Yesterday we took Jessica’s friend Melissa to see Waterford. The first thing we tried to see was closed, but of course, the main attraction there is the Waterford Crystal factory, and none of us had seen it before so we were pretty excited. Unfortunately, Waterford Crystal is no more! The company went out of business recently and was purchased by an American investment group that has decided to close the Waterford factory. Apparently, they intend to continue making crystal in Germany or something like that, but it just doesn’t seem right to make Waterford Crystal anywhere else!

Anyway, even though the tour and show room were closed, they did still have the employee gift shop open so they let us go in there and we got a couple of the last pieces made in Ireland – at employee prices!

The rest of our day was spent trying to find other things to do, and we ended up stumbling on a very cool castle ruin as well as a quaint little coastal town with an ancient stone tower built by monks and an amazing hiking trail that ran along cliffs by the ocean. It was a good day after all!

There’s more pictures in the gallery!