours of Bath
Starting early we headed off to Bath to spend the day before arriving late in the day at Chester which we will explore tomorrow.
Bath was originally a Roman outpost from 1 AD to 4th century. The Romans established the very first bath for which the area is named which took advantage of the natural hot springs.
Sunday 27 February 2000
Highlights: Cardiff Castle, not throwing up (from overnight ferry).
Quite amazingly we got to Cardiff at about 6 am from Rosslare and caught a bus straight To Cardiff even though my stomach still hasn’t quite settled. At check in they forgot to get us to pay saving us a night’s accommodation!
Saturday 26 February 2000
Highlights: St Mary’s Cathedral, King John’s Castle
Today we explored Limerick City starting with St Mary’s Cathedral was built in 1172.
Next was the excellent the King John’s Castle. King John is often portrayed in fiction in Robin Hood stories. In reality he was forced to sign the Magna Carta. The audio-visual presentations were brilliant, highlighting the siege of Limerick in 1690-91 by the English and Dutch against the Irish and the French.
After the Irish surrendered they signed the ‘Treaty of Limerick’ which was supposed to treat Catholics fairly but was instead broken fairly quickly leading to future struggles and fights and eventually the creation of the Republic of Ireland.
From here we caught a train to Rosslare Harbour to catch an overnight ferry to Wales. The sea was very rough with Jon really struggling with seasickness.
Friday 25 February 2000
Highlights: Bunratty Castle
Although technically today was a day based in Limerick we actually caught a bus out to Bunratty village to visit Bunratty Castle. Originally we tried to hire a car to visit Lough Gur stone circle but all the rental places had a 3 day minimum hire requirement so that plan was adjusted.
Bunratty Castle is in excellent condition and was built in 1270 although Viking structures existed before this date. The O’Brien’s, Kings of Thomond (half of Ireland), occupied the castle until the 17th century.
The castle is setup as a tourist attraction with rooms recreated inside and out from different periods of Irish history. Disappointing we. Issued out on the medieval banquets it was overbooked.
After a few Guinness beers at the local pub, built in 1600s, we headed back to our Limerick hostel for an early night.
Nathan's Insights 