Good Friday at the Ring of Kerry

9-10 April 2009

Good Friday at the Ring of Kerry

One of the nice things about being in a Catholic country is that you get a 4 day weekend for Easter! Ryan and I decided to make the most of this time and travel out to the west coast of Ireland which we had heard has beautiful landscape. We booked an evening train out of Heuston Station (on the opposite side of Dublin from where we live). We had even reserved seats ahead of time so when we boarded, we had to enter a specific car and find out seats. I was impressed that there was a little digital display above our seats with both of our names on it! Who says the Irish trains are no good?

Unfortunately the 8pm train that we took did not go directly to the town of Killarney but had a 20 minute stop in the town of Mallow. It was quite late, almost midnight, when we arrived in Killarney and very quiet. The first thing we saw when we stepped out of the train station was a church with a huge spire, very pretty. As we made our way towards our hostel, the town seemed to wake up. There were brightly painted pubs lining the streets with the sounds of traditional Irish music resonating out to the streets. The fish and chip shops were filled with hungry drinkers. Tourists and locals were roaming the streets. We were tempted to join their revelry but figured we’d better at least find our hostel first. We were following our travel guide map to Neptune Hostel but after walking around one block in circles looking for Bishops Lane…we were feeling frustrated. Bishop’s Lane just didn’t seem to exist as the map said it would! I called the hostel and the man working there actually came outside and showed us the way…turned out our book’s map was a little off. Since Ryan had never stayed in a hostel before, I booked us a private room which was about €40. It was clean, cozy and even had a skylight. After all the time we wasted getting lost, we figured we should call it a night at get some sleep for a busy day tomorrow.

The next morning I awoke feeling refreshed and ready to go! Ryan, on the other hand, was not as happy. Having stayed at dozens of hostels myself, I have learned to always bring earplugs and even an eye patch for shared rooms. I suppose I should have clued Ryan in to this trick…he was up all night listening to our neighbors going at it in the next room with the headboard banging away. So needless to say, it took a little bit of coaxing and harassing to get Ryan’s tired self out of bed that day.

Now the reason we came out to Killarney, which is in County Kerry, was to see the “Ring of Kerry.” This is a 175 km road that makes a circular loop around the Iveragh Peninsula, which is scenic and rugged. Since we had no car of our own, the only other option to see it all was to join a guided tour. Our hostel offered a reasonably priced tour at €17 per person. Before it departed at 10am, we took a stroll around Killarney on a beautiful morning. Killarney is an adorable little town with colorful shops and pubs, narrow alleys, cute cafes. We ate a quick breakfast in a sunny café…I had tea and scones, and Ryan had his first Irish breakfast…lots of protein!

Our tour bus left promptly as scheduled at 10:15…luckily we were not on one of those gigantic tour buses, but a smaller one holding maybe 20 people. I would say they majority were Americans with a few other Europeans mixed in. The tour guide was a humorous older Kerryman with a strong, at times difficult to understand, Irish accent. He pointed out different things along the way including some of the Irish folklore like “fairy forts” and “fairy trees.” The Irish are quite superstitious people, even to this day. They will not cut down a lone tree in a field as it is called a fairy tree, and if one cuts it down, the fairies will bestow bad luck upon 3 generations of the family. The bus driver said that this is perhaps why the Kennedy’s have had such a tragic family…their ancestor in Ireland was said to have cut down a fairy tree! Fairy forts are basically crumbled ruins of old stone buildings now overgrown with vegetation…also bad luck to mess with these!

