Knock, Knock, We Were There

Friday

A day to wander around Dingle and say goodbye to landladies, publicans, restaurant owners, wait people, and friends. A day to wash clothes and pack. Filled the tank with petrol. (Using much less gas than expected because of having a hybrid) Barbequed hamburgers at home for dinner.

Saturday

Bye Bye Dingle. The destination for tonight is Balllina in County Mayo, about a five hour drive. We left at 8:30 AM. Fortunately the route goes right through Limerick because we had to return there to re-up our car rental. 30 days is the max rental period and we were at day 28. That took all of three minutes to complete and we were back on the road. We stopped at the SuperMax roadside rest area in Tuam (of which you’ll hear more in a few days) for lunch and had surprisingly good sandwiches. With time to kill before we could check in in Ballina, we stopped in Knock. This is the home of Ireland’s amazingly large International Eucharistic & Marian Shrine. Your lesson for the day:

On a wet dark August evening in 1879,  the villagers of this place had spent the day doing the usual work of the harvest time of the year – gathering winter fuel and fodder. As evening approached, the heavy mist that had been persistent throughout the day,  turned to a steady downpour.  The villagers gathered around the turf fires in their homes, taking comfort and shelter on a terrible night.

Suddenly word spread throughout the village that something extraordinary was happening at the Church and so they hurried to the windswept gable where they witnessed a heavenly vision surrounded in a brilliant white light. Men, women and children gathered in prayer at the gable wall of  the parish church.

The witnesses clearly saw the Blessed Virgin Mary dressed in white robes, her hands and eyes turned towards heaven in prayer. On her head was a gold crown and where the crown fitted the brow, a single golden rose. On her right, bowed respectfully towards her, was St. Joseph. He appeared older, his beard and hair were grey and, like Our Lady,  he was barefoot.

To Our Lady’s left stood John the Evangelist vested as a bishop, wearing a small mitre. He held an open book in his left hand and in its pages the lines and letters could clearly be seen. He appeared to be preaching but no voice was heard. He stood so that his back was neither turned to the Virgin or to the Lamb that stood upon a simple plain altar. Behind the Lamb was a Cross. The witnesses watched and prayed for over 2 hours and though they were wet, they noticed that no rain fell on upon the Apparition or on the gable.

If you need more, click on the link above. We saw no apparitions and we motored on to Ballina.

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We checked into the beautiful Ice House Hotel located directly on the River Moy. We enjoyed wine by the open window. Pictures from our room:

Then we wandered down (five minute walk) to Crocket’s Quay Bistro for an early pub dinner. Nope. Closed for reconstruction. Instead we walked 30 minutes into Ballina where we had a forgettable dinner in a fast food family restaurant. We just wanted something quick. Some pictures from the walk into town:

Then we went to Harrison’s Pub. Harrison’s is owned by Derek Leonard who I used to play basketball with back in the early 1980’s in Boston. Elaine also met him on several occasions in Boston. He lived there for about ten years. He married his Irish sweetheart in Boston and his first son was born there. For awhile he was the manager of Kitty O’Shea’s Irish Bar on State Street (which is no longer there). Eventually he moved back to his native Ballina and purchased an old decrepit pub and rehabbed it. We had a fun reunion over several beers and met some of his customers who were delightful. It’s a very laid back pub with no music and no food and most of the customers are regulars. Our kind of place. It was a great reunion.

After the drinks we took a taxi back to the Ice House with the best cab driver ever – full of fun and facts. It was well after nine, but the sun was still out. We slept with the curtains open as the sun went down. Here’s a panorama taken from our room window.