23 Hours and 57 Minutes in Sligo

On Wednesday morning we were up early to catch the bus to Letterkenny. From there, we hopped on a bus to Sligo, where we arrived right on time at 11:50. This left us time to use the restroom, eat the wraps I'd made for our lunch, and set off for the hospital. We were early for Bill's appointment and we expected to be waiting for a while, but he was actually brought in about 10 minutes early. He was done about half an hour later. I was sitting in the waiting area with my book and was surprised to see him back so soon. The hotel was just across the river from the hospital and when we were there in June, we'd discovered that we could get there using a pedestrian path leading from the street--it goes down to and across the river, coming out right by the hotel. We made our way there and were able to check into our room. We were both really tired and had already stopped at a grocery and gotten a bit of food to have for supper so we didn't have to go anywhere, but we decided to go out for a short walk along the river.

As soon as the swans saw us, they started gliding over--guess they thought we might have some food for them. They were disappointed.

So were the ducks.

They had to content themselves with swimming around among the boats, one of which had capsized, and waiting for the next, hopefully more generous, person to come along!

It is a nice walk by the river.

We headed in that direction because we wanted to see what one of the buildings is--we saw it both last time and this time from our window and the thing on top reminded me of a lampshade. I have no idea what it is, but the building is the county offices.

The Riverside Hotel, where we stayed, has a great breakfast menu and buffet, which is included in the price of the room. Bill got scrambled eggs and smoked salmon and I had scrambled eggs and mushrooms stuffed with pesto and tomatoes--their vegetarian option. I am not usually a huge mushroom fan, but this was really good!

I surprised myself by ordering it, but when I looked at the menu, it seemed like that is what I should get and I am glad I did. The buffet itself is so extensive that even if you just ate from there, you would not go away hungry. They have breads and pastries, fresh fruit, fruit salads, bowls of grapefruit segments, yogurts, and cereals, including some excellent homemade granola with lots of nuts and seeds. I rounded out my hot breakfast with a piece of brown soda bread and a scone with raspberry jam, plus a bit of yogurt with some granola mixed in. There was coffee too, of course. Between the extremely comfortable rooms, the nice tea and coffee, the view of the river, and the wonderful breakfasts, I am glad we stumbled onto this place. It is perfect for us, since the only reason we have been in Sligo is for Bill's eye appointments and we are tired when we are there--it is nice to have a comfortable place nearby to go to after his appointments.

After breakfast we hung around for another hour or so before leaving to meander back to the bus station. I thought this was an interesting paint job.

And I took a closer look at this pair of wee trousers in a shop window (sorry about the reflection).

Turns out the shop won an award for being the best independent drapers and this is their trophy! Clever!

Of course, the very first stop we made in Sligo as we were on our way to the hospital was this funky little shop where we'd stopped last time after Bill spotted yarn in the window. At the time, I noticed some beautiful variegated thread and bought a few balls. I had to check again this time and see if there were any more wonderful colours. He only had a few balls of thread and one was black and one was white, but he did have this brown variegated, which I love. It has come home with me :-)

The bus pulled in from Galway to let a bunch of passengers off and load a bunch more of us in, pulling out at 11:47. We made it to Letterkenny with an hour and a half to spare until we had to catch the bus to Moville. We stopped in Tesco there to grab some extra mature cheddar, which we cannot get locally, and a few other things. It was nice to get home--it felt like we were gone for longer than a day.

It's a bank holiday weekend here and we change our clocks back this weekend. Yay!

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