To me, Limerick city will always be my University city. It’s where I smuggled bottles of vodka into nightclubs and cried after the chipper when fleeting relationships broke down. The days of studying in the library and sneaking into town for a break are shuffled in as particularly relevant memories.
Eight years later and to me, Limerick is a changed city. Sure, there’s a massive student life and serious night scene. There is however also so much culture, new developments and what was once a recession-hit small city is starting to come to life again.
There’s loads to do day to day, of course. But hey, why not shake things up? That’s what I always say. The joys of being flexible while living in Ireland means I get to check out different options. Limerick offered this option this Summer when I was particularly excited to head to the International Food Truck Festival. It was the first of its kind and I’m pretty sure it won’t be the last. Set up in Limerick People’ Park, there were 15 trucks with a variety of cuisine from sweet to savoury. Of course, there were speckled bars across the location for good measure with a couple of types of wine and beer to boot.
The articles online were researched days in advance by yours truly and they excitedly bragged of shark meat and alligator. You can imagine how the search was on when I got there. This was both across social media and in person in the pouring rain as we were met with showers and muddy puddles galore. Not finding the promised random cuisine wasn’t enough to turn us off. The gallivanting carried on and turned into tasty wine, cold beers and an array of Lebanese, Mexican and Canadian food. This could only be topped off by hot chocolates, fondue and shots of espresso.
Sitting with a friend later that night, we reminisced about how things have changed but how we still love to adventure around Limerick city. While the classics like Flannery’s bar and Nancy’s will always deserve a visit, branching out to a random festival or two never hurt anybody.