A day away

Sometimes it's really nice to get away from it all. On Saturday we decided to take advantage of the break in the weather and got out to see a bit of the countryside. The weather here has been awful. It's so cold and it just hasn't stopped raining, apart from Saturday that is. So we started out on the trek with the intention of going to somewhere in Wicklow - perhaps to Avoca and that was as much as we had planned. We drove as far as Woodenbridge and just had to stop to admire the views. It's a really pretty village and the pictures here really fail to do it any justice. We stopped and admired the Golf Course and took a few more pics.

Then we made our way to Avoca. I'd planned to stop and look around but I have been to Avoca before and shamefully unbeknowst to my husband the allure of Avoca for me has a lot to do with Avoca the shop so I've no pictures of the village - oops. I've made up for that with the quantity of pictures from Avoca. Tour buses above!!!

We had a good look around the shop and had a fantastic lunch in their restaurant. ( For anyone who doesn't know they have two great cookbooks - available here). I'd no baking plans at the weekend so I couldn't resist buying these.

Then it was off to the Weaving Shed to see how all their wonderful throws, blankets and scarves are made.Look how fabulous these colours are.

Somehow at that time we were the only visitors in the Weaving Shed and I managed to have a quick chat with one of their handweavers.

I have no clue about weaving, knitting is my thing but all the same I was really interested to find out how it all worked. The very affable man offered to let me have a go - I was delighted so, here I am trying hard not to undo his good work!

An American tour group arrived then so we said our thanks and let him on with his demonstration.

As if that wasn't enough for one day we then headed off in the direction of Aughrim and decided to call into Macreddin Village. I'd been trying to get there for awhile but somehow just never seemed to be in that part of the world. I was so surprised at the size of the place (it's a planned village with a hotel, pub, gourmet/organic/healthfood store and a designer clothing store) that's about it but I guess that is it's charm (it's tiny!) and I must admit it's like being in a little bit of civilisation in the middle of nowhere. That's how it feels anyhow, even though it's not actually that far from other towns around. We stopped (yet again) and had a leisurely coffee. We ran into a neighbour from my husbands home town who just so happens to now live about 5 mins from our home in Wexford. It was lovely to meet her and with promises of inviting each other over for drinks in the next while I hope thats a promise we'll keep.