One of the first places we went in Ireland was the Irish National Stud at Tully, County Kildare, since I'm a horse nut. This is one of their stallions in his paddock. Unfortunately, I don't remember which one this is. If it's one of the horses on their website right now, he could be Elusive City or Touch of the Blues, but I'm not sure. I took a lot of pictures there, and while the stalls and paddocks did have name plates, there were a few that didn't match up. The day we were there, they had two of their retired geldings, Vintage Crop and Danoli, sharing a stall - it was farrier day, and these two guys were buddies so they were hanging out in the same stall until it was their turn for shoes.
Aside from the horses, the estate at Tully (almost 1,000 acres!) has St. Fiachra's Garden, the Japanese Gardens, and the Horse Museum. The museum was apparently refurbished last year, but it's got a timeline of horses in Ireland and a lot of racing memorabilia, including the skeleton of a famous racehorse named Arkle. The tour of the Stud takes about 45 minutes, and you get to walk through the barns and the stallion paddocks, as well as the miniature horses that are bred there. The stalls have skylights in them; apparently the fellow who built the place before donating it to the State was a believer in astrology, and had readings done for the foals to decide which he kept and which he sold.
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