Ireland

---

So, I'm afraid today wasn't very interesting. We packed up all our stuff and checked out of Aviemore. 2 hours down the motorway and we were in Edinburgh. A couple of hours and a short flight later, we were standing in Dublin with the rental keys in our hot little hands.

Where to? Was the question.

11 days, 1 island, no plans. so we journeyed south. Horrible, Horrible idea, straight into rush hour traffic. I figured mum needed to get off the road pretty fast, so we spent our first night in Ireland at this gorgeous B&B near the beach.

Dinner at the local pub, which we walked to mind you, and that completed day 1.

June 22nd. And I thought it was Howl's castle that moved!!?

Well, I've had my first adventure with the untrustworthy Irish map. You would think that after 6 or so centuries, they'd know where a castle was, right?? well, obviously not. Totally in the wrong direction, on the wrong road, and near an abbey for god's sake!! And one more thing to write to the Irish mapping department about. If the only way to cross a river for 20km is by ferry, you'd think they'd have the decency to write it in bigger letters.

After leaving the previous evening's B&B, we checked out the ruins of an old fort and headed south east to Wexford. Window shopping, a lunch and an interesting though slightly morbid walk around an abbey was the full extent of our explorations there, then it was continuing on to Waterford. Of course we got all muddled thanks to the map!! But eventually after a therapeutic ice-cream we finished our days journey by not taking the ferry, and choosing instead the more scenic though slightly longer road route.

June 23rd - Although it's really nice bread, it's not a really nice place to visit.

We didn't stop last night in Waterford as previously anticipated, because much to our surprise it was a fairly large town, and we're not really fans of those. So we headed about 10kms out of town to a place that was described as the best holiday spot, with the best beaches for tourists. Now, Tramore was gorgeous, I will admit, but in a sort of Redcliffe, old fogey, I have a promenade and an amusement park way.

Leaving Tramore the next day, we decided to go and see the famed Waterford crystal centre. Well, it was really quite interesting much more exciting than I had imagined. ( I must admit to a few horrifying thoughts of rooms full of crystal and being led around the outside by a tour guide who pointed out extremely fascinating details like the difference in shape, and patterns) We actually got to walk through the factory and see the crystal actually being worked in all it's different stages.

Where to next? At breakfast that morning we had shared the dining room with a couple from America. They recommended to us a town called Cobh where they had stayed the night before. So onward to Cobh.

Do not go to Cobh!! Although it is the cutest town ever, it's cut into the side of a mountain, and the streets are so narrow that traffic can only go one way at a time, although they are all two way streets. So we decided to find somewhere else to stay the night.

What's close to Cobh? Why Blarney of course, and although I already posess the gift of the gab, as you all know..I thought Mum might benefit from kissing the stone. So Blarney it was. We went down the pub for a couple of drinks and hopefully some light entertainment which we got thanks to my enlightening commentary on the Irish fashion trends. Anyway, we met these two lovely Aussie ladies there who we shared our thoughts and travels on Ireland with, I also scoured the youngest ladies brain as she's spent 6 months out west in Australia fruit-picking.

June 24th. The Oxley hotel biker rally had nothing on this turn-out!!

Early breakfast, drop the laundry into the laundromat, and off to the castle. Absolutely gorgeous even though the weatherman was disinclined to give us sun. However just a warning to everybody else..the stone is about five floors up, five floors of winding stone staircase onto the open topped highest level where the stone is. They get you to lie on your back and lean out over a hole to kiss this stone, which looks no different to any of the others, just because it's supposed to give you 'eloquence of speech'. Can't improve on perfection, so's I'm fraid aint no difference to me email.

The ladies from the previous night had recommended the ring of Kerry to us. So that was our next destination and somewhere around there, hopefully our goal for tonight. To get there however, we passed through Killarney, a moderately small town which boasts a decent tourism industry. Decent describing every weekend except the one weekend in June 2006 when they host the annual European Hog rally. 6000 harley davidsons, and their riders, partners, dogs and cuddly toys certainly take up a lot of room!!! and the noise, like you wouldn't believe. However, the juxtaposition between the hogs, and the traditional horse drawn carriages was certainly unique. The best bike we saw, no it wasn't a pink one, or a black one, a tricycle or one with a side cart, it wasn't even the one with his dog, or the guy wearing the traditional red haired wig under his helmet. It was the old scotsmen who had decided to forgoe his usual leather for a kilt. Now that's a stiff breeze!!

But off to the ring of Kerry which is a gorgeous drive through mountains, national parks and around lakes. Apart from the fact that the roads are really narrow and every time a bus driver passed, your life flashes before your eyes, it would be perfect.

A B&B on the edge of the sea,
tucked up in bed with a hot cup of tea,
that is where you will find me!!!

p.s I'm getting fat.

