Darn it--the Cyril and Blackie video was blocked. Try this link or look up "Cyril O'Donoghue Blackie O'Donnell Wings Festival 2024" and see what comes up. It's such a great performance by the two of them. I just keep thinking that had Cyril not died, we'd have been treated to a duo at the FolkFest.

We hung at the FolkFest for a bit more, but no other performances caught our fancy. The crowd was getting decidedly younger and we started to feel out of place. No matter--we had to return to the hotel for dinner anyway.

Russell's did it again--or I guess I should say WE did it again. We never picked up our menu and told the waiter we had found perfection and just would do it on repeat: the seasonal salad, bouillabaisse, and lots of bread. And keep the Cute Hoor beers coming.

As we finished our meal, we debated about returning to the festival or going down the road to McGann's or McDermott's. Our hearts weren't in it. Our feet were tired from all the standing around, and we were no longer interested in being with a crowd, no matter how good the music. "We've done our part over the trip," my husband said. "We got what we came for." We hung at the hotel bar for a bit to listen to their musicians (not fantastic, but not bad) and then moseyed on up to bed.

Tomorrow was travel day.

The next morning over breakfast, I told my husband we should use our LEAP card balance to get to Shannon Airport. "It's really easy. We just pick up Bus Eireann #350 towards Ennis at the Hotel Doolin, and then pick up the 51 Expressway there." My husband was having none of it. "You've been limping along, and you know it's just going to get worse lugging bags up and down bus steps. I want a 'one and done' ." Giving up the battle, I said, "Well then, this time YOU arrange the driver."

The hotel desk clerk called Doolin Day Tours, and you'll have to forgive me if I can't remember the name of the driver, even though was a great guy. I do have his contact info:
Doolin Day Tours
+353 851 922 922
[email protected]

Our drive to Shannon was pleasant. We were able to shut down discussion of the "T-word", although as with every driver on the trip, it took a couple tries. Once inside Shannon, it was easy-peasy to check into Aer Lingus to LHR, check our luggage, and make our way through security. My husband and I both said for the umpteenth time that it was a shame we had no direct flights to here.

Our fare gave us entry to the Aer Lingus lounge, and just as we did at LHR, we took a look around and left. There was a bar and concession area nearby that was doing a bang-up business, and soon we were settled into a table with a Scottish woman and her son. The time to our flight passed pleasantly, and our flight went off and landed on time at LHR.

"Now for the hard part," I told my husband. We were going to have to make our way from Terminal 2 to our hotel at Terminal 5, the Sofitel. Yes, we could have just exited to Ground Transportation and taken a taxi, but we knew we'd be forking over for that tomorrow morning. We decided to do the free Heathrow Express transfer instead.

This map gives you an idea of what we'd have to do:

After picking up our luggage, we'd have to descend to the pedestrian underpass and walk to the Heathrow Express transfer point that serves both Terminal 2 and Terminal 3. There, we'd need to pick up a free ticket from a kiosk. Then we would have to find the correct direction (harder than you think) towards Terminal 5 and use our ticket to get onto the platform. And the only way to exit there is with the SAME ticket we picked up (I lost mine somewhere years ago and it was a bit of a hassle to get through).

It sounds simple, and actually, I suppose it is. But one thing to remember is that getting DOWN to the pedestrian underpass in Terminal 2 isn't a snap. Going UP to Terminal 2 when we started our trip at LHR wasn't a hassle; going DOWN can be a nightmare because the elevators don't sequence correctly. We were lucky--our one roll-on and our suitcase backpack allowed us to use the nearby escalator. We felt bad for the people with heavy luggage.

The pedestrian underpass is clearly marked, but there are distractions along the way. You have to pass the exit area for the Central Bus Station and the Underground, and you must ignore anyone selling Heathrow Express passes. Just to the right past the exit for Car Park 3 is a bank of machines, and that's where you get your free transfer ticket. Here's a decent map of the arrangement.

and here is a photo of the machines for the transfer ticket.

We successfully got on the Heathrow Express to Terminal 5 and exited. After a few mishaps, we made our way to the Sofitel Terminal 5 tunnel. All was well.

