Moose the Dog in Ireland

Moose kept bugging me to write a blog post about him – he’d do it himself, but is lacking the necessary digits for typing!  This article is as dictated by #Moosethetravellingdog about our recent road trip around Ireland – he has asked it be titled as thus: Moose the Dog in Ireland.

The journey began on a Thursday night (when Mom usually comes home and chills out for the evening), but instead she came home and flew around the house like a hurricane, packing suitcases and making me worry she was going to leave me FOREVER!  Turns out we were driving somewhere along windy roads [to Stranraer Scotland to catch the ferry to Ireland].  We stayed the night in a local pub, where everyone loved me and fed me biscuits!

The Ferry to Northern Ireland from Stranraer

In the morning, after finding a park where I could run around and do my ablutions behind the privacy of a tree, we drove onto a big boat.  I thought I was going to get to run about the place with my humans, but they left me behind [in the car with a soft bed, food and water and a window open].  But it was only 2 hours (apparently, I can’t tell time), and we were soon off the boat in Northern Ireland.  

The humans made it up to me by taking me for a run on Ballycastle Beach.

Is Ireland dog-friendly?

Turns out that it’s a lot harder to find dog-friendly pubs in Ireland than in Scotland, so Mom rang around a bunch of places to try to find somewhere that would cater to my specific dining requirements.  I didn’t think I was THAT picky!  Mom found a wonderful inn with a special dog dining area up the coast from Portrush.  

Mom’s human friend, Ros, and dog friend, Jessica, joined us for dinner.  Jessica was small and annoying, and everyone loved her more than me. But I snuck up and stole some treats while everyone was distracted by Jessica’s cuteness, so I call that a win!

The Coastline of Northern Ireland

The next day Mom promised me that I’d get to go everywhere with the humans… I didn’t realise she meant that we’d be going to the same places as ALL the other humans in the WORLD!  

Apparently the Giant’s Causeway is a special dog-walk, but I had to stay on the lead, when all I wanted to do was go swimming.  I don’t know what all the fuss was about, those funny looking rocks were really hard on my paws!  I wasn’t allowed on the bus either – what are they, dogist?  It gave my humans a good workout though, so that was fun!

Galway

We then went to Galway (apparently), and it was awesome cos we went to a pub [called Garavan’s] where they let me in and loved on me, and I even got a mention from the band.  This random stranger at the bar gave me lots of treats. And we met some lovely people from Dublin who stroked my ears all evening.  

I think my Mom got drunk on Dingle gin, cos she got me chicken tenders from Supermac’s at 1am. But I was more than ok with that.

Dingle Peninsular

The next stop was the the Dingle Peninsular, where Mom let me run on Castlegregory Beach. A highlight was the dead bird I rolled in.  Mom didn’t seem pleased.  Then she made me behave myself when we reached the town of Dingle, and forced an encounter with a statue of some famous dolphin called ‘Fungie’. I wasn’t impressed, he didn’t even want to play!

TBEX

Mom needed to go to the TBEX Travel Bloggers conference in Killarney, so I had to be on my best behaviour with all her friends.  She even made me wear my jaunty neckerchief, which meant she was serious!  It was nice to spend 4 days in one location, cos I’ll be honest, being on the road all the time is tiring for a wee dog.

Dog friends

In Killarney, we found a pub run by a dog called Ginny.  The good part was that I was allowed into the pub, but the bad news was that Ginny didn’t like me at all.  The lovely humans at Jack C’s pub asked Ginny to go to bed so that I could have the pub to myself for the evening.  Great for me and my humans, but bad for the family who came in to visit Ginny and never got to have a selfie with her.  I’d like to think I was a decent substitute, mind you.

On our last night in Killarney, Mom dressed me up in my Scottish dinner jacket, as apparently we were going to a special event.  It was the closing party for her conference and she wanted to show me off, obviously!  I spent the evening shmoozing with the TBEX glitterati and gaining fans from around the world.  Mom pinned something on my back [Moose’s hashtag – #Moosethetravellingdog] and people kept taking photos of me – I know I’m pretty, but come on!

I had many wonderful beach walks, and there was a lot of Moose-love from the local Irish people.  My favourite part of the trip was getting to spend 9 whole days with my humans cos they didn’t leave me behind in Scotland – I’m easily pleased!  If you said ‘hello’ to me in Killarney, please do leave me a note below and I’ll get Mom to read it to me.  Please pass on ear-rubs, extra walks and cuddles also.

Love, Moose the dog in Ireland

All photos © Hannah Henderson and may not be used without permission (sharing this blog post is fine, though!).  Images shot with a Canon DSLR T3i Rebel + Canon EF Lens 50mm 1:1.8 STM; and an iPhone6s.