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olutely buzzing with activity we turned north at the western end to explore more of the central shopping district and it was a bit quieter after a while my wife wanted to stop and sit for a bit and get something to eat we were getting hungry since we hadn t had a proper lunch it was around 16 30 when we found a place called nosta which did turkish and italian food they gave us a table but said we had to be out by 18 00 for a reservation i think we were a bit lucky to find a place to eat and that we wanted to eat early since it might have been impossible without a reservation later we both had pide my wife a mixed vegetable one and me the sucuklu with pepperoni we didn t get anything else to keep the meal a bit lighter the pides were pretty good we noticed right across the pedestrian street was a chocolate cafe called tory top i suggested we could go there after dinner to sit for a bit and relax with some hot chocolate i dated over to ask when they closed and it was 18 00 we finished our meals shortly after 17 00 so had plenty of time to go over there and sit for a bit the place made its own chocolate and there was a small factory at the back visible through a wall of square glass panes we ordered a hot chocolate for my wife and a mexican hot chocolate for me with cinnamon and a hint of chilli and i asked for the last choc chip cookie in the treats display which had both white and dark chips in it the woman asked if we wanted marshmallows in our hot chocolates and before my wife could even say she didn t want any she appeared with a huge container full and scooped spoons of mini marshmallows into both of our drinks the drinks and the cookie were excellent i asked the woman if i could take a photo of the factory area and she said yes and said she could even give me a tour if i wanted i accepted eagerly and she showed me around the machines that process the cacao beans and turn them into chocolate one had a vat of molten chocolate being mixed and i said it smelt delicious and she said she could give me a taste and got some small wooden spatulas and dipped one into the flowing chocolate and gave it to me i licked off the warm chocolate and it was really delicious it was a dark chocolate with about 70 cacao and she said not a lot of sugar she also dipped another spatula and took it out to my wife to taste as well we left the place just before it closed at 18 00 and walked back to our hotel we grabbed some things from our room and went down to the hotel bar to sit and do artwork and then i typed up today s diary posted on 2026 10 25 2026 10 25 categories daily update tags travel leave a comment on uk ireland trip day 9 cahir castle cork uk ireland trip day 8 poulnabrone dolmen cliffs of moher another interesting thing about driving around ireland at this time of year is the autumn leaves most of the trees are still mostly green just starting to turn various different shades of yellow orange brown or red while a few are close to fully transformed this is quite an amazing sight for us since we don t really get autumn colours much in australia the vast majority of trees remain green year round for us i ve never travelled overseas at this time of year before so i think this is really the first time i ve ever experienced this phenomenon of autumn colours we got up later this morning just after 08 00 my wife had a good solid sleep and i sept a bit better but was still a bit restless for part of the night i located some likely places for breakfast and we chose a cafe called mocha beans they had a granola bowl with muesli and berry compote which we both chose they also had some tempting looking pastries but we resisted after breakfast we packed for another day on the road the woman at the hotel reception checked us out and validated our parking ticket for a discounted overnight rate then we headed back to the car and packed for the drive out first planned destination was poulnabrone dolmen it rained as we left galway the remnants of the overnight storm we navigated on main roads out of galway but quickly ended up on narrow country roads that wended their way through the landscape i prefer these sort of quiet and scenic routes to spending time stuck on a freeway so it was really good the rain eased up and stopped as we drove not far before reaching the dolmen we saw signs for hazel mountain chocolate a factory and shop along the way we decided to pull in and have a look at the front of the property is a cafe but you need to walk around the back to a display area and the chocolate shop a few other people arrived at the same time as us and we walked in together to be greeted by an enthusiastic blonde woman who asked us if we wanted to try some cacao water she poured into paper cups from a can and we tasted the drink it was fizzy and sweet slightly fruity and had a chocolatey aftertaste the woman explained that it was the cacao fruit flavour so it was more sweet than chocolatey it was pleasant though i m not a big drinker of sweet drinks she also gave us samples of a 72 cacao dark and a 40 milk chocolate she explained that they roast their cacao beans only very gently not burning them like many other chocolate makers do so their chocolate had less bitterness and they can use less sugar in it both were really good we browsed around the shop and looked through some large glass windows at the factory area where a large machine like a cement mixer was churning some cacao beans or something and there were vats full of molten chocolate and sacks of cacao beans we ended up buying a few bars of chocolate to take home for gifts back on the road it was a short drive to poulnabrone dolmen this is a simple site with a small visitor car park and no facilities there were about ten other people at the dolmen as we arrived but they departed as we approached on the walking track from the car park so we had the whole dolmen area to ourselves for several minutes until some more people arrived the dolmen was roped off but we could walk right around it about ten metres back the landscape was tricky though being eroded limestone with lots of ridges and potholes large enough to take a foot so we had to be very careful walking around not to trip or twist an ankle it was also very cold and windy the dolmen was situated on a slight rise in the middle of extremely exposed terrain ad the wind whipped around us making it very uncomfortable from poulnabrone we drove to the small village of doolin where we stopped for lunch there wasn t much there a pub or too a cafe and a couple of shops with some surrounding houses we went into fitz s pub where i tried their atlantic seafood chowder with treacle bread while my wife had focaccia with hummus and sun dried tomato dip the food was good as we ate a large party of people dressed in formal suits and dresses arrived apparently wedding guests drifting in over several minutes from doolin it was a short drive to the cliffs of moher one of the major tourist attractions of ireland the car park here was huge compared to the one at poulnabrone and they charged 15 per adult for parking and admission to the site hundreds of other tourists were all over the place we parked the car and got out and were almost blown away by the wind it was much stronger here than at poulnabrone we could barely stand and it was difficult closing the car doors against the wind i had to help my wife get her jacket on as she couldn t get the sleeve in the right position