The Ryndex

I had left all my packing for Ireland until the last minute, and was in a panic. There was camping gear all over my place, and Sylvain swore when he saw how much stuff I had. We shoved it all into his back seat of his little grey Clio — we would have to repack when we reached Véronique’s house anyway. At her house, we both swore again. The Clio’s back seats can fold down individually, but there was no way we were going to fit all of our gear. We had to start trimming.

One of our three tents got sent back. My spare lantern and one of Véro’s blankets and all of Sylvain’s pots and pans — I’m a camping gadget addict and I had just bought a three piece camp set with a 1.5L and 2.0L pot, a little pan, a lid and a detachable handle. Teflonated and in fashionable black. The laptop got put away — we’d have to rely on the cards of our digital cameras. A pillow and some clothes? Half of our toilet paper? The culling got a bit blurry as we got a bit panicked. We had to be in Cherbourg in the early afternoon — a good four hours away.

There’s another two weeks of vacation, so I’m only going to mention one thing about the 16 hour ferry ride: I don’t like ferry rides. I enjoy free time to sit and think, but there’s something about ferries that makes me feel restless and trapped, and the horrible “reserved seating” that we bought stank of crowded human bodies. Many of the chairs were broken. Here’s Ryan’s Irish Ferries travel tip: if you can’t get a cabin (we couldn’t), bring your sleeping bag and sleep free on the floor somewhere far from the dank, stank “Reserved Quiet Seating”. Here’s another Ryan’s Irish Ferries travel tip: fly.

In fact, that’s not entirely true, since we saved a whack of cash by bringing the car along, even if the ferry trip was more than half the cost of the entire two weeks (1200&euro for three, cattle hold one way, and a cabin on the return).

Cork, Blarney, Dingle, Kerry, Killarney

The next day at noon, we got off the Tedious Boat and drove onto magical Ireland. It was cold, it was grey and it was pouring sheets of rain. We headed grimly in the direction of Killarney. I always knew, theoretically, that in other countries they drive on the left side of the road. I can confirm this theory. It’s the first time I’ve ever experienced this, but it’s like wearing a speedo: it’s odd, but not really that odd, and everyone’s doing it. After a while, you shrug and don’t think of it again.

I’m not permitted to drive in France any more, since I’ve passed the one year grace period where a new resident of France has the same driving privileges as a tourist. But I can drive in Ireland, and I did! “Vroom, vroom” were some of the noises I made getting ready to go, and “Look at me, I’m driving!”.

“Perhaps you should put the car in one of its gears?” was a noise made by Sylvain.

“… and brake at some of the turns?” added Véronique a few moments later.

It stopped raining when we arrived at Fleming’s White Bridge campground just outside of Killarney in the late afternoon, and set up our tents (24.5€ a night for the car, two tents and three adults). It’s different than Canada camping, but in an impressive way. The grounds had thick, well-kept grass. There was an indoor dining room for wet weather, and several sinks with hot and cold running water for washing your dishes. The individual sites weren’t labeled — you picked a good section of grass reasonably far from your neighbours. There were neither picnic tables nor campfire pits.

Like driving on the left, I knew theoretically about the campfires. But I confirmed anyway with an older English lady at the washing up station that night.

“A campfire at the campsite? Oh, how lovely camping in Canada would be!” she exclaimed with convincing wonder. “Still, I’d be afraid of the bears.”

Europeans always bring up the bears. “Grrr,” I replied.

I didn’t mention that I’ve seldom had a hot shower at a campground in Canada, and never a luxury as a washing up station. But I can’t compare the two — we weren’t in Ireland to camp, and we were staying in campgrounds that let us cook our meals, sleep, shower and spend the day touring. A hotel without walls.

So we cooked our supper. Well, we had elected Sylvain cook and Véro and I were washers-up. And then we went to sleep.

Our tent was moist in the morning, but it wasn’t raining. The sky was grey and grim, and threatening as we had our breakfast. We never did have the Irish breakfast, with the eggs and potatoes and white and black pudding — it was always the French style coffee (for Ryan), tea (for Véro) and hot chocolate (for Sylvain), with brioche or pain de mie (a “normal” loaf of sliced white bread) and nutella and jam. I don’t have a lot of breakfasts with French people, so it wasn’t until we reached Ireland that I learned that they drink their hot morning beverages out of a bowl! It’s true, and there is no justification.

We headed off to visit Cork, passing the bright and pretty buildings of Macroom on the way. It was easy to park in the center of the city, and we walked around the Grand Parade and some of the really nice pedestrian streets. Our mission was to find one of those folding picnic tables, and we went from department store to sporting good store. I suspect the Irish salespeople have a conspiracy — they memorize a long chain of stores that they are sure will carry your item. We quit after spending far too long looking.

Our first real tourist stop was after lunch, at the Tower of Shandon. It’s the carillon for the attached church and has a great view of the city. I told the man that we were French and he asked us to play La Marseillaise on the carillon upstairs. Apparently, any old idiot willing to pay the entrance (5€) can ring the bells. There are eight of them, and they’ve thoughtfully provided music. They didn’t have the French national anthem, but they did have O Canada, so I gave it a good effort.

