Grá on the Go: Castles, Cliffs, and the Long Way Home (Part Two)
The Gra' That Stayed
Last week, I told you about the woman on the train who gave me a word I didn’t know I needed—grá. It’s Irish for love. Not just romantic love, but a deep, enduring connection. The kind of love you feel for a place, a memory, a person. The kind that sticks.
I didn’t realize how true that word would become until I looked back at everything we did on that trip. So let me take you through the week that made us fall head over hiking boots in love with Ireland.
We had caught the grá.
We landed in Dublin and drove straight to Malahide Castle, the first official castle of our anniversary adventure. From there, we made our way to Trim Castle and stopped for fish and chips because if you’re going to do Ireland, you might as well go all in early. That night, we stayed in our first castle: Lough Rynn.
The next day brought us to the breathtaking Cliffs of Moher. This was our collective “wow” moment of the trip. We couldn’t stop taking pictures. It was like trying to photograph awe itself. We spent the next few nights at Dromoland Castle, which quickly became our favorite. While there, we visited Bunratty Castle and the Rock of Cashel, both steeped in beauty and history.
From there, we headed to Killarney National Park and took in the lush, green beauty before making our way to Blarney. We passed on kissing the Blarney Stone—too high, too scary—but we did check the box by being there.
Waterford Castle came next, along with a visit to Wexford and a tour of the Waterford Crystal Factory, which was way more fascinating than we expected. Our final castle stay was at Clontarf, a fitting and peaceful place to wrap up a trip we never wanted to end.
We made a lot of memories in a week, but a few really stood out.
• Rowing on the lake at Dromoland, just the two of us, birds chirping, the water lapping gently against the boat, with Karen pointing where she wanted to go and me paddling us there like we were the only two people in the world.
• Riding bikes through the castle grounds, me getting a little too excited about the downhill parts.
• Stopping for tractors on the backroads, waving at strangers, and navigating narrow bridges. I grew up in rural Tennessee. Ireland felt so much like home.
• Trying new food—soups made of things I didn’t know could be soup. A parsnip soup in Waterford might be in my Top 5 of all-time dishes. The cheeses and seafood weren’t bad either.
• Laughing—like when Karen kept reminding me to “stay left” while I was driving. Then when we got home, she instinctively said “stay right” and we both lost it.
• Being just us In Ireland, we were not Mom and Dad, not the people with the schedules and the carpools. Just Maury and Karen. A couple of kids with 25 years behind them and still plenty ahead.
And it wasn’t just the places. It was the people.
The staff at every castle treated us like friends. Not because it was their job—but because that’s who they are. They asked about our trip, gave us ideas, made us feel like we belonged there.
Even strangers like the woman on the train had this way of making us feel seen. Like we weren’t just visitors, but welcomed guests.
So maybe that’s the takeaway. Sometimes the best kind of love isn’t loud or grand or planned. It’s found in the quiet curve of a country road, in the clink of a borrowed teacup, in a stranger’s kindness, or the familiar voice of your wife saying, “Stay left.”
We didn’t just see Ireland.
We felt it.
And now we carry a bit of it with us, every time we slow down enough to notice the view…or each other.
