ireland - day 4
today has been my favorite day so far. better than the cliffs of moher, and i loved the cliffs of moher. it was my turn to drive, and i wanted to head south. i was originally thinking of driving the ring of kerry, but after reading the suggestions of rick steves (seriously, if you're going somewhere ... get a rick steves' guidebook. he's been a fabulous traveling companion so far.) i decided we should start by driving around the dingle peninsula and then hit the ring of kerry if we had time. i really figured we'd do both since the dingle peninsula road is only about a 35 mile loop. i was wrong. :) and while i have no idea what the ring of kerry looks like, dingle was amazing.
we grabbed a quick lunch in tralee on our way to dingle. the mickey d's sold curly fries! marlana confirmed that the mcdonald's in ireland do, indeed, sell shamrock shakes ... but unfortunately they were gone for the season.
from tralee to dingle we had two routes to choose from. one was tight, curvy & treacherous. the other was just tight & curvy. i, of course, opted for treacherous. :) why drive if you can't drive on the side of a mountain?
we stopped at the first available pullout, in part, because i wanted to get a photo of this sign. when we got out of the car, however, we realized ...
there was a waterfall right behind us! marlana, braver than i, scurried across the rocks for a photo and went under the bridge we'd just driven across to get photos. i admired her bravery and stayed on dry land. :)
this is at the connors pass view point. the haze was unfortunate, and the wind was ridiculously strong ... but the drive was still worth it. we had to pull way over on the side at one point to let a tour bus pass us ... but other than that, we were very fortunate on the tight road.
once we got to dingle, we relied on rick steves to give us a kilometer by kilometer (gotta love the metric system) guide to driving around the peninsula. seriously, i recommend taking him with you. dingle is classified as a gaeltacht, which means they're officially recognized by the government as as an irish-speaking region. the signs still had english subtitles, though, so we were good.
we got to ford a stream! it wasn't that the road was flooded ... it's simply built to ford the stream instead of building a bridge over it. thankfully, again, we were the only car on the road so we were able to stop & take a photo.
actually, the absence of other tourists has been one of the best parts so far. it's not like it's creepy abandoned ... it's just nice & calm. and we don't have to wait forever to get a photo without strangers in it.
this is it. this is the landscape that makes me breath deeply & exhale all the stress of everyday life. rocky coastlines are therapeutic for me. i could have sat myself down & stared at the waves for hours. at least, i could have if i wasn't so excited about continuing on. :)
we stopped at the gallarus oratory - an early church built between the 6th & 12th century. it looks like upside-down canoe, and it still completely waterproof inside. the walls are about 3 feet thick, and the doorway is about 5'6" tall. i had to duck a little. :)
and we stopped at the kilmalkedar church & cemetery. the surrounding land has risen so much over the years that you now have to go down three steps to get into the church's front door.
there was no way we could have even started the ring of kerry today. that road is at least three times the length of the dingle peninsula, and as it was we had a two hour ride home. home? maybe not home ... but we are feeling pretty comfortable here.
tonight's pub came complete with an illinois license plate. :) excuse the fuzziness of the photo - i'm against using my flash in restaurants. we started our meal with shots of jameson. we figured it only fair to celebrate the trip with a little irish whiskey. sure, it made my tonsils burn for awhile ... but i figured i'd cure that with a nice, refreshing guinness.
i tried marlana's guinness yesterday and enjoyed it more than any other beer i've tried. and it just seemed right to drink a pint in ireland. the bartender knew we were tourists (must be the lack of accent, right?) & my drink came with this cute li'l shamrock on top. i was not able to finish the pint. it was good, but heavy. and i did have a shot of whiskey already coursing through my veins.
speaking of tourists ... the majority of people we see in the pubs at night are americans tourists. tonight we saw at least three groups - a couple of which had just landed today.
we tried ordering a dessert we'd never heard of before, but they were out. the bartender suggested a strawberry peach cream cake ... yowza, that was good.
