This is a compact, in town, shopping centre built on a steep hill, so it is split level with a fairly steep escalator running between floors and part of the centre is wedged into a Sheraton hotel with an adjoining walkway between the two. It has a Starbucks and an O' Brien's sandwich bar as well as a juice bar at ground floor along with a few independent food/coffee places, all on lower floor, and an independent cafe serving substantial meals on the upper level, more toward good cafe than bistro/fine dining but always far and away better than the fast food burger places and Subways sandwich stores of this world. Although I could walk through it end to end in a few minutes, it has an M&S including a food hall, several clothing and sports stores and a pound shop equivalent where most stuff, particularly made in China rubbish, is sold at €1.5 in short this place has something for everyone but fine diners. I hope the citizens of Athlone don't mind me saying that while their medieval town is really quaint, it's not built for cars and lorries. Pony and traps would be fine in the historic centre. For those who enjoy history it's well over a thousand years old with Athlone Castle offering stunning views from its battlements. South of town, along the River Shannon, is the early Christian ruins of Clonmacnoise include a cathedral and 7 churches. How did we end up here? Well we set off yesterday for a few days away at Ireland's Bloomfield House, Mullingar and diverted to Athlone for a quick visit. Like so much of Ireland it's truly beautiful. We had breakfast at Gather and Brew before we left and pointed our noses to Europe. We used to be on Europe but alas democracy removed us. As we travelled yesterday we had a few thunderstorms and powerful downpours as nature provided the backdrop to the news on the car radio about the real threat of global warming. As the radio host spoke of flash floods from intense rainfall, more frequent heatwaves and drought, increasingly severe storms and loss of coastal land to rising seas we could identify it all as happening here. And will all the doom and gloom we turned to a music station so we could delude ourselves that it was summer after all. 14c and thunder and lightning but still summer. read more

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