I felt much better in the morning, having rested all night. But then I started having some GI issues (although no pain) and fairly heavy spotting -- my typical travel outcomes. We ate sugary cereal for breakfast which didn't sit as well as porridge. We were both hungry again well before lunch.
Regardless, we drove to Connemara! It didn't look quite as beautiful as I remembered -- not as green and there were no yellow flowers, but the sheep were still stinkin' adorable and EVERYWHERE. Including in the road. I loved it! **Note: Connemara sheep aren't like the rest of the country -- they're extra fluffy/round and have little black faces and spindly black legs. They're my favorite!
We stopped first at Kylemore Abbey. The cafe had very tasty food -- we got beef and Guinness stew and a great turkey panini -- and surprisingly wasn't expensive! Unfortunately the stew had clearly been sitting out for awhile (cafeteria-style service) and I immediately felt pretty sick. There were a lot of tourists around, so we opted not to pay to go in the castle or abbey. We went to the gift shop, which was very nice for a gift shop, but I had to leave suddenly to run to the bathroom. By this point, in addition to diarrhea, I had bad malaise, a sore throat from bad post-nasal drip, GERD, and various other small MCAS symptoms.
Next we drove the the Connemara National Park. It was packed. Next time we would definitely plan to get to the park before the tourists and the sun, which was quite intense. The park was nice (we did the blue and red trails), but Dan pointed out that the hike views hadn't been much nicer than the incredible drives. It was nice to get exercise though, and the view from the top was gorgeous. I struggled pretty hard, between not feeling great and pain/fatigue from my compression leggings, plus the sun... Near the top were tons of tiny cairns, and some cute kids were running around collecting rocks to build more.
We'd decided to not go to the Killary fjord, but then accidentally took a wrong turn and got there anyway! It was not as cool as I remembered, but the drive was really nice. We got a bit lost trying to leave (the streets are labeled very strangely, for example the same route # pointing in three different directions...), and I felt pretty sick, so we stopped in Letterfrack to get wifi and food. We went to the Cloverfox pub. The food was good and they had some beautiful art! I had pretty bad spine burning and malaise by this point though, so we left to go home and found that someone had smashed the mirror on our rental car, you know the one with a $1600 deductible? I was proud of my ability to let go, though, and not worry about it. It would only make me feel worse.
We then drove straight to Galway. Between the food and the drive, somehow I felt better! I was full of pep in Galway! We walked around the castle walls in my favorite mall and I got to shop at Penney's, another highly nostalgic moment! There was a cool choir singing outside the store as I shopped.
We walked around looking for music and watching the swans. Eventually we made our way to the King's Head Pub -- and yet again the deja vu hit me! So many fun memories! The pub itself is 800 years old, and has some interesting history including a beheading (hence its name). It has a beautiful interior with a variety of seating options, including some couches (always great for my wacky body!) and a great stage for music. We caught an awesome band playing songs like County Down, Four Green Fields, Red is the Rose, and fun reels. The percussionist step danced on one song. They also played some American songs, which was lame, but still fun. They had a guitar, vocalist, accordion, fiddle, and drum. And the bar even served chamomile tea!
We finally left the pub around 11:30 and got some Chinese street food. Dan loved it so much, he now says it was the best part of the whole trip! We got to hear some more music on the street, including a large (8 person?) band playing some great trad music.
This was one of those days where I felt pretty terrible and didn't know whether to rally or rest. I'm so glad I rallied and proud of myself for how well I did it, but the noise, heat, and people in the pub made it quite tough. So, by the time we got home, it was clear I'd pay the next day for using up so many spoons. We canceled our Friday plans and didn't set an alarm.