----------
'becca thinks today was her favorite so far.
we grabbed a quick lunch in tralee on our way to dingle. the mickey d's sold curly fries! marlana confirmed that the mcdonald's in ireland do, indeed, sell shamrock shakes ... but unfortunately they were gone for the season.
from tralee to dingle we had two routes to choose from. one was tight, curvy & treacherous. the other was just tight & curvy. i, of course, opted for treacherous. :) why drive if you can't drive on the side of a mountain?
we stopped at the first available pullout, in part, because i wanted to get a photo of this sign. when we got out of the car, however, we realized ...
there was a waterfall right behind us! marlana, braver than i, scurried across the rocks for a photo and went under the bridge we'd just driven across to get photos. i admired her bravery and stayed on dry land. :)
this is at the connors pass view point. the haze was unfortunate, and the wind was ridiculously strong ... but the drive was still worth it. we had to pull way over on the side at one point to let a tour bus pass us ... but other than that, we were very fortunate on the tight road.
once we got to dingle, we relied on rick steves to give us a kilometer by kilometer (gotta love the metric system) guide to driving around the peninsula. seriously, i recommend taking him with you. dingle is classified as a gaeltacht, which means they're officially recognized by the government as as an irish-speaking region. the signs still had english subtitles, though, so we were good.
we got to ford a stream! it wasn't that the road was flooded ... it's simply built to ford the stream instead of building a bridge over it. thankfully, again, we were the only car on the road so we were able to stop & take a photo.
actually, the absence of other tourists has been one of the best parts so far. it's not like it's creepy abandoned ... it's just nice & calm. and we don't have to wait forever to get a photo without strangers in it.
this is it. this is the landscape that makes me breath deeply & exhale all the stress of everyday life. rocky coastlines are therapeutic for me. i could have sat myself down & stared at the waves for hours. at least, i could have if i wasn't so excited about continuing on. :)
we stopped at the gallarus oratory - an early church built between the 6th & 12th century. it looks like upside-down canoe, and it still completely waterproof inside. the walls are about 3 feet thick, and the doorway is about 5'6" tall. i had to duck a little. :)
and we stopped at the kilmalkedar church & cemetery. the surrounding land has risen so much over the years that you now have to go down three steps to get into the church's front door.
there was no way we could have even started the ring of kerry today. that road is at least three times the length of the dingle peninsula, and as it was we had a two hour ride home. home? maybe not home ... but we are feeling pretty comfortable here.
tonight's pub came complete with an illinois license plate. :) excuse the fuzziness of the photo - i'm against using my flash in restaurants. we started our meal with shots of jameson. we figured it only fair to celebrate the trip with a little irish whiskey. sure, it made my tonsils burn for awhile ... but i figured i'd cure that with a nice, refreshing guinness.
i tried marlana's guinness yesterday and enjoyed it more than any other beer i've tried. and it just seemed right to drink a pint in ireland. the bartender knew we were tourists (must be the lack of accent, right?) & my drink came with this cute li'l shamrock on top. i was not able to finish the pint. it was good, but heavy. and i did have a shot of whiskey already coursing through my veins.
speaking of tourists ... the majority of people we see in the pubs at night are americans tourists. tonight we saw at least three groups - a couple of which had just landed today.
we tried ordering a dessert we'd never heard of before, but they were out. the bartender suggested a strawberry peach cream cake ... yowza, that was good.
----------
'becca thinks today was her favorite so far.
Labels: ireland
posted by 'becca at 11:59 PM
2 Comments:
No way! The bartender poured you Guinness art! i guess there's more in common between stout and espresso than i thought. That's really cute. :-)
How has the surrounding land risen ?
i really love your photos... and i think it would be a blast to ford a stream and scurry around rocks for photos. Well, i have done the latter. Not the former.
Some day I'll have to make it to Ireland and get a real Guiness, not the dark water we get here in the US.
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