OK! So now on to Thursday.
I left off with telling you all about our trip to Galway. Well the next morning we woke up and went to the breakfast room. We had the traditional Irish breakfast which was a fried egg, 2 sausage links, 2 sausage patties, 2 pieces of bacon and a selection of breads and jams. It was absolutley delicious! Another couple came into the breakfast room shortly after we did. They sat at the table next to ours. A little bit longer they asked us where we were from. We told them Missouri in the US. They said, “No kidding! We are from St.Louis!” They were an older couple whose children were grown and they were enjoying traveling. They told us they had been on Ireland for 10 days and made a trip around the whole island spending a day here, a day there. They told us about the Kylemore Abbey. “A perfect place for people on their honeymoon to go.” They told us all about it and got us interested in making that one of our stops. We talked with them for nearly an hour during breakfast talking about sites we’ve seen around Ireland, and they told us different places they had traveled. They also told us some highlights for Dublin that helped us decide to take a day to go to Dublin, which we were not originally planning. After breakfast we sat and discussed what to do for the day. We found out that a show we had seen flyers for Trad On The Prom had a show that night as well. Their Shows were Tuesday, Thursday, and Sunday nights. We asked our hostess what she recommended and told her we were also thinking about visiting Kylemore Abbey. She told us Kylemore was over and hour away and if we wanted to do Trad on the Prom that night we needed 1) get tickets right awya and 2) probably take it easy on the travel cause being at Kylemore would ware us out and we wanted to be sure and enjoy the show. First we went to this place in Spiddal called Standum. We saw flyers for it and it was supposed to be a great shopping area. We got there and it was actually a very small store with a wide variety of things. David and I did not see anything we liked so we decided to head down to Eyre Square we had dinner the night before. We only saw a small part of it the night before. We did not realize how big the square really was. It was 15/20 blocks of shops and restaurants and along with a mall in the area. We parked in the ‘Car Park’ or parking garage for the mall and wandered the mall. While walking we came across this store called The Galway Hat shop. That is where I got the blue cap you saw in a view of the photo previews David has uploaded. We shopped for a hat for David, but none of the ones in his size, he really cared for. So we decided we would keep looking. Wandering around the streets was great. We got to see tons of street performers while walking around, had a great time seeing all the local flavors. There was several shops that said they were the “original makers of the Claddagh ring.” (We did stop by Faller’s later that day where I got a bracelet and necklace with it.) That day was a lot of fun trying to local coffee, and just meeting people from the Galway area. We also went over to the Galway Cathedral. It was beautiful church and we did get photos of it. That evening we stopped in the food court of the mall and had a light dinner before heading to Trad On The Prom. I was SUPER EXCITED!!!!
http://www.youtube.com/user/tradontheprom
This is a good intro to the show. Also this is from a special show they did so some of the performers they show was not at our show. http://www.youtube.com/user/tradontheprom#p/u/0/MFosZsRJjJY
This is the Trad on the Prom You Tube and Site. We did not get any photos at Trad on the Prom except for a few of the stage and the sign before the show. The show does not allow any photography or recording. We were a little disappointed about that. I can only describe. The show was at the Salthill Hotel down by the coast on the other side of Galway from where we were staying. The resturant inside the hotel was called The Prom. It that helps at all. 🙂 The show was set up inside of a ballroom. The stage took up half the room. There was four sections to the audiance. A was to the right of the stage, B&C were infront of the stage, and D was to the left of the Stage. The seating was first come, first served,only your section was assigned. David and I got there early and were able to sit in the 3rd row of the section. We could of sat closer but since the rows curved with the stage, we liked the angle the 3rd was at better. Also there was 3 platforms misxed in the seating and on of the was directly behind our row. The other one was in the D section, and the third was in the back. The dancers, (actually one the 3 male dancers) used those platforms is several numbers. The performers in the show were TOP NOTCH! The music director for Michael Flately The Lord Of The Dance, Gerard Fahy was in the show. Also his 2 sisters, Eva, and Marion were in the show as well as Marion’s husband Chris. Marion was the lead violinist for the Riverdance show. They also had a male vocalist Sean Castello. He was very good. They said he had recently been voted male voacalist of Ireland. The other performers in the show included a piano player, and 8 dancers. 5 female dancers, and 3 male dancers. 4 of the female dancers did the riverdancing and the 5th did the other forms of folk dances. The three men were incredible. 2 of them were actually brothers. The Keaney brothers. They said in the show that the elder Keaney ( I think it was Cathal) recently won the “Grand Slam” for riverdancing compeitions. He won champion titles in Ireland, and for all of Europe, for all of Asia, and North America. We bought Marion’s and Ger’s CD. I could prattle on forever about the amazingness of this show, but it would not do it justice. So go watch the videos! Have fun! It is lunnch time and I have stuff to do this afternoon.
Take care and ‘Cheers’. (Irish way of saying goodbye.)