Day 13 – Drogheda to Dublin Airport

Slept in a little this morning before breakfast.  We had a couple of hours before we had to be at the airport so we decided to do some more site seeing.

First stop was St. Mary’s Priory in Drogheda.  Also knows as The Old Abbey, it was founded by a Norman about 1206 AD.

All that remains of the abbey now is the central belfry tower surmounting a Gothic archway and some fragments of wall.
 
Another random horse.  Possibly the last Irish horse Erin would get to see/pet this trip...so we had to stop!

 

Next stop…the Hill of Tara.

 It contains a number of ancient monuments, and, according to tradition, was the seat of Árd Rí na hÉireann, or the High King of Ireland.

Current research indicates that it was not a true seat of Kingship, but a sacral site associated with Indo-European Kingship rituals including the coronation  of Irelands pre-Christian kings.

This was not an hereditary Kingship, the kings either won it in battle or were chosen for it.

Although no buildings survive there are a number of large earthworks still remaining on the hill, some are inside an even larger iron age enclosure known as a Hill Fort.




In the middle of this enclosure are two linked ring forts, Cormacs House and The Royal Seat.		 In the centre of the Royal Seat stands a pillarstone which is believed to be the Lia Fail (stone of Destiny) or Coronation Stone. The pillarstone, a prehistoric phallic symbol, originally stood in the Northern part of the enclosure near the 4,000 year old neolithic passage tomb known as the Mound of the Hostages.

According to legend, this stone was brought to Ireland by the Tuatha De Danaan and when the true king of Ireland stood on the stone, it would roar.

We’re running short on time and head to the airport.  Signage for the car rental return was pretty good and it didn’t take long to check our bags.  We passed through a fair number of security checkpoints, along with immigration, but all went smoothly and relatively quickly.  The flight back to Philly was pretty comfortable.  We had a three hour layover in Philly, but by the time we de-planed and got through customs and a couple more security points…we didn’t have too much time to kill.  We found a sports bar just in time to watch the Belmont Stakes and then grabbed a bite to eat while reacclimating ourselves to a wall of televisions and the sensory overload that we now have to readjust to.  The flight back to RDU was delayed a bit and we got into RDU about 10:30.  John’s parents picked us up and we were home and settled before midnight.


The End...or is it?

(Be sure to click the other links on your left (History, Observations, Crosses, and Maps) for more fun stuff.)