Traveling with Michelle

Thursday, June 12, 2014

The Ring of Kerry

Thursday 12 June 2014

Today we left the hostel. This is the hostel without functioning wifi and only one outlet in our room—none in the children’s room. So, not too sad.

We drove the Ring of Kerry today, counter-clockwise. This is intended to not encounter as many buses. And we didn’t get behind many buses, but we did have oncoming buses. Yikes! Many of the roads are only wide enough for one vehicle. When two opposing vehicles approach, one has to pull into an open driveway or other space so that the other vehicle can pass. One road we were on was only 5 feet wide!

Two cars are supposed to drive on this?

Hope we don't meet up with another car coming toward us--we can't pull off to the side!

The Ring of Kerry (just a road going around the Kerry peninsula, just like the Ring of Baera was the road going around the Baera peninsula. Not as rocky as Baera but still beautiful. Personally, I prefer the rocks and green better--it just seems more dramatic and is artistically satisfying to me, but the green of Kerry is good too! Baera was half in County Cork and half in County Kerry, but the ring of Kerry is totally in Kerry (thus the name!). I read the descriptions of the things before we started and as we arrived at each from the Rick Steves' Ireland guide. The children decided that they wanted to see the beach, the chocolate factory, and a ring fort. We went to O'Carroll's cove for the beach, we took photos and Joshua and Shelby collected shells.

The cove (the beach! say the children)

Having fun!

These are marks left in the sand after high tide of the seaweed (I think). It's beautiful!

Rock draped with vegetation from the sea

More rocks draped

Some of the rocks had shells embedded in them which also had things growing on them--it's crazy!

Anneliese

Randy

More of the cool marks left on the beach

We tacked on the Skellig Ring to get in the end part of the peninsula. There we visited the Skellig Chocolate Factory--fun visit and many free samples! So, of course, we had to buy a bag as well!

Anneliese and Joshua

I love this!

Making candy!

There were three ring forts on the trail--we stopped at the Cahergal ring fort. The forts are from between 500 BCE and 300 CE and they are unsure whether the forts are defensive or ceremonial in nature. It was during the change from the hunter/gatherer time to the farmer era and the herders might have used them when marauders came, or families when rival clans came, or it may have been used for ceremonial gatherings of clans. The wall are all drywall--no mortar--it's amazing! The fort we visited also had the remains of a house in the center. It seems to be from a more recent time and the placard said that the occupant must have been a person of importance. We decided that they must be both. There were paths along the edges with steps built into the walls. There were no railings. In the US, big metal railings would have been put in, and that's if they allowed you on them at all. From Cahergal, which is very well preserved, we could see another ring fort--Leacanabuaile. It was very short and not much was there, so we skipped it and went to a ruined castle we could see-- .

The ring fort

Shelby at the ring fort

Joshua said that he was sure he could push it over since it's not mortared together

Inside the ring fort

Shclby--not in the US! (Note the cows right outside!)

The remains of the house in the middle

To get to the castle (also drywall), we parked in a car park there, but had to climb under barbed wire, then walk through long grass to get to the castle. Part of the staircase was intact, so we climbed up, making our way precariously to get over the missing part (again, not in the US!), then climbed around and explored. Very cool!

Castle Ballycarberry

We also saw a deserted stone house close to the roadway--they are everywhere. No roofs, but still in place. Again, just drywall with some plaster smeared on the inside walls. We stopped at one, climbed over the fence and explored. Fun. We had to beware of the sheep poop which was everywhere, and some wet places.

Abandoned house

Inside the house

We stopped again because Randy wanted to climb a huge grassy hill. Randy, Joshua, and Shelby reached the top. About 1/3 of the way up, Anneliese and I realized that we weren't having fun trying to make our way over hillocks of grass, piles of squishy moss, sheep poop, bracken, and wet ground so we went back down to the road and talked while we waited. I slipped on the way down and my butt got wet. Also, tried to grab a plant and got thorns in my hand. Annie got scratched up.

