Wicklow Day Tour

This past Friday my friend Rochelle and I went to the county of Wicklow for a day trip. It was my first time out of Dublin since I got here, and even though the weather wasn't the best, it was still a great day! We had an early start and were touring around for about 8 hours, but most of that was spent on the bus. First stop was the Glencree Valley ("glen" means valley, "cree" means heat = heart of the valley) where we had our coffee stop and had a little snoop around. Then we drove through the Wicklow Mountains which had a very different bog landscape to what I'd seen before.

Bogs in the Wicklow Mountains

We saw where some of the scenes in "PS I Love You" and "Braveheart" were filmed, as well as the Guinness estate on Lough Tay (which means "Lake Tea", if I'm not mistaken).

Rochelle and I by the Guinness Estate (where Paul McCartney wrote "Yesterday"!)

We went to a monastic ruin in Glendalough, which had a lot of eerie character and skewed gravestones.

We then stopped for a late lunch in the town of Avoca, which was famous for being the set of the fictional town "Ballykissangel" (an old soap opera I think? Although I could be wrong). One of my favourite stops of the day was at the Avoca Wool Mill, where we saw rugs and things being handmade with looms. The colours in the mill were so vivid and beautiful! Avoca is a shop in Dublin that sells cooking things, clothes, rugs, candles, books, etc. and has a café with cakes to die for (at least that's what people say; I've never had any myself).

A man using a 120 year old loom to weave a rug.

All of the handwoven things in the store are supplied from the Avoca Mill, so it was interesting to see where and how they are made.  All in all it was a great day, and nice to get out of Dublin. I definitely want to do another day trip sometime, but perhaps I will plan for when the weather is nicer!