County Tipperary - Ireland

The Place: Along the River Shannon, we stopped at various towns including GaryKennedy, Terry Glass, and Banagher all of which fall within or on the outskirts of Co. Tipperary, Ireland.
Some features: GaryKennedy had a great restaurant called Larkins, pictured at the top, where they screened the Irish sport hurling. We all sat down to hearty Irish meals and could barely move afterwards due to the size of the portions.
In the marina where Jamie skillfully mastered getting the boat into its tight mooring there are still ruins of an old castle that used to stand watch over the Lough Derg.
In Banagher, where we stopped for our third and last night on the river, the main street leading from the dock seemed to be mainly run by the Flynn's, with a gastro pub, supermarket and house all bearing the name as well as a flyer advertising a music performance by Kate Flynn coming soon! We enjoyed the evening in a pub which played live Irish music, with piano and accordian. Particularly interesting was an old painted portrait on the wall of a young lady at her piano with black bun in hair. Lo and behold the pictured lady was the actual piano player that eve, still wearing a black bun in her hair, only aged by about 50 years.
It was sad to see that in the town, many of the shops and even the Royal Shannon, built in an old bow-fronted Georgian style from 18th century (pictured at the bottom) are no longer in business due to the recession in Ireland.