with the wind ripping it away we dashed across the car park and the road to the visitor centre which is dug into a hillside we rested in there for a few minutes to steel ourselves to face the wind again i pulled out the hood of my jacket which i rarely ever use and tightened the drawstrings around my face and over my hat to make sure it wouldn t blow away then we braved the wind again to walk over to the actual cliffside and to see the famous cliffs themselves they were rather different to what i expected i was kind of expecting them to be white like the cliffs of dover but they were dark grey rock they looked quite dramatic against the grey sky and the hostile looking atlantic ocean far below in places there were great spumes of sea spray blowing up the cliffs and over onto the land walking through some of this to another lookout position was like walking through a heavy rain we saw the two main viewing areas which offered views to the north and the south the sun came out as we were at the southern lookout looking north and the cliff there was beautiful in the sunlight but we didn t linger too long before scurrying back to the visitor centre to rest out of the wind for a while after looking through the gift shop we braved the wind again to return to the car and depart i think it had died down a little compared to when we d arrived but it was still pretty miserable we enjoyed getting into the car and closing the doors from here we headed to limerick it was about 80 minutes of driving and the only stop we made was shortly past the cliffs to refuel the car which was down to about a quarter of a tank filling it took 22 29 litres at 1 989 per litre for a total of 44 33 we drove on some really narrow roads which required pulling over in some places to let other cars pass slowly we made it on to wider roads and then highways and freeways which took us into limerick limerick is a much bigger city than galway limerick has high rise towers which i don t think we even saw anywhere in dublin we again parked the car at a parking station near the hotel where we ll get a discounted overnight rate from the hotel we unpacked the car and went down to the ground floor in a lift and emerged to the surprise of heavy rain falling it hadn t been raining at all when we drove in a few minutes earlier we pulled out our umbrellas and set out for the hotel but i recognised at the end of the block that we were near the waterfront which seemed wrong so i checked maps and found we d gone the wrong way and had to backtrack so we were a bit wet when we finally found the hotel and entered to check in after a few minutes to catch our breaths and dump luggage in the room we emerged again to look around the centre of limerick before dinner and the rain had stopped we walked around several blocks of the central shopping and dining area stopping in an irish handcrafts shop to look at some of the things there eventually we decided to find a cozy pub for dinner and i searched and found the locke bar just across the river we walked over there and it began raining again as we reached the river and the bridge inside the pub we got a table by the window and had some drinks and did some artwork until we were ready to order food my wife had the pumpkin and carrot soup with brown soda bread while i had the beef and ale pie which came with chips and mushy peas while my wife was painting a woman from the table next to us came over and asked her about what brushes she was using she has pentel water brushes which have a plastic tube handle that can be filled with water and a squeeze mechanism to wet the brush head for painting they re great for travelling as you don t need a separate bowl of water the lady said her daughter paints and would love such a thing so wanted to know where to buy them my wife gave her the product name and i searched for it on my phone and showed her and she took a photo of my phone so she could remember the food was good my wife continued painting a bit afterwards until we were ready to leave we walked back to our hotel and sat in the bar restaurant for a while to do more artwork and typing up this diary before retiring for the night posted on 2026 10 24 categories daily update tags travel leave a comment on uk ireland trip day 8 poulnabrone dolmen cliffs of moher uk ireland trip day 7 corlea trackway roscommon castle we got up just after 07 00 my wife slept well but i m still struggling to sleep through the night we searched online for somewhere to have breakfast but found that longford isn t quite as cosmopolitan as dublin most of the cafes didn t open until 09 00 and we found contradictory information online about two cafes that supposedly opened at 07 00 or 07 30 or 08 00 depending what web source you believed one near our hotel was the coffee corner allegedly open for breakfast at 07 30 we walked the short distance there and the place was closed and dark inside it was bitterly cold out so we didn t want to wait there to see if anyone arrived and opened up so we returned to our hotel room to take stock i did some more searching and found another place called fabiani cafe that was also supposedly open at 07 30 it was a longer walk in the other direction but the only option i could find so we set out again but when we emerged we could see the lights on at the coffee corner so we walked over there to check it out it was indeed open now and we went in and said we wanted breakfast the woman who had opened the cafe said they weren t serving breakfast just coffees she added that nowhere would be making breakfasts this early but we walked the other way to check out fabiani they were open and when we said we wanted breakfast the woman there said we could only have the non cooked breakfasts at the moment but that was fine as we wanted the granola bowls which came with fruit and yoghurt so we sat and ate those and they were pretty good the one woman was serving everyone who came in and a queue developed for people ordering coffees as she took one order then stopped to make it and only then took the next person s order before we left i wanted to get one of the very delicious looking sweet treats they had amazing looking cookies with choc chips and oats but i decided on a piece of the hedgehog slice as well as the usual biscuit chunks in the chocolate matrix it also had what looked like m ms and bits of marshmallow i asked the woman for a piece of the hedgehog slice to take away and she looked at me strangely i pointed at what i wanted and she said oh the biscuit slice i felt compelled to explain that in australia we call that a hedgehog so that she didn t think i was weird another interesting thing we ve noticed is all the halloween decorations everywhere almost every shop and cafe has some sort of halloween themed decorations pumpkins autumn leaves ghosts skeletons witches etc it s very strange to see back home in sydney businesses don t decorate for halloween at all back in our hotel room i checked our plans for the day to visit athlone castle then the clonmacnoise monastic site before stopping at the small town of atheny before reaching galway however when i checked the opening hours of athlone castle and clonmacnoise i found that both of these sites were currently closed for repairs so we were stuck without anything to do on the way to galway i did some searching for tourist attractions on the area of our route and found a couple of other alternatives our first stop was the corlea trackway near keenagh this is...