My Accor points had provided us with a free night at the Sofitel, and as we've done in the past, we enjoyed it. The rooms are quiet, even though people from all over the world are entering and exiting 24/7. We ordered a taxi for the next morning (more on that later), went to the bar for a light meal and beers, and then zonked out for the night.

Our points-paid Sofitel room came with breakfast. I'm sure it's lovely, but we never saw it. Our major goal for the last day of travel was to experience the most of Virgin Atlantic's Upper Class fare's perks. To that end, we planned to arrive early for our flight home a via car at the Upper Class Wing of LHR's Terminal Three.

Yes, we could have easily done the Heathrow Express from Terminal 5 to Terminal 3 and completed our check-in there in the Delta Priority Lane. But even my husband became intrigued about the whole Upper Class Lounge whoopla. Our Sofitel desk clerk the night before, Maria, was a sweetie, and she explained where we could get a taxi without ordering one (just retrace our steps to Terminal Five and head out the Ground Transportation door) vs picking one up through the hotel opposite the registration desk. We could also have ordered an UBER. But I showed my husband all the info I had collected where some of the picked-up cabs and some of the UBERs did not understand exactly WHERE the Upper Class entrance was, even though it was marked with a pin on the UBER app. "Heck with it," he said. "Let's just do the ordered car." Of course, people have also reported about ordered cars that never showed, but...

The car was waiting for us when we arrived downstairs ten minutes before our pick-up time. The driver knew the drill--he told us that it was super important to have a small enough car to make the circular turn. He was comfortable, too, with the security gate procedure. When we arrived at the Upper Class Wing entry doors, our bags seemed to be magically whisked inside. Our actual check-in took less than a minute, and our security process took just a few minutes. My husband laughed about how fast I led him swiftly through the long Terminal 3 commercial maze to the Upper Class Lounge elevator. I told him that I had watched at the very least 10 YouTube videos about all of this. And no, tempting as it was, I wasn't about to mount the grand staircase up--"the foot" was not happy that day and it would still have to last the walk to the gate.

After the check-in on the top floor, we entered the lounge. It looked as I expected--I never agreed with the videographers that the place looked "amazing." The decor had always seemed sterile to me, and in real life, it WAS sterile. But it did function perfectly.

We settled onto a banquette dotted with small lap tables, and we each used the QR codes on our tables to start ordering. I emphasize "START." After I was served my champagne, I studied the breakfast menu. The vegetarian English suited me; the "quaffle" certainly suited my husband. I also visited the buffet while my husband tried out the avocado bagel with what seemed like endless cappuccinos. We still had a lot of time, so we moved around, trying out different seats. My favorite was a deep chair with a footrest. Service at every single point was top notch. Every staff member looked as though their jobs were pleasant.

Some more bubbly later, our flight was called. I had warned my husband that our gate would be a haul--and it was. What I did NOT expect was that again, the line-up to get on the plane made NO sense. In fact, it was even more disorganized than the area in Atlanta. I still don't understand it. I suggest that Virgin Atlantic bring in a Kindergarten teacher and tell him/her, "Fix this."

Thank goodness, our flight experience was far from disorganized. Unlike the crew on our flight over, this crew did not seem stressed out. And this time, my seating area was not being held together with gaffer tape. The food was good, but like most airlines, it's obvious VA is cutting corners now. I sure didn't care--I had already eaten my body weight in the lounge. I had a lovely book to read and an endless selection of movies and tv shows to watch. I must admit that one of the things I most enjoyed about the entire flight was the screen--it was PERFECT--and it might spoil me for future flights with other airlines. The bedding is really good, too. I don't recall ever having such a nice pillow on any other flight. One downside that is constantly mentioned is that there is NO storage around the seat. The overheads are practically empty, though, and one can certainly make do.

Yeah, like one has problems in business class anyway.

We had perfect weather, so perfect that our flight landed early. We whisked through security with our Global Entry, and to our surprise, our bags didn't even take that long to arrive.

All in all, it was as near as perfect of a travel day as we'd had in ages, so we did not end our trip on a bad note. As we were leaving the airport, I said to my husband, "You know, this was our cheapest 24 hours. We just paid for one cab. Our hotel was free with points and so was the flight." He said, "I think the rest of the trip ruined that balance sheet."

