Driving for Views, Our Ireland and Scotland Journey, Part 5

Day 6

Another great breakfast by our lovely hostess at Mountain Dew B&B.

Wait.

I'm getting ahead of myself.

Before breakfast I took another jaunt down to Ross castle.  I wanted to catch the morning light at the castle and hoped for still water for a reflection.  One out of two isn't bad.  I"ll take it.

Morning at Ross Castle

It was a beautiful morning, albeit a tad windy.  I was able to capture some nice colors and really had a grand time of it. 

Ok.  Back to breakfast.

One thing we missed the prior day and wanted to see was Muckross Abbey.  It's

Muckross Abbey

just on the outskirts of Killarney and got great reviews by travelers.  The current building was founded in 1448 as a Franciscan friary but there have been previous religious buildings here as far back as the 6th century.

The walk to the abbey was very nice.  We parked near the highway at an access point and took a paved trail to the site.  It was sunny and lovely and I read a psalm as we walked.

The abbey buildings were really interesting.  An ancient yew tree is

Yew Tree in Courtyard

still growing in the small courtyard and the morning shadows gave the place an extra sense of mystery.  In fact, there are intact stairs to the second floor which is almost completely intact and additional stairs to the next level in the tower.  It was really cool and I'm sure kids have a blast here.

In fact we ran across a family having an outing, mom and dad and three young, curly, red-headed kids.  We had a nice little cross-cultural conversation about raising kids to appreciate what they have.  No politics.  Just two families connecting through shared experiences.
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Unfortunately we weren't able to stop time.  It was still marching on and so we did likewise.

This was a long drive day.  

We drove just south of Limerick and made our next stop in the town of Adare.  This stop wasn't well researched.  It was something that Kim had read about and the town was supposed to be the most quaint village in Ireland.

Au contraire, mon frère.

Perhaps prior to the village being known as the "most quaint village" it actually was.  Today it just looked like a tourist trap.  Not impressed.  A little jaded maybe.

On the plus side I did have some local ice cream that was good.  One point for Adare.

Bunratty Castle

About thirty minutes later and just west of Limerick saw us arrive at Bunratty Castle and Folk Park.  We had been debating between King John's Castle in Limerick centre and Bunratty.  Both castles have been restored but Bunratty seemed a little touristy sounding.  King John's Castle (yes, THE King John) is in the middle of a big town, harder to reach and park and much more traffic.

So during our conversion with the local family at Muchross Abbey the topic came up and the mom really sold us on Bunratty.

The castle was built by the MacNamara family in the early part of the 15th century and later was owned by the O'Briens (earls of Thomond).  While the park has some 19th century exhibits and demonstrations, we primarily went for the castle.

And it didn't disappoint.  It has been restored on the inside to closely resemble how it was used and furnished in the 15th-16th centuries.  It was almost completely open to explore.  The corner towers have bedrooms and spiral stairs that were really narrow.  And if you were really important there was a privy in a nook outside your bedroom.  Looks like a hole going straight down to the base of the castle.  Gives a whole new meaning to the phrase "poop chute".

We spent a good deal of time in the castle and thoroughly enjoyed it.

Next stop, the Cliffs of Moher about another hour of driving.

We met some serious traffic on the way to the cliffs so I knew that it must be

Cliffs of Moher

popular.

I was mistaken.  It's really, really popular to the tune of $8 euro each to park there.  It's an iconic view and well advertised so props to the advertisers and travel agents.

Still, the view was stunning.  And windy.  And crowded.  You gotta take the good with the bad.  If you boil it down the place is really just a big photo-op ... but I would do it again, lol.

Leaving there for Galway we drove through the Burren region.  This is a rare region in Ireland without green hills.  In fact the hills are mainly bare limestone by all appearances.  Certainly different.

Just south of Galway we came to Dunguaire Castle.  This is a very photogenic castle literally on the side of the road.  Unfortunately the tide was out so the great view across water was more like great view of seaweed and a castle.  Timing is everything.  Snapped some photos and moved on to our stop for the night, Consilio B&B in Galway.

Dunguaire Castle

Gotta run.  Packing for a travel day tomorrow (I'm a day behind again).

Grace and peace,

Randy