Mrs Wildax’s advice was to get to Galway early, as you literally have to queue to get a pitch.  I had followed her recommendation as frankly by this time I was fed up with trying to find decent and reasonably priced places to stay.  Ireland was hard work in the planning department.

We got up at the crack of dawn to be off Achill by 9am and on the road. The google said that we were looking at about 3 hours, so we got on with it.  About just over half way we stopped at a roadside horsebox which we spotted doing coffees and snacks, and it was full on the best decision of the day!  The coffee was strong and tasty and the snacks were delicious and kept us going until we reached Galway.

We made it in good time, and turned in to the driveway of Salthill caravan park just before 11, to join the already growing queue of campers.  When they finally opened the office door, they approached all the campers and informed each one when they could step in to the office.  It was a long and tedious wait.

When I finally got to step inside, I was seriously doubting whether I could even pay by card if things were done in such an antiquated way, but they were more than happy to relieve me of 60 feckin euros a night. 

Grass pitch – front line of the sea, mind, with electric, wifi if you’re prepared to sit on the bench outside reception, and showers that you have to pay for on top. Vans are crammed in along the plastic fence separating you from the drop onto the rocks, and we had exactly a Bean width between the van and the enormagantic floodlight which was the limit of our spot. Rrrrrrrrrrrrip off.

After having resuscitated myself from the shock of what we had just paid out for, we walked along the sea front path into Salthill and Blackrock, taking in lunch and a beverage at the Oslo bar.  They had a clock like a Tui bottle top, but no staircase to nowhere.

The girl child spent hour upon hour sat outside the office, snapchatting and Tiktoking and we made a plan for heading for home.  Still no onward plans or reservations, but we werent prepared to shell out any more to stay in Galway for a 3rd and final night before heading for home.

The boy got his wish to have a go at fishing, but the location and the conditions were not ideal and he didn’t catch owt, but he was keen to report back to his grandpa that he had tried.

Bus stop was right outside camp and on Galway day 2 we caught the 402 into Galway town centre for 5 euro 60 return for the 4 of us.  We sneaked a coffee from the Cottage Pantry coffee shop and deli next door but one to the campsite on the way out.  There is another campsite next door to Salthill but it didn’t look any better than where we were.

We took a wander around town and reminisced about the last time we were in Galway and almost missed the plane home.  Funnily enough we didn’t really remember much about it… must have been the Guinness.

We had a decent lunch in Busker Brownes for 91 quid and bought gelatos from Ginos – 3 x single scoops for 14.26 (not too bad)

And then we decided to take a daredevil trip on Le Petit Train!  I say daredevil because the door next to where I sat didn’t shut properly, so I spent most of the trip holding it shut so I didn’t accidentally spill out on to the carriageway. It cost 32 quid for the 4 of us and took just under an hour touring round the neighbourhoods and the seafront towards Salthill.

We took a final wander and bought some shoddy souvenirs before bussing it back to the camp.  Interesting occurrence of the week was the appearance overnight of a cruise ship in the bay, which was nice.

My last ditch attempt at finding somewhere to stay nearish to Dublin, to make pegging it for the ferry a less frantic affair, was done very much begrudgingly, and I didn’t have much faith in the place I ended up going for, just because I gave up trying.  How wrong I was.

We left this sardine-like carpark of a moneymaking scam …

… for this humongous beaut of a pitch!

A trek across the middle of Ireland didn’t seem so bad when we encountered actual motorway, so we hit Camac Valley Touring Park in about 2 and a half hours.  It cost 49 euro a night, still steep, but for my money , it was so much better value.

The pitch was gigantic, part hardstanding, lots of grass.  Hedged all around and easily room for a big awning, big tent and another vehicle, still with room to put your tables and chairs out.  And our pitch was by no means the biggest on there.  KB said he found it very continental, so much so that he almost gave out a round of bonjours when he trotted forth.

We had electric and water on the pitch and the facilities were pretty good.  Mother would nod her head at the cleanliness, but maybe not at the need to buy tokens for the showers.  Although these were spacious and hot with good water pressure.

Kicking myself that I hadn’t found it earlier, and mulling things over with a gin and tonic, we both agreed that it is a campsite we’d definitely go back to, and it would make a great base for touring around Dublin and surrounding areas.  There is a bus stop outside which is on the tour bus route, so it’s a hop on, hop off arrangement, and there is plenty to keep the kids occupied too, local takeaways deliver there, the office sells ice creams and coffees and there’s a TV room and campers kitchen.

All the more gutting is that if we’d have only done one night in Galway we would have had the time to do a bit of a trip into Dublin itself, and without having the headache of trying to park the big red bus.

Ferry was 2pm the next day.  Motorways around Dublin are awful, tolls were paid, but clearly we missed something as we got a letter a couple of weeks after getting home with a fine for not paying something or other.

So Ireland was a bit of a mixed bag.  The countryside and coastline were stunning.  The food and whisky were great.  The roads and the parking not so much.  The camping situation variable and not easy to book or evaluate from what you can find online. Yet again it proved that the design of a website and the pictures you see can be really misleading.  The places that were the best were ones we took a chance on and where we had low expectations.

To say this was supposed to be a reasonably cheap holiday, when all the sums were done after getting home, we spent £2556.40 all in.  Which worked out at £639.10 per person. 

Of course none of this actually means anything because we never keep track of what we spend, so have no idea if we actually spent any more or less than on any other trip!  Maybe this will prompt my curiosity for the next trip to …

Normandy in October!!!