We've thought about everything a lot, discussing the trip with each other and our kids. There were high points and low points, yet in a way, some of the low points were valuable.

Fact: We are OLD. It shades everything, whether we want it to or not. Travel is harder on us now, and our day activity hours have lessened. My husband is older but friskier; I'm sort of falling apart. Darn!
Fact: We now need to "soften the edges" of our travel and that saddens us. We would have been willing to sit in the last row of economy of any flight years ago, just as long as we could get to where we wanted to go. Now my want is to book overseas flights with lie-flat seats and hotel rooms that almost guarantee sleep. On this trip, we reasonably could have skipped drivers and taxis because public transport alternatives were not unreasonable. We did not.

It hurts that we are willing to go and not quite as much "there" anymore.

On the bright side, every time we encountered a travel obstacle, we both said to each other, "It's good that we are encountering obstacles and solving them." Often we had to use new technology; often we had to use our well-honed people skills. We realized we are still fascinated by the lives of other people and other cultures, and we truly still enjoyed getting out of our "box" every darn day. We love it that we always feel "present" every day of travel. And it was so wonderful that we were told over and over again throughout the trip something to the tune of, "Wow--You guys are my parents' (or grandparents' !) age and they'd never be able to do what you do." Ok, we'll take that.

Good Choices or Bad Choices
Virgin Atlantic--I always wanted to try it. There are things the company does well and things it does not. I can say that I was happy (gaffer tape aside) with 90% of it; my husband was only happy with 77% of it (remember, he had the bathroom door escapade near him on the way over). We would fly the airline again. As I told him, "Just for the pillow."
Choosing to do ATL-LHR and then LHR-Shannon--Yeah, it was a long day. But it ended up being fun for us. ATL-DUB and then on to Westport would have been so much easier. You do you.
The Old Ground Hotel and Ennis--This was a treasure for us because of my memories and getting to share those memories with my husband. My husband said he would have liked to have stayed two nights. I agree.
Tony Woods Chauffeur--Dave, our driver, was a peach.
Westport Plaza Hotel--The location works for us, and we knew ahead of time the room would work for us, too.
The Westport Folk and Bluegrass Festival--I don't know if we're going back for the 20th, but it's not because we did not love it. The festival is a commitment by what seemed like the entire town, similar to how Falmouth's Sea Shanty Festival was. We felt bad we could not attend more events, but we felt blessed by the sessions we attended.
Our Galway VRBO--We'll stay at a hotel the next time. We did treasure our view, and that view sustained me while I was "out of action". But the fact the place had been renovated and furnished on the cheap did outweigh the view.
Galway--At the end of our stay, my husband said, "I think I'm done with Galway now." And just a few days ago, I caught him saying, "When we go back to Galway..." We loved the West End. We still loved The Seafood Bar@Kirwan's and I'd go back to Oscar's, too.
Fiddle+Bow, Doolin--Our room was clean; the sheets and pillow were fantastic. There WAS a lot of noise from downstairs in the evening (chairs, not music). But when we had stayed in Doolin decades ago, there were NO hotels, only B&Bs, so... The hotel restaurant, Russell's, is really good.
The Doolin Folk Fest--We have mixed opinions, and this time, our opinions were shared. So much was lovely about it, and so much was physically hard. Not being able to find a seat and/or SHADE just wears one down. We will always treasure The Jim Cullinan Tribute and Piping Heaven, Piping Hell performances. But my husband said, "You know, I just wish we had stayed here without the festival. We could have easily sought out sessions in all the pubs and been just fine." I don't think I can talk him into going back to Doolin, though. As he said, "I said goodbye to all my cows."
Drivers or Bus?--We loved meeting up again with Mary O'Toole, and both our driver from Galway to Doolin and Doolin to Shannon were lovely. But if my one foot had been well, I would have talked my husband into bussing it from Galway to Doolin and bussing it from Doolin to Shannon. It's just not that hard--and I really do like seeing how other people live.
The Sofitel LHR--I would go back in a second. Our first time there was following a cycling trip to the Canary Islands, and we used it to dash into London at Christmas time before we flew home. The hotel WORKS.