This is the hill

This is what the climbing was like

Then we continued on our way and made our way halfway around the peninsula of Dingle before we reached our hostel. As you can see, the caretaker was able to get the wifi working for us and we rented towels. We had tried to find a restaurant to eat in Dingle, but at 6:00, the evening meals weren't being served yet, and the lunch was done being served. The ones that were serving were way out of our price range, so we bought pasta, sauce, sausage, bread, pineapple, strawberries, and milk and made our own dinner when we arrived at the hostel. The Dingle Peninsula has more dirt on the rock, and so, some trees grow here and we saw some crops. Following are some scenery and photo stops that we saw/made:

The Ring of Baera

Wednesday, 11 June 2014

Here we are, setting out for the train station! Our big bags are on our backs, our "personal" bags in front.

Our first two stages of our trip went successfully on Tuesday: closing the house, walking to the train station, and taking the train to the airport, then our flight to Philadelphia. At the Lindbergh terminal, they now have a tram that takes you from the train station at the airport to the terminal—much more convenient. I’m not sure how long they’ve had that, we usually fly in and out of the Humphrey terminal.

Our American-Japanese food. Eaten with chopsticks by most of us!

Here we are, waiting to take off from Philadelphia!

In Philiadelphia, we had an almost 4 hour layover which we spent walking to our terminal (they are very spread out) and eating (American-version) Japanese food. I used chopsticks, but for the fried rice I gave up and used a fork after awhile (I would have been there for another hour otherwise!). Played a few games, then spent almost an hour loading the plane. Then another 45 minutes waiting in line to take-off. The pilot on our overseas plane made some funny jokes (such as saying they had to turn the lights down to make the flight attendants look more attractive, and when they were slowing the plane when we landed he opened the PA and said only “Whoa Nellie!” ). The flight attendants also were friendly and had a sense of humor. The plane was smaller than on all of the other overseas flights we’ve taken. Just one aisle with three seats on each side of the aisle (instead of the center section of 5 or so seats between two aisles and three more on each side of the plane. There were also only 22 rows. We were served dinner and a literally flattened muffin for breakfast. We couldn’t watch the movie because you had to turn up the volume so high due to the noise from the plane that it hurt your ears. We slept a little off and on for our only 5 ½ hour flight.

In Shannon, we picked up our rental car and declined the many layers of optional insurance and the extra fees for a second driver, but paid slightly more to get a slightly larger car for our family of 5. We decided that Randy would be our driver for this leg of our trip so he is still trying to get used to the car—where everything is, the weird eco thing (it shuts off at stop signs and you have to restart it by pushing in the clutch), the touchy clutch, and, of course, driving on the left side of the road and shifting with your left hand in a different gear pattern and with a six speed.

our car

I navigated, following the maps Randy had taken screen shots of on his iPad before we left. We only had to backtrack once for a missed turnoff (because the sign was on white instead of green). We made our way through Limerick and Killarney to Kenmare. We had one problem: there was a toll booth (there was no mention of toll booths on the maps or in the guide book). We had neglected to get cash at the airport and they only took cash. So, we received an unpaid toll booth voucher we need to call and pay for with our credit card. In Kenmare, we had to make contact with the manager of the hostel. She was supposed to meet us there at 1:00. Instead there was a general sign on the door to call a phone number or walk down the street to use the pay phone to call her. Not having a cell phone, we walked down to the public phone booth, but lacked the 2 euros in change for the phone (we had stopped and had bills but less than a euro in change). We tried our credit card, but the number wouldn’t go through. So we went back to the hostel and found the back door unlocked. We went in, found the reception desk, then used the wifi password on the desk to skype her. 15 minutes later, we were in our rooms. Off went my hiking boots and jeans, and the bed felt so good! We took naps, then went to the car (which Randy had had to move twice since all of the streets have only 2 hour parking and the carpark the hostel mentioned was full).

We drove an abbreviated version of the Ring of Baera drive around the perimeter of the Baera peninsula. We took a pass through the mountains. There were many sheep grazing, some right on the edge of the road, including a very cute baby lamb! In places, the road was only one car wide without any shoulder (cars approaching from the other direction were a headache, trying to squeeze by eachother) so stopping to get photos was out of the question most of the time. On the pass, we found a pull-out and stopped to hike a bit and take photos. The scenery was gorgeous—magnificent black rocks jutting out of green grass and moss with the occasional lake. And all of the sheep! J