So! after leaving the girls in Munich I ventured up on the train to Marburg to meet my good friend from home Kate who has moved to Germany to teach for a while. It’s nice to know i have a good friend so close in Europe. It was great to see her and her host family were very kind to put me up there for a few days. Marburg is a lovely little medieval town not far from Frankfurt with cobble stoned streets and beautiful old buildings. Kate and I had originally talked of going to Poland from here for a few weeks since neither of us had been there before and we both had a keen interest in seeing the country. However after looking into things a bit more Kate informed me it would be difficult to get to from Marburg and not easy to travel around, so we decided in the end on going to Ireland… which was fine by me since it was what i had originally wanted to do during this time anyway before I made plans to catch up with Kate. I had been to Ireland as a kid with the family but it was so long ago now (13 years maybe) that all my memories of the UK have rolled into a bit of a blur. So it was rather exciting to be going back and doing it myself.
so after much debate about costs we decided to hire a car from Dublin Airport and just wing it bascially. We arrived in Dublin to…yep you guessed it, rain! After managing to find our car, it was a relief to dump my 20kg bag which i can tell you I am fast getting sick of carrying, in the boot and take a hold of the steering wheel again. Happy to be designated driver of our little Corsa, we took off….. ah so good to be in a car again….
Until i hit the first exit at the airport and was met with a traffic signal controlled round-a-bout. WTF?! since when do round-a-bouts have traffic lights? doesn’t that defeat the purpose? So after circling it a few times and getting cut off by people and generally bluffing my way through with no idea, we eventually managed to get onto the correct motorway out of town and headed straight for the town of Kilkenny. A busy little Irish town with a lot of pubs (how unusual….) we found our first night’s accomodation no problems and enjoyed a hearty pub meal with a pint of Kilkenny, in Kilkenny. Whilst in town we visited the Castle which was quite cool… and very complete compared to everything else we would see on the trip! With a vast green lawn sprawling out around it and autumn coloured trees dotted aorund the grounds, the big grey castle was quite spectacular. Here we also visited the first of many ruins on our trip, Kell’s Priory, an old monastic site that has absolutely no information posted anywhere, and the only visitors there were us. This was also the first time in years I actually walked through green, green, wet grass! We wandered through the site which had the remains of an old church and the rest was left up to our imaginations. I was quite shocked that such a beautiful place could be left so much to ruin… the grave sites were overgrown and we were allowed to wander over these ruins as we pleased. I thought that such a place would have moe upkeep… but then Kate pointed out, in a country that is so so old and is littered with old sites like this, how do you maintain all of them? How do you decided which sites are the most important? Very true.
And so we ventured on, headed towards Cork. On the way we stopped at (another) monastic site The Rock of Cashel, and a cottage Kate wanted to see, and then we hit the mayhem of Cork, a drivers nightmare of one way roads and peak hour traffic. I was so frustrated by the end of it that by the time we found our hostel we decided to get out of there early in the morning and move on. So we didn’t see Cork at all. The next morning we headed (in the rain) toward Blarney to kiss the Blarney Stone at Blarney Castle (and receive eternal eloqouence aparently). I remember doing it as a kid… and nothing was different the second time around!
Blarney Castle
So after creeping through the tiny stairwells of the castle in the rain we set on our way again and ended up in Trallee, a town near the Ring of Kerry and the Dingle Peninsula. The town itself was fairly ordinary, and our attempts to find a cute Irish pub to drink at were met with dissapointment as we again entered another one to feel completley like we were intruding on the locals. This would be a recurring thing on this trip. Maybe we were just choosing the wrong places but we never felt entirely comfortable wherever we went.
Using Trallee as a base for a few nights after finding a very comfortable hostel we decided against driving the Ring of Kerry due to the famously narrow roads (which i hate to imagine after already driving through some ridiculously narrow roads already on the this trip) on which i may be met with oncoming buses (no thank-you). so instead we decided that the Ring of Dingle (western most point of the country) would be just as spectacular… and it certainly was well worth it. After driving over the Connor Pass, the highest pass in Ireland and a most spectacular drive through a barren brown landscape, we were met with the beautiful peninsula of rolling green hills dotted with sheep, that meet the beautiful blue ocean, all against the backdrop of blue skies.