June 25th. Ireland’s greatest tin whistle player ever!!

Sunday again, first things first fill the car with petrol. Unfortunately in the very religious county of Kerry, no one was back from church at nine thirty to open the petrol station. So, it was on to Waterville, where it was thankfully late enough for the shops there to be open. Now, as many of you probably know, I'm not very good at sitting still and doing nothing for long periods of time. We came up with a solution. I am now the proud owner and maestro of an Irish tin whistle. If you listen closely enough when I play, and allowing for a few mistakes, speed it up in your head and if you already know what tune I'm supposed to be playing it almost resembles something close to the efforts of a five year old.

Accompanied by our seemingly ever present yet ever over-taking harley friends, we headed towards Dingle where we stopped for lunch and a look see.

We then drove with no further destination in mind along the coast of West Ireland.

We spent the night for all you mapping our journey at home, at Askeaton, and had dinner at 'the prettiest town in Ireland' Adare. Which co-incidentally is where Bill Clinton stayed on his last visit to Ireland. Expensive alcohol, great seafood chowder.

June 26th. The castle, the living village, and the president.

The lovely lady at the beautiful B&B we stayed at last night, said that if we were to go anywhere today, it had to be Bunhratty Folk Park, and once Mum heard that it included a fully restored castle, there was no other option.

Personally, I think all castles look pretty much the same, however this one was pretty good. All the rooms had been refurnished and decorated in the style that would have been popular at the time. It had some gorgeous furniture and priceless antiques including a table from the Spanish Armada.

As well as the tour of the castle, the folk park also contained a working village. So we got to see many different types of houses, stores, and even an original church which they had transported stone by stone from a place where I guess they didn't believe in churches anymore. Maybe they all believed in placing statues of Mary, and sometimes even Jesus all over the mountains, roadways, peat bogs and beside docks. Like many people in Ireland seem to.

Meanwhile, the smell of peat burning is disgusting, I would prefer to go cold. It's smokey, it's stinky, and it makes you feel sick. However, it is very warm.

Lunch at Macca's!!! Yum!!! red meat for once.

Passing through Ennis, still traveling northwards around the coast to Connemara.

We stayed in Clifden which had gorgeous views, traditional irish music, and an unfortunate one day too late visit from the president of Ireland. Our B&B lady was sooo excited that she was going to get to meet her. Strange, but I don't think I'd feel the same about meeting Johnny Howard.

June 27th. A day of scenery, disappearing deserted villages, and missing castles

Leaving Clifden, we drove north again. We stopped to photograph the absolutely stunning Kylemore Abbey, which nestled into a mountain on the banks of a lake, sorry lough. Naughty mummy, went through the exit gate and didn't pay to take her photos.

Heading towards Achill now, which is our next siteseeing destination. Great surfing beaches, maybe if you're four. A deserted village, which seems to have vanished, and a disappearing castle. Once again I blame it on the maps. We did however find Kildravnet tower, once home to the 'notorious' pirate queen Granuiaille, who's name was actually Grace O'Malley, what a let down.

Driving through glorious mountain scenery, which unfortunately I am the only one that gets to see. We sojourned for the night at Ballina.

June 28th. The cemetery.

It's no longer castles which are on our list of things to see. Today we stopped just outside of Sligo to view a megalithic cemetery. Now, I wasn't particularly interested in 6000 year old tombs. However, I will admit to a slight interest into the way people lived.

So, most of the tombs are made up of a circle of stones with a dolmen in the centre. A dolmen being five stones set into the ground with a large rock balanced on top and a passage leading towards it. However, there was this one huge cairn in the centre of the cemetery which had a dolmen buried underneath it. Fascinating stuff!! There are many such cairns in that area and the lovely tour guide pointed them out to us, mostly on top of mountains. There was even one which you could spend 45 minutes walking up a mountain to get to (we didn't), which is the supposed burial ground of the famous Iron-age queen Maeve.

So, after spending what seemed like hours walking round a field full of cows in the wind looking at rocks, we continued our journey.

June 29th. The story of two giants who to my knowledge had way too much testosterone

So, we spent the night in a place called Dungloe. Now, I'm sure it's very nice, but when it's rainy and miserable, it certainly didn't have that sort of a vibe about it. However, the house we stayed in had this awesome glass house, sun room thing where we had the best omelette's of our entire lives for breakfast. They were so good!!!

We had our entire day planned out. Like almost everyone else that visits Ireland, we had to see The Giants Causeway. So we spent the morning driving across wild wilderness, national park areas, on a highway mind you, but that sort of ruins the imagery. Anyway, unbeknown to us, at some stage, and without any signs or anything, we crossed over into Northern Ireland. Now, as some of you might know, Northern Ireland is a part of the United Kingdom, so therefore the currency there is pounds rather than Euro dollars. We of course only had on us Euro dollars, so rather than exchanging with a bureau de change, we paid an extraordinarily high price for the carpark. So there we were at the Giants Causeway.