The first stop that we took on the tour, was to a place called the Kerry Bog Village. This was most certainly the biggest tourist trap of all! It was a corny little “village” of a few cute thatched roof homes set up to look as they would have in I guess the 1800s even with mannequins. The bogs, however, are a big presence in Ireland. A decently large percentage of Ireland is covered in bog land and this is where they get peat. Peat is basically partially decayed vegetation and is actually an intermediary step in the production of coal. When peat is dried, also called turf, it is used as fuel and 20% of the heating in Ireland comes from peat! It has a very distinctive smell when burned, somewhere between coal and wood, but very much its own aroma. The bogs are great at preserving things…the tour guided talked about how they found a 300 year old barrel of butter in the peat bog which was still as fresh as the day it was buried. Bodies, all over the world, have been found perfectly preserved in bogs. He also said they found a body in Ireland in a bog and started a forensic investigation on it as the body was so fresh, they assumed it a murder victim. They later discovered it was something like 1000 or 2000 years old, still in perfect condition!

The Ring of Kerry tour lasted for 6 hours and we made numerous stops along the way. We saw beautiful scenery with rolling green hills dotted with sheep, cows, and goats and lined with ancient rock walls. The hills were also covered in yellow flower buses called furze (aka. gorse). There were pointy mountains brown mountains including some of the highest in Ireland, MacGillycuddy’s Reeks. We had views of the Atlantic Ocean, Dingle bay and peninsula and the Skellig Islands. I loved seeing all of the farm animals along the road. Since it is spring, there were lots of tiny sheep and calves frolicking about. We had a lunch stop in a town called Waterville. The sun was bright and the sky spotted with fluffy clouds. Ryan and I walked along the beach at Waterville and took lots of beautiful photos. It was pretty quiet that day as it was Good Friday and many places were closed. We decided to opt out of the pub lunch with the tour group and just grabbed some sandwiches and snacks at a convenience store and ate outside. The shoreline offered beautiful views of the green mountains, Skellig Islands, Derrynane Bay, and Beara peninsula.

We made an afternoon stop at the town of Sneam which was very charming with a river running through it. As soon as we got off the bus it seemed the skys opened up and got not only rain but also hale! Luckily it did not last long and we were able to explore the quaint colorful town. It had a nice church with some rock formations behind it. We ended the day by driving through the beautiful Killarney National Park, stopping for a great view from up in the mountains to the lakes down below.

When we returned from a great tour, Ryan and I felt inspired to visit the Skellig Islands, namely Skellig Michael. It is a jagged rocky island off the Iveragh Peninsula that was inhabited by monks in the 7th-8th century! At this time of year, you can also see puffins on the island. It is supposed to be otherworldly and we desperately wanted to go…but unfortunately we realized that without a car, it was nearly impossible for us to get back out to the tip of the peninsula to catch an early morning ferry to the island. Apparently on many days, the ferries can not even depart as the water can be much too choppy. So instead we decided to book another night at Neptune hostel, this time in a shared dorm room, and spend the evening biking around Killarney. We negotiated and got 2 bikes for €14 for the day. We embarked on probably a 14km or more round trip tour of Killarney National Park. Our main points of interest were Ross Castle and Muckross House but we enjoyed all of the beautiful green scenery along the way!

Ross Castle was home to the O'Donoghue can and was built in the 1400s. It is located right on the edge of Lough Leane and has gorgeous views. After exploring that, we headed further into the park to Muckross house. Along the way we saw Japanese deer in the fields and Muckross Abbey. By the time we got to Muckross it was probably about 7pm so there were virtually no tourists around. It is a beautiful mansion built in the 1800s by Scottish architect for an Irish politician. The house is nestled in a valley with green mountains beyond. It has a lovely garden with flowering trees and colorful tulips and even a small glass conservatory. We could have spent a lot of time there but knowing that it would be getting dark around 8pm and we had a ways to go, we headed back on our bikes. I was quickly realizing how out of shape I was and felt exhausted! When we finally made it back to town, we headed out for some dinner. Unfortunately all of the pubs were closed for Good Friday…the stores are not even allowed to sell alcohol. We ended up eating at a Pizza Milano restaurant and wolfed down our food. We were so tired that we had no problem sleeping in our 8 bed shared hostel room. This was Ryan’s now official first hostel experience and he said it wasn’t as bad as he expected!!