Dingle Peninsula
This was the moment we realised the benefits having a car, because seeing this countryside would be very difficult without one. We visited the visitors centre for the Blasket Islands which lie off the coast of the peninisula and used to be home to a small community of gaelic people up until the 50’s when the last inhabitants were evacuated… no wonder since the islands were subject to such harsh weather conditions and life was increadibly hard. One has to wonder why anyone would have chosen to live there.
The next day was a similarly beautiful drive along the Burren, a coastline of grey rocky outcrops and cliffs almost moonlike in appearance. We were headed toward the village Doolin and the nearby Cliffs of Moher. Doolin was a small fishing village with a lively pub with traditional music, at which i ate the most beautiful piece of atlantic salmon i have ever tasted. And a few doors down was a home made fudge shop which Kate and I nearly died in. I’m not one for fudge usually but this was something else! The Cliffs of Moher were quite stunning although the time of day we visited wasn’t the greatest for lighting, and i do believe we didn’t see it at it’s most beautiful.
Cliffs of Moher
Actually Kate and I agreed that as nice as they were, nothing compares to the cliffs of the Great Ocean Road at home. And for me, i didn’t find these cliffs as special as the White Cliffs of Dover which i remember being mesmerised by as a kid. We did attempt to wait around the at the cliffs to see the sunset, but it seemed to be taking an awfully long time to set, and it was dreadfully cold by this point. After deciding the sunset didn’t look like it was going to be all that great, we left. we visited the fudge shop at this point, and then the moment we came out, we saw a brilliant splash of pink and orange across the sky which hadn’t been there before. Typical! so we raced down to the water to take some snaps and watch the wonderful sky turn to night.
From Doolin we didn’t have much of a plan, so we took off north again, deciding to give Galway city a miss. We ended up driving up into the Conemara region at the suggestion of the Lonely Planet… which turned out to be one of my most favourite drives of the trip. Like a few of the other areas we had visited, like the Dingle Peninsula, Conemara is Gaelic speaking, which we had great entertainment in witnessing at a local servo. It has to be one of the funniest languages i have ever heard. It’s easy to forget that they actually speak various forms of Gaelic in many parts of Britain, and when you actually hear it, it’s so intriguing! It literally sounds like nothing else, it’s like jibberish. It certainly adds something to the feel of the country, it’s hard to describe. The landscape in this region was so different to anything we had seen so far, and nothing like i had expected to see in Ireland. Brown barren mountainous landscape with glassy lakes dotted around, and the whole place covered in an eery mist. It was much more like the highlands in Scotland than what we had been seeing in Ireland with the green rolling hills. We stumbled upon Kylemore Abbey which was a stunning grey building set in the hills overlooking a beautiful lake… so very picturesque.
Kylemore Abbey
We ended up staying in a quiet little town with the dorm to ourselves (again) and set off the next day towards Dublin. I would have like to have spent more time seeing the national park but it was hideous weather and we had a long drive ahead of us.
I had hoped that we would be able to find somewhere nice and picturesque along the way to Dublin to stay at overnight… but I now realise there is a reason the centre of Ireland is not mentioned in the Lonely Planet… there is jack all there! We attempted along the way at various points to find tourist info centres but they were all closed. Trying to find accomodation was a nightmare, and 70Euro for a very ordinary b&b was not a favourable option. Well into the evening we ended up finding ourselves in Slane which was much further than we had intended to get, but the accomodation there was cheap and we got a private room so we stayed for 2 nights. From here we explored the Boyne Valley and the Bru na Boinne monument, a neolithic burial ground created 5000 years ago, predating Stonehenge by 1000 years.
Bru na Boinne (Newgrange)
It is quite an amazing structure, they say that not a drop of water has leaked through since its creation. The only time when the chamber inside the mound is lit up is at the winter solstice each year when the sun’s rays shine straight in through the passage. One has to wonder how all this was created so perfectly 5000 years agon, and how these thousands of stones used to create it were trasported from 30 and 60 miles in opposite directions of the site. It has certainly puzzled modern engineers, a team of which tried to replicate the monument… and failed. Quite an amazing place!
From Slane we also visited the seaside village of Blackrock, which I of course had to visit, my hometown in Melbourne being Black Rock. I could see a slight similarity between the two towns, although I’m not sure if this was psychological with me wanting to find similarities rather than there actually being any.
