Shenanigans and Switchbacks: Galway or the High Way

Saturday May 9, 2026

Galway

Weather is sunny and fresh, around 12-14 degrees, with a good, stiff breeze.

We are situated next door to the Dexcon arena, home of the Connacht Irish Union Rugby Club, with the final home game of the season tonight. We had actually been thinking for a month or two that given we are right there, it would be fun to attend a game, sit in the stands surrounded by fans cheering for the home side. We thought, depending on how we were feeling we would just get walk-up tickets. Since we were so thankful to not have a day in the car and just hanging around town, we could easily put that on our itinerary, so we walked over to the stadium to see when the ticket office opened. 11:00 am was a little early for it but a security guard told us that there was little chance as the 12,000 seat stadium had been sold out for "a month or two" but we should come back mid-afternoon just in case. We did return before the ticket office opened but someone who works there walked by and asked if we were "doing ok". When we indicated our intent, she was quite forthright but apologetic that we were SOL. Even our accents didn't help us here.

Anyway, it was back to the first priority of the day, which was a walk to the Saturday market and a stroll through the "Latin Quarter". The market was largely at Eyre Square - a collection of stand of vendors selling their artisan wares, jewelry and coffee stalls. We even saw a game of rugby being played in the square. The game looked like a cross of an organized game and a bunch of guys playing in a park but they wore things to identify their team, like a jersey with the number 39 for one side and horizontally striped sailor hats for the other. We had come across them just as the last plays we're being run and then watched them all hug each other, run a "handshake gauntlet" then pose for pictures together. Now, I can only surmise what happened next but if you don't know anything about rugby, you might be surprised to know that they are all going out drinking together, likely to excess.

The post game Gauntlet handshake.

Tent vendors in Eyre Square.

The walk through the Latin Quarter is something of a euphemism as we didn't see anything that resembled Latino culture. However, the Latino connection might be more reflective of the area's history rather than what is currently going on there, as back in the 12th century it was the staging area for trade with Spain. We saw several wool shops purporting (or implying) their products were from the Aran Islands, just off the coast from Galway. Wandering through one of the stores, i saw several large cartons with shipping informarion that indicated the boxes came from Killarney. I guess that makes sense since I can't imagine all of the sweaters were hand knit by little old ladies working a pedal spinning wheel, as I saw in a video in one store.

While we have had several recommendations since arriving in Ireland to make the journey over to the Aran Islands, we needed an "easy" day. If we had planned three nights in Galway that would have been a high priority.

What the Latin Quarter is really about is shopping at stores and stands, with a number of buskers. The main street is closed to vehicular traffic, which is a good thing because there were a LOT of people.

Galway Latin Quarter buskers.

Once again, that's a big file.

In the afternoon, we did yet ANOTHER load of laundry, after paying 30 Euros to having it done in Balarney. We got muddy down in the cavern so some garments were totally out of commission. It's like motorcycling in the old days: never pass a gas station without filling up or like the new days: never pass a bathroom without, well, you get the picture. Doing laundry is pretty much a requirement when you have two nights someplace, so that sink washed items at least have the opportunity to dry before packing up again or having enough time for in-house facilities to run a full cycle or a commecial operation to do the stuff and sort it. When we checked into the Galway B&B, we were given a tour of the laundry room so muddy stuff was given a cycle today. I pulled our clothes out of the washing machine and since the tea towels in the dryer were still a little wet, I threw our washing in with theirs to dry. When it all came out, I ended up folding their laundry in addition to our own.

We had a good long walk, taking a circuitous route to Harry's, the place we tried to go last night.

On our walk, we went by a salt water "lake" with houses situated across the street. On the lake side of the road, there were little plots of land marked "private property" that may have been yard-plots of the houses across the road. They were all fenced and portioned off from one another. Some were very tidy and manicured while others were wild an overgrown.

I wasn't quite as motivated as last night to have a guilty pleasure but I did manage to choke down a pretty good double burger and fries. The place was hopping when we arrived at 4:00 pm and there was limited availability for a seat; this is a restaurant dressed up to look like a bar so everybody has to have a seat, unlike a bar where you just squeeze in as many people as physically possible. We sat beside each other and (sort of) watched a soccer game on the television. There was a festive atmosphere, however, as many people were primed for the big rugby game tonight. Lots of people dressed in the home colours.

We walked back to our place and I said to Nan that I was going to walk over to the stadium entrance. Even though it was 2 1/4 hours before the match, there is lots of fans around and many already filing in though it's not clear where they are going because nobody is going into the seating area. They are probably going into the in-house pub.

Entering the stadium over two hours before kickoff.

One of the back ways into the stadium, we'll protected.

I went back to our next-door B&B and said to Nan that i was going to go back later when the game was on and try to get a look over the fence to get a picture of the game being played, then I realized that our bathroom window faced the playing pitch!