Well, yesterday was Sunday and it was time to hit the road again for our next destination in Ireland. We headed to the town of Killarney. Before we checked in at the bed and breakfast we decided to go to Crag Cave, touted as Ireland’s best show caves. They were pretty cool, but nothing compared to Timpanogos.
When we got to the B&B (called the Avondale House), the owner wasn’t there so we just put our stuff in the rooms. This new place is pinkville! Every single thing you could imagine is pink. And it’s decorated very old granny-like.
In the afternoon we went to Ross Castle, which is on the shore of the lower Killarney lake. It was pretty rainy (surprise, surprise), but we decided to take a boat tour around the lake. Lucky for us, the boat was covered and the views were gorgeous! There are tons of little tiny islands in the middle of the lake. One of them was used as the Irish version of Alcatraz—prisoners were sent to this tiny little island to serve their prison sentence. On another island, monks built a monastery and wrote some famous book about Irish history.
After eating dinner and wandering around town a little bit, we called it an early night and watched some Olympics and whatnot. Today we’re doing a driving tour called the Ring of Kerry, which is basically a self-guided trip around County Kerry. At the moment we’re driving along the Atlantic coast. The clouds have kind of cleared a bit and the view is beyond gorgeous. Earlier on our journey we visited Glenbeigh. It was a little recreation of a bog village from the 1800s. I envisioned it to be like Plymouth Plantation in Massachusetts, but I was a little disappointed. It had the potential of being really cool because they had some really neat thatched roof buildings and stuff, but there were a grand total of about five of them. However, they did have some cool traditional little Bog Ponies.
The next stop was a really cool fort that was built using the dry stone technique (piling stones on top of each other without using mortar and magically they stay together for thousands of years). They just let you climb up anywhere you want. It was like this circle with random stairs that led you up to the top—which was really really high. There were sheep everywhere and the view from the top was INCREDIBLE. I took pictures and I’ll post some on facebook later.
Just down the road from the fort was a super cool castle. Cows were just hanging out there so I braved the mud and poop and got cozy with the cows for a picture. We ate a tasty lunch of nutella and banana sandwiches and apple juice (which was MUUUCH better than yesterday’s beef jerky and barfy crackers) there in the parking lot.
Have I mentioned how gorgeous it is here?! Along the way, we stopped at a little pull-off viewing area called Coomakesta Pass. It was a beautiful view from high up on a mountain looking down over the crashing waves of the ocean and the ultra green fields. The wind was blowing so hard my cheeks were flapping in the wind. My mom was wearing her ugly yellow poncho and I thought she was going to blow right off the edge!
All in all it was a swell day...except for the part where I got really carsick. However...we did see a rainbow over a river. It was like the ultimate Irish experience. Downright lovely!
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