Hill Walking in the Rain - Dublin, Day 2

Despite some less than lovely weather, we decided to head out for some hill walking on a little day trip to a place called, "Glendalough." Glendalough, meaning "Glen of two lakes" in Gaelic,  is a glacial valley located in County Wicklow, Ireland, renowned for its Early Medieval monastic settlement founded in the 6th century by St Kevin, a hermit priest, and destroyed in 1398 by English troops (Thanks Wikipedia).

It is about an hour away from Dublin by car, but you feel like you are a lot further away once you get out of the city. There are lots of different trails for hiking and some are easy (as in you can take a baby buggy on them) and others are a bit more advanced (let's just say we saw some serious hill walking gear on some folks).

Before I continue, I should probably explain that in Ireland, they refer to "hiking" as "hill walking" and according to our Frommer's 2010 Guidebook to Ireland, it is a relatively new "sport" in the country. We weren't sure what was more odd, the fact that they called hiking a "sport", or the fact that they referred to it as "hill walking," but either way, we put on our coats and hats and piled in the car to spend the day out and about.

Casper was totally into holding his Uncle David's hand, which made the walking go slow at first, but was beyond adorable so we all just went with it.

 

 Even with the clouds and rain, it really is a beautiful place. We had a great time just walking around and taking it all in.

 

 

 

 

At one particualry picturesque spot, I decided I wanted to climb in a tree and pose for a picture. David decided he did not want to and thought it was too dangerous. Of course I ignored him and proceeded to climb into the tree. 

This is the face he gave me.

And this is what happened next...

 

 

 

Very cute photo, right? I thought so too!

 

 

I think Casper got a bit nervous with me up there in the tree.

Especially when I started to fall...

He got particularity upset then...

So then we opted for a little safer photo op location.

After the hike we made a stop at Avoca, a seriously cute shop that I believe started as a mill (one of Ireland's oldest mills) and has evolved to a lot more. They now sell all kinds of amazing things and even have some renowned cafes. We shopped around a bit, picked up some yummy goodies for later in the week and then headed back to town. It was a lovely little Sunday.