Trabern

This morning, we woke to glorious sunshine. We breakfasted in our room on apple, kiwi fruit and clementines followed by the cakes we purchased yesterday. Mine was an almond croissant and Bernie’s was a blueberry topped cake/tart. We had sealed both up in a ziplock bag straight after we purchased them yesterday morning and they were still good to eat this morning. We hit the road about 9.00am heading south on the N71. At Bandon we turned southwards onto the R603 so that we could pick up the Wild Atlantic Way (R600) again to drive along the coastal road towards Timoleague. We made a few photo stops along the way with the coast looking fantastic with the sky blue and the sun shining. So many fantastic views, so few places to stop! The roads are really ... read more

After another scrumptious breakfast we packed the cars to head south towards Cork but more specifically this morning to the Jameson Heritage Centre at Midleton. The SatNavs were programmed, and it looked like we were going to take the N24 across to the M8 and then rocket down the motorway. Ahem, we were driving around Limerick again on the N18 expecting to flow onto the M7 and then head off onto the N24 at Junction 29 but, that’s not what happened. At Junction 1/30 where the N18 and M7 intersect we were directed off into Limerick. Whaaaat?! After negotiating a number of busy roads in Limerick we found that Apple Maps had decided to redirect us onto R512, R514 and R513 to Mitchelstown before setting us on the motorway (M8) heading south to Cork. And we ... read more

This morning found us heading north-west across the country towards Limerick rather than south-west towards Cork. Ordinarily a circumnavigation of Ireland would continue clockwise around the country BUT we had to make another compromise on OUR itinerary because of Bloody Bruce! Bruce and the E-Street Band are playing Cork tomorrow night, so fans booked out all the accommodation in and around Cork months ago!! Fortunately, it’s a small island and the cities aren’t too far apart. We will head down to Cork on Friday after Bruce packs up and leaves. We started out travelling west on the N25 from which we could see another spectacular bridge crossing the River Suir. After we navigated a short section of the N9 and turned onto the N24 Bernie spotted a place to pull over to photograph the bridge. We ... read more

Freakin’ fire/smoke alarms! After our experience with the fire alarm at our Staycity apartment in Dublin on Saturday morning, this morning the smoke alarm in our room shattered the peace at 6.00am!! Much worse. At least on Saturday we were already up and about. This morning, we had been hoping for another hour and a half of sleep! Fortunately, we had a stool in our room that gave Bernie just enough reach to rip the bloody thing off the ceiling and take the batteries out. Thank goodness it wasn’t hardwired. We were sure it was a false alarm, but I did open the door and sniff for smoke before trying to go back to sleep. Damned flat batteries. When the alarm went off, we were fast asleep again so … two rude awakenings this morning. We ... read more