Galway; Tuesday, 28 July, 2009

I checked out of the hotel and took my luggage down to the left luggage office at the train station, then walked the short distance to the coach station to join my day tour of Connemara.

The tour headed out along the banks of Lough Corrib and then out into the Wilds of Connemara stopping at a ruined abbey at Ross Errily before heading to the village of Cong where they filmed “The Quiet Man”. From there it was a drive through the stunning scenery of Connemara, where the small coach proved its worth going up little lanes into the hills that a normal sized coach wouldn’t be able to traverse.

The main stop of the day was at Kylemore Abbey and Gardens, then it was time to start heading back towards Galway, only there was a slight problem. Two of the tour group failed to show at our departure time. They had got ten to four and ten past four confused and wandered back, thinking they were on time, 20 minutes late. Normally this wouldn’t have been a problem, but the tour was now not going to arrive back into Galway until after 6, and the luggage office closed at 6.

The driver got onto the office who went and spoke very nicely to the left luggage office staff at the station and because I had been able to describe my bag (and more importantly had left the Belfast baggage tag on it so I was able to uniquely prove it was my bag as it had my name and I could confirm the flight details), they let them take it so we didn’t have to worry about getting back into town in time.

After the tour ended I was reunited with my luggage, grabbed some water for the bus journey, and waited for my coach to Limerick