The Story of the Giants Causeway as remembered by me.

Reportedly built by the giant Finn MacCool, who of course being male wanted to fight another giant, he built a causeway all the way over to Scotland. Of course the big (that's an understatement) wimp that he was he saw this other giant and ran back home cause he was chicken. Old mate Scottish giant saw that the causeway had been built, so trotted over to Ireland to fight Finn. When he arrived Finn's wife having heard of how huge the Scottish giant was had dressed Finn in babies clothes and placed him in a cradle. (Must have been a massive cradle). Anyway, when the scottish giant gets there and see's this huge baby, he can only imagine the size that the babies father must be and hightails it back to Scotland so fast that he tears up the causeway with the speed of his flight.

So, the giants causeway was beautiful, and mum even managed to walk the path down and up without succumbing to the use of the bus. I, well what else would I do but take the long route and see the sights, I'll admit, you should not try and run up all the stairs, and if anyone else is going to do it, take a water bottle.

After the giants causeway and some delicious mushroom soup at a nearby cafe in Bushmills, we drove to this gorgeous ruin of a castle perched on the side of a cliff. I may have done the naughty and sneaked in without paying and took photo's of the funky smugglers cave underneath. But I paid for it, there was an awful lot of stairs down to the ocean, and they were wet and slippery. I could have died! Well, maybe not, but had an uncomfortable, and fast ride on my arse down the stairs if I slipped.

We stayed the night at Ballycastle, and had awesome homemade pizza for dinner. Authentic Irish style with mushrooms, capsicum and lots and lots of cheese!!

And I just have to mention quickly that on our way out of town the next day we came across the most gorgeous ruins of an old abbey stuck in the middle of a golf course.

June 30th. Laundry, Steak and homemade brown bread.

Let me give you a heads up on the laundry situation in Ireland. It's really quite magical. You give a nice lady your clothes and about a million dollars, return in 3 hours and your clothes have been miraculously cleaned, dried and folded. Apart from the money aspect, I could really get used to that idea.

So, we chose Larne for our laundry and spent our time there checking out the stores and eating. Although not a booming town with a huge population, it's more than a quaint settlement, and on the day we visited it was filled to capacity with the entire student population of I swear every single school in the area. Because we had just happened to arrive on the half day, the last day of school before Summer holidays. And you guessed it, it was afternoon when we arrived.

So after stocking up on books, so not for me, and chocolate, also wouldn't have been for me, we headed to Armagh. At Armagh we stayed in the quaintest little farmhouse, it was gorgeous. Had really comfy beds, and an old fashioned bathroom, but can't be fussy. Anyway, we had decided that after eating mostly chicken or pasta our entire trip around Ireland that night was steak night. So off we went to this inner city hotel and ordered our steaks. They were worth the wait, they were so good!!! No vegies for us, all we had was steak and mushrooms and a beer of course. Yum, yum, yum, yum, yum!!!

The following morning our house lady was obviously well aquainted with the cooking of a hearty breakfast, heaps of food all hot and fresh from her stove. She even had home made bread baked that morning, and scones. I'm afraid I can't tell you how the scones were I had eyes for nothing but that bread....

July 1st. Another day, another cemetery. Newgrange. where the hell does the 'new' part in the name come from??

Okay, our last full day in Ireland. What to do??? Mum had the answer. Newgrange. My only question... What the hell is New Grange. Do not worry, I now know. It's another grave sight. Ok, ok, sorry all those people who actually know about it, and just died of shock, fright and horror by the simplicity of my statement. It's a Megalithic Passage Tomb which is best known for it's amazing light illumination which happens during the winter solstice sunrise. A shaft of sunlight shines through the roof box over the entrance and penetrates the passage to light up the chamber. We obviously didn't get to see this, however we did get to go inside and see the artwork and the alcoves which had bowls and stuff, and yeah, it was very impressive. A little claustrophobic considering you're actually in in a teeny tiny space under tonnes and tonnes of rocks.

After Newgrange, we went and saw the Hill of Tara, for no other reason than everyone else always does. We did have great soup there though, and of course we brought souvenirs. There was a second hand bookshop there as well, I just happened to notice.

We spent the night at Dundalk which is actually North of where we spent the day, but we had no desire to go elsewhere so we didn't. We went down the road for dinner, which was fine, I mean it was wonderful, but while you're travelling you sort of get used to eating great food. However, this night I ate desert, which isn't a usual occurence for me, but holy cow, if every desert tasted as good as this one, it was like wow, so good!! it was ice-cream with chocolate, and a baileys cream sauce over the top. oooohhh!! I'm not even going to try and explain that sound, but you get my meaning.

---