The Big G
Perched on Ireland’s west coast, the air in Galway is thick with sea salt, a hint of turf, and the smell of rain on stone. This is a Guinness and oysters town.
The sea is omnipresent here. The Galway hookers, the native sailboats, and their red sails are never far away. Galway is adventure. Sometimes that adventure no more than getting lost in the alleys and getting really wet, but it’s there.
Medieval Galway
Galway is medieval. It was a walled port city, and it retains that feel to it.
The Spanish Arch still stands at the end of the Latin Quarter, a lone guardian. It was the last port before the Atlantic.
The diversity in looks in Galway is attributed to who knows who stayed here generations back. There are loads of dark-haired people in Galway, including the Galway Girl herself.
The medieval leftovers are all over the Latin Quarter. Shop Street has some crazy little doorways, still in use, that make you question the height of the people then, 4’6” maybe?
The 16th century Lynch’s Castle looms ominously to the left. The Allied Irish Bank is in the building now. But go in, see the tragic Lynch swords and shields.
The King’s Head Pub isn’t purely 800 years of beer, food and music, but proves that you might end up with a bar by chopping off a king’s head, Charles I specifically. The Eyre Square Shopping Centre shows that you never know what you might dig up when you start excavating in Galway.
This project found two pretty cool towers from the old city wall while they were building the mall in the 90s. This city is old and full of buried secrets.
Salthill Prom
Walking west, you end up where the Corrib meets the sea, meets swans and pastel houses, in the Claddagh. The Claddagh is not much more than a block, but it was an iconic fishing area, all black shawls and red hooker sails. Go further and you will land on the Prom in Salthill.
This is a cement and boardwalk summertime favorite of everyone in the west. A slightly kitschy but nice walk along the ocean, complete with some honky tonk ice-cream stands where you can get a 99, a custard cone with a Cadbury flake stuck in the side.
Swimming there is for the hearty, desperate and under 10s. It is cold and rocky.
Galway is unique with its own charm. But for some reason, tourists avoided it for the most part. That has changed. Two years ago, I was there in July at the end of the Galway Arts Festival, which, outside of the Galway Races, is the busiest time of year.
I am still trying to figure out what I saw but it was something like a Heironymus Bosch painting: people were doing some kind of moving yoga with headphones on, tour buses were teetering through the way too narrow streets and some little white train was puffing around.
I sat in an overcrowded bar day-drinking gin and tonic. Had Galway become EuroDisney?
Galway Charm
We went again this last Christmas. Trepidatiously, we planned to spend a night, a quick hedge against disappointment.
But one stroll down Shop Street and it was back. One night turned into three. The city was crowded, but not mad.
It was actually nice to see people out physically shopping for Christmas presents, though they were mostly feral looking men weighing up choices in the multitude of jewelry stores. The fever even caught Mr. O’Rourke, who almost bought me something he would have regretted for years.
The city was absolutely magical between the stringy lights all over, the happy crowds and the music everywhere. There were big markets just for Christmas.
Our one strange night was on December 23, the Twelve Pubs of Christmas. We found ourselves in some kind of eerie youth zombie apocalypse, where we were the only people over 25 to be found on the street.
The Corrib
The just under four-mile Corrib River flows through the city and straight into the Atlantic. It is the wild pulse of the city. It might be short but it is one wild ride of a river, the second fastest in Europe.
It was going like the clappers at Christmas and was as high as we could remember seeing it. The lifebuoy rings sprinkled along the shore would be little help to anyone falling in.
I don’t think a major league pitcher could get one of those rings to you before you were out to sea. That power makes the river impressive to watch, especially in the summer when the salmon are jumping.
Small Town
For all of this, Galway is a small town. There are townies and they know each other.
We wandered into a pub to hear music and met an old friend of my husband. They hadn’t seen each other in almost forty years, but where else would you find each other but in Galway listening to music in a pub?
Going into the wonderful Dela for breakfast, the owner came over to chat with us only to discover that she grew up with some of our friends. That same family has a son working at the local Micil distillery now.
We know the owners of Micil. That is Galway, smaller and more connected than it seems.
Galway Buskers
You don’t have to look for entertainment there, ever. Fiddles are another thing that are always in the air. The streets are full of buskers, drunks and sometimes crusty hippie types, just to keep things interesting.
Ed Shereen busked on the rain-soaked corners here and Emma O’Sullivan continues to hammer out dance on the cobblestones. Leo Moran is often drinking in Tigh Neachtains’.
The next superstar is playing guitar somewhere there. If thirst overtakes you and you want to venture into a pub, you are spoiled for choice. All the pubs have atmosphere to burn, with touches like old bikes hanging from the ceiling, oil paintings done by locals, antique jugs and the like. You might even catch a session.
Bia (Food)
The food in Galway has always been good, kinda. I can tell you my sons had a bologna pizza there that is family legend. Stick to what you should stick to and things go better.
The access to fresh fish is a no brainer. McDonagh’s is where you go for fish & chips and has been forever. You even get to pick your fish!
Believe it or not, we have moved on from bologna dressed as pepperoni and now the best pizza in Ireland is found in Galway at the Dough Bros. The old mushy pea greasy spoons have been replaced with some trendy organic restaurants baking their own bread and all. Trendy or not, places like Bia and Dela thrive with access to simple, always-been-organic Irish produce.
Galway isn’t perfect. It’s rainy and unpredictable. So why bother? You could just go to the more genteel neighbor, Westport. Loads of people do. But what do you miss?
Definitely the wild spark – you might end up rain-soaked in a pub making new friends, or not. There is something in that salty sea air, some alchemy of sea, air and stone that stirs the imagination in a singular way.
Check out this video:
Galway – An Insider Tour of Ireland’s Most Charming City
By @Project Gaia