And so we headed on to Dublin to return the car which I had grown quite fond of, and spend a few days in the capital of the country. Kate has a friend in Dublin who we were luck enough to be able to stay with. While we were in the city we went to see the Book of Kells which is an illuminated manuscript containing the 4 Gospels of the New Testament, dated in the 8th century I think, and complete with some amazing artwork and calligraphy. And on a similar theme we visited the Chester Beatty Library which was an amazing collection of manuscripts and artwork collected by Chester Beatty himself, who then donated the collection to the people of Ireland. We saw illuminated copies of the Qu’ran, pieces of papyrus with gospels printed on them dated 150AD, and other amazing artefacts from the far east and asia. Even a quite increadible collection of snuff bottles. Quite increadible that this one man aquired all this himself personally during his lifetime. This is a museum I would definately recommend to anyone visiting Dublin. We also visited the Guiness factory which i am very glad for having a free pass to, as we both found it a total waste of time. You don’t actually see any brewing of the stout beer at all, it’s just a loud, over the top exhibition. Of course we had a pint at the end, which i attempted to finish but just couldn’t. At least i tried! The most exciting part of the factory was seeing Vince Vaughn… and not just a glance from afar. I remember seeing this guy on the escalators and saying to kate “haha, that guy really looks like Vince Vaughn…” then i realised that was because he was was Vince Vaughn! We then somehow got stuck behind their tour group and managed to follow him the whole way through.
Vince Vaughn
I would have loved to got a photo but couldn’t bring myself to hassle him. Ah well…. i got a sneaky pic of him at the bar for proof anyway!
Callum was kind enough to take us on a drive through the Wicklow mountains just out of Dublin one afternoon, where we drove past a farm they used to film at for one of my favourtie movies P.S. I Love You, and visited the famous Johnny Fox pub… where many a many a famous person has visited. Actors, musicians, and politicians including Johnny Howard. Quite a cute lively pub with some great live music and some food that i was salivating at each time the waiters walked past. I would have loved to have eaten there but by the time we got a table and got our food it would have been several hours later. To our amusement we were having a sticky beack at the rooms at the back of the pub (all the rooms walls are covered in weird and wonderful paraphernalia) and there was a single table of people eating dinner in there, which i didn’t take any notice of until Kate started giggling… and we realised it was Vince Vaughn, again. Twice in 2 days, seriously I was starting to think he was stalking me…
hehe.
I wouldn’t say Dublin is the prettiest city or that there is particularly much to do there… but the few things we did see were quite cool. Except the abundance of Australian Ugg brand ugg boots nicely priced at an average of 200Euro =$400. I’m not sure if Europeans just really love our ugg boots and are stupid enough to pay these ridiculous prices for them, or if the recession (particularly bad in Ireland I might add, everything was sooooo expensive) has just hit the old sheepskin slipper in a big way. Either way… Ugg boots are an obsession over here and I for one just do not get it!
So that bought us to the end of our trip through the lovely Ireland and the end of our Kate reunion. It was a great opportunity for me to see a part of the world I vaguely remember seeing as a child… it was quite a strange feeling going to a place having a strange recollection of having been there before. It was really nice to go back and do it myself and being able to properly appreciate it as an adult. Especially the difficulties my parents must have endured of driving the tiny country roads… where the speed signs will say 80 on one side of the road but 100 on the other (what the??), and where there will be a painted “very slow” on the road with a speed sign post of 100 planted right next to it. Not to mentioned the fact that these speed limits of 100 are on tiny, winding, bumpy little laneways with blind corners that terrified me at times. But it’s all a part of the experience hey?! A great few weeks with a good friend was just what I needed before settling in to the coming months of cold wet and dark England. But more on that next time 
Took the dog up with us which was great. 4 hours in the car on the way up and she was a restless as I’ve ever seen her! Then for the whole weekend she was harassed by the 1 year old lab pup Tess who has boundless amount of energy and a fascination with Minka’s fluffy ears. She seems to also be a bit confused as she constantly kept mounting Minka and humping her like there was no tomorrow, haha. Minka didn’t move the whole way home, and neither did she move for about 3 days after we got home!
Coffee and breakfast outings, a quick trip to the Mornington Peninsula for some wine tasting and R&R, lazing by the pool and having a splash down the beach. Needless to say i am feeling much better! Sunshine does wonders. Although so do drugs, haha. Still can’t believe how unwell I actually was back when I was in the UK those last few weeks and when I got home. It’s not til now that I am feeling so much better that I realise how crap i actually felt. I am so so thankful that I was at the Robbins’s at the time and not living in a backpackers as I am sure I would have been a lot worse. I am ever in debt to that lovely family who looked after me so well. 