Are we going back to Ireland next June? It's up in the air. We live on borrowed time now. I've reduced my bucket list by 90%, and the Bilbao Guggenheim is still on it. I can easily talk my husband into anything Basque because he toured it in his youth and loved it. I've never been. He may not be willing to stretch that visit into Galicia, which also remains on my bucket list.

What I CAN tell you is that I think it's highly unlikely that my husband will ever say, "Honey, I think it's time we thought about a cruise."

--End of Trip Report--

Wonderful trip report - such an enjoyable read. Thank you!

Enjoyed your TR thank you, brought back wonderful memories from our last trip in 2023.

Jackie44 and ANUJ--Thank you for your kind comments.
My one daughter--the ultra pragmatic one--has asked why in the heck I write these things. I always say that a few random tips from other people here made HER early life of endless travel possible. And that's certainly true.
Secretly, though, I know it's my way of savoring a trip for eternity.

I enjoyed your trip report. We are just back from 16 nights in Ireland. We did the Westport Plaza Hotel and really enjoyed it. We have been to Westport 4 or 5 times before. Our first time at the Plaza. We did hit Matt Malloy's and caught a great session with six siblings! So talented. While in Galway City we opted for the Park House Hotel and really enjoyed it. We did dine at Kirwan's Lane and were very pleased.

Thank you for the compliment, Bette, especially because of your lovely experiences.

Re the Park Hotel--We had stayed there three times and really liked it, but we were ready for change this year. Even though our Galway VRBO wasn't perfect, we enjoyed staying on the West End of town. It's not as though we were that far away from our usual Park Hotel "base camp", but it does change how you interact with a city.

I'm researching entirely other trips (Basque Country anyone?) for next June, our traditional "big trip" month, and I'm falling prey to all the various video algorithms. One popped up on my feed this morning, and I found tears rolling down my cheeks.

As I had reported, the Doolin FolkFest tribute to James Cullinan had moved us greatly, even though we had never heard him play. This was for the Elders of Fiddling, which is a big deal in Ireland. They wrote a lovely bio for him that stands up well after his passing.

I just shared all with my husband, who is doing a deep dive into financial markets in his office downstairs, and he had the same reaction that I did. My husband loves Spain, particularly because he remembered his early Basque adventures in his 20s, but his love of Irish music goes deeper I suspect. I'm so torn planning between his two favorite memories as we are entering our final days of life expectancy, and yes, we are so aware it's a luxury.

No matter what, I hope you all get to hear, wherever you are, musicians of James Cullinan's caliber and humility, and that you get to extend his kindness wherever you are.

AZ

I just commented on one of your other Ireland trip reports that we will be attending the 2026 Westport Blue Grass Festival, and we're pretty excited about it. We appreciate your bringing it to our attention all those years ago. This last report gave us quite a bit of needed information.

I'm so happy anyone is making any use of it. Enjoy, enjoy, enjoy. We debated returning, especially for the anniversary, but we decided to head to Basque country to fulfill one of my bucket list items.

My daughters often wondered why I write anything at all. They have never been Facebook/Instagram "share all" peeps, although they are tech savvy and participate on multiple platforms. But I always say to them, "All your childhood overseas trips were accomplished by the help from others who had posted." They do pay things forward in so many other ways, so I'm sure they will get it.

What I DON'T say right now is that my trip reports remind me of our lovely, priceless journeys with them and also might be a record of their parents' ability to survive their departure from our nest (sniff) .

Congenial Traveler--If you don't mind my asking, where were you able to get a room? For our two trips that coincided with the music festival, I was able to land a place at the Westport Plaza because I was booking so far ahead, and for our last trip, a lot of the hotel rooms were already blocked. Where did you end up?

AlelsandraZoe,
We had problems booking for a bit. As you seemed to imply, blocks of rooms may have been booked far ahead. For most hotels with any openings, we could get Thursday or Friday nights but not Saturday. Finally, though, there were full weekend bookings at the Westport Plaza and at the Castlecourt.
There were some strange bed arrangements with those openings, but as you said, the important thing is the walkability of the location.