Day 03 -- 6/03 - Cobh (Cork), Ireland

 Silently and without much fanfare the Regal slipped into its berth at Cobh, Ireland at 8am (a full hour early).  We were up and showered and ready for the day before then.  So we headed to the Horizon Bistro on the Lido deck for our breakfast.  We weren't in too much of a hurry as we had no specific plans other than overnight I purchased tickets for the 9am Titanic Experience which was located close to the ship.  Later at 2pm, we were meeting a fellow for lunch in Cork, but that was a long time away at this point.

We finished our breakfast and headed off the ship and found the Titanic Experience museum.  It didn't open until 9am so we walked across the street and photographed the Lusitania memorial.  There was a mother and her adult son also waiting for the Titanic Experience and we chatted a bit with them.  At 9am sharp the museum opened and 6 of us took the first tour.  It's essentially a guided tour telling the human side of the story of the Titanic.  Cobh (pronounced cove), was the last stop in Europe before crossing the Atlantic.  At this port, the Titanic anchored offshore as it was too time consuming to enter the harbor and this time savings would lead to a faster crossing.  Each of us was given a ticket with the name of a passenger that got on that fateful day.  At the end of the tour, we learned whether the person whose name was on the ticket survived the event.  Mine, Michael McEvoy, age 19, did not survive.  Angela's person did survive the sinking.  At the end of the formal guided tour there were a number of additional exhibits one could peruse at one's leisure.

After the museum experience, we hiked up the hill to St. Colman cathedral which is an imposing structure high on a hill overlooking the harbor.  There was a mass being conducted so we couldn't photograph inside.  We head back to the city via another route that gave us great vistas of some colorful buildings.  We found the train station and purchased round trip train ticket for 6.90 Euros each.  The trains normally leave every hour on the half hour, but with the ship being in port, there was a train every 1/2 hour.  It was pretty full for the 11am departure.  

The ride was scenic and had 3-4 stops before reaching Cork.  We disembarked the train and walked about 20 minutes to our meeting point at the city Library.  Given that it was a sunny Saturday, the streets were packed with people.  With the knowledge of our meet up point in hand, we ventured off to visit the huge Anglican Church St. Finn Barre which cost 6 Euros each to visit with no restrictions on photography.  This church has 77 nice stained glass windows.  From there we walked to the nearby Elizabeth Fort and did a quick walk around before heading back to the Library.  

We met our friend, Donal, and we went in search of an Irish restaurant.  We found Kelly's and we all ordered the Corned Beef & Cabbage 4 course meal.  We really enjoyed our first in person chat with Donal who I had only met online in a YouTube group devoted to cruising. We finished our lunch and headed across the street to the English Market.  It's a closed in market area where all sorts of meat, poultry, fish, vegetables and associated goods are sold by small merchants, many of whom have been doing this for years.  It's much like markets we've seen in Asia,but without the crowds and frenzy.  Around 3:30, we said our goodbyes to Donal and walked back to the train station and caught the 4pm train back to Cobh.  It was also full.

We did a brief stop in another Titanic themed shop but re-boarded the Regal Princess by 4:30pm and spent a leisurely time relaxing before the evening show.  We weren't hungry after the late large lunch.  The evening entertainment was a hypnotist, David Knight, and he was pretty good.  After the how we watched a little of the World Orchestra in the Piazza before snagging a small portion of the Bavarian themed Lido food. We followed this with a few minutes of listening to AJ Clarke, vocalist and pianist.  He's really good.  Angela left to do karaoke once again and I went back to the room to do my blog.  

It was a good day and we'll be using the Water Shuttle tomorrow at Dublin.  We may not even go into Dublin as we were there about 8 years ago.