Europe 2016, Part III: Highlights of My Galway Walking Tour

Browne's Door - Eyre Square.

Ancient City Wall in Eyre Square Mall.

I started in Eyre Square (pronounced “a-er square”), a little park between where I was staying and the city centre. Inside are a statue of JFK and the Browne door, the original medieval door to the Browne family house. The house wasn't actually on that site, but they had to move it from its original location several years ago and placed it in a more prominent location. Next, I went to see the "city wall." This is literally part of the medieval wall of Galway and is (where else?) in the middle of the Eyre Square mall. Seriously. I walked through the mall a little confused and finally came upon this giant wall and tour with history plaques handing from it. So bizarre and awesome. Galway was run during this time by 14 Tribes (families) and their crests hang on flags in various parts of the city.

Left: Flags of the crests for the 14 Tribes of Galway.
Above: Statue of Oscar Wilde and Eduard Vilde.

This guy was playing some
kind of traditional music in
front of Lynch's Castle. His
instrument also controlled the
puppets on the ground!

Doorway to Lynch's Castle.

After seeing this, I continued down the street to the statues of Oscar Wilde and Estonian writer Eduard Vilde (Wilde) – they are sitting on a bench as though they’re having a conversation. I’m not sure that they ever met, though they were both writing in the same general time. Estonia gifted the statue to Ireland in 2004. A little further down the street, I came to Lynch’s castle. It’s a medieval home/castle built by (you guessed it) the Lynch family, one of the original 14 Tribes of Galway. They’ve turned it into a bank now, but the first floor has some large posters detailing the history of the building and some of the notable features you can see. The most interesting feature to me was the giant fireplace in the main first floor room. Apparently it was common to build a fireplace when a couple got married and carve the initials of the couple into the mantle. There was an example of this and it was the biggest fireplace I've ever seen. Very cool.

St. Nicholas from the outside.

Inside of St. Nicholas.

Above and left: Remains from the floor of the
Hall of the Red Earl, excavated in 1997.

I then stopped at the St. Nicholas church, which is incredibly old but still in use today. They have it set up as a free (suggested donation) museum where all the features are numbered and you go around with a little guidebook to see and read about them. The stained glass, in particular, was stunningly beautiful. It was hard to capture in a photo, but I did my best. I also went to the Hall of the Red Earl, which is the remains of a medieval municipal building that were discovered in 1997. They had really great diagrams pointing out the remains and how they fit into a drawing of the original building, as well as where the building was on the ancient map of Galway. Another site was the home of James Joyce's wife, Nora Barnacle, which has been turned into a small museum. I walked to it only to find the museum was closed that day. 

The Spanish Arch is the little stone building on the right.

Later, I walked through the Spanish Arch to get to the city museum. The Spanish Arch was used as a lookout point for Elizabeth I’s forces during naval battles with the Spanish armada, but there’s not much to see. The city museum was small, but interesting. On the first floor, they had the beginnings of an exhibit on the history of Irish women, which is set to debut later this summer. The plaques they had up already were wonderful mini biographies on various women who played significant roles in the shaping of the Republic of Ireland. Fascinating! Upstairs, they had an overview of the 1916 Revolution and its aftermath, focusing on events in Galway and the war that led to independence. It was a great follow-up to the bus tour I did in Dublin earlier in the week. They also had a few other exhibits, but they were less interesting to me and I had to go to meet the Smith’s by this point.