Continuing upstairs, we had to clamber up and over the beams holding the bells themselves. We could touch them. We met a man doing some restoration work — apparently he was hoping that no tourists would arrive while he was up there. Church bells are loud. We also met a breathless woman from Toronto who rushed to the tower to meet us on hearing our anthem. We shared the view at the top of the tower, and I noticed a little door to the belfry, just large enough for a crouching human. And open. So I crunched up and waddled in. It was full of… well, bird waste. There were rickety ladders going up to the upper levels, at least another six metres up, but they were covered with guano, so I opted to return outside.

Back downstairs, I asked the man at the desk about the hole.

“Did you go in?” he asked me. I nodded. “Hmm. And you look so intelligent.” Evidently, the grate had fallen in about six years ago but hadn’t yet been replaced. I thought the grate was there to be walked on, to avoid slipping in bird by-products.

We went to Saint Finbarr Cathedral. They charge to get in, but since it was the end of the day, they let me in for free. The pipe organ was interesting — it was sunk into the ground in a big square sub-basement. Then we passed by Elizabeth fort. There was some sort of police station and some remparts closed for repairs. That might have been it, but it started raining hard, so we went to find a bit of shelter.

Back at the pedestrian mall, we stopped at a little cheese shop and bought a variety of Irish cheeses. The proprietor was a young French man, so we stopped to chat in French for a bit.

Our next stop was Blarney (7€ entrance for the castle and gardens). The castle is in ruins, but the stone is there. You have to lean over backwards and upside down over the void in order to kiss it — which legend says will grant you the gift of eloquence. There’s a man specially designated to hold your legs and collect your tips.

If there’s anyone out there who is going to tell me they heard of a friend of a friend who peed on the most famous and kissable tourist stone in Ireland, you can keep it to yourself. I’m sure the scabby and diseased lips of countless tourists have scoured the stone “clean”.

We went through the gardens as well. There was a “witches stone”, where other tourists had left coins from their countries. I don’t know why, but I inexplicably found a Canadian penny in my pocket, so I left it there as well. I have no idea how a Canadian penny got into my pocket.

We planned the Dingle Peninsula for the next day. This is a skinny peninsula just north of Killarney, and it’s full of prehistoric sites and scenery. I haven’t mentioned the scenery yet — it was already spectacular, but it hit us at full force at Dingle. Wow. We reached the town of Dingle at noon and went to look at the harbour and the local church. It was reaching one of the busiest tourist weeks of the year, and parking was pretty full.

From the town at Dingle, we went to one of the sites on the cover of our Ireland travel guide. The Gallarus Oratory is impressive because it was built without mortar 1100 years ago out of carefully placed layers of stone, in the shape of an upside down boat. It’s still waterproof. Apparently, it’s free if you park on the side of the road and hike in, but we paid 2.5€ to use the parking lot and inevitable gift shop.

The next site (Kilmalkedar) was also a church, but from 200 years later, showing the Roman influence of that period. The graveyard surrounded the church, with mostly modern graves, many noting that the Irish occupant had been repatriated from the States. There were some Gaelic artifacts among the graves that predated the church — a sundial, a stone cross, and an Ogham stone. This was the only Ogham stone that we saw outside of a museum, and I had no idea what it was at the time. Our travel guides were little help, except to note that Ogham stones are found all over the region.

We took a small side road to Dun an oir, or the Golden Fort. There had been an important battle (and subsequent massacre) there many years ago, but now there’s… nothing. It was one of the few sunny moments of the day, and we rambled along the colourful cliff jutting out into the water. There are a few spots where a bump of earth might have been covering one stone on top of another. It would be a nice place for a picnic.

We wound around the little roads in the region, using the terrible, terrible map purchased in Dingle. Based on parking accessibility, we passed by Sybil Head (one of the sub-peninsulas on the Dingle Peninsula) and clambered over Clogher Head instead. It was still grey and windy, and we followed the paths to the end of the head, climbing up and down and over scattered grey rocks. We had time to sit and watch the water for a bit and then headed out to Dunmore Head, where the oscar-winning film “Ryan’s Daughter” was filmed. We went down to the beach and I stood in the Atlantic, getting my shoes wet and my socks sandy. It was chilly enough to need my raincoat, but the beach was still in use.

Continuing the circuit around Dingle, we stopped by a stone house where a charming Irish grandmother was sitting on her porch waiting for tourists. She chatted briefly and charged us each 2€ to walk around her property and check out her beehive huts. At this point, I didn’t know what a beehive hut was, when they were built, or who lived there. The name is apt — it’s a stone hut in the shape of a tall dome, built by stacking flat stones without mortar. A couple of the huts were without roofs, and there was a large double hut built like a figure eight. The grandmother’s ginger cat followed us around, meowing loudly until it was petted. Her sheep, however, generally walked away.

On the way back to the campsite, we stopped at a last point marked on the map. Dunberg Fort dates from the Iron or Bronze age, and was a fortified encampment. It had a large stone hut in the center and a thick wall of stone, and three or four ridges of earth rippling out. The weather had finally committed on a light, spitting rain. When we arrived, there was a man in a plywood shack ready to take our 2€. We were his last customers of the day — he had already gone home by the time we left.

We took the Conor pass home, the highest pass in Ireland. It was very windy, still spitting and eleven degrees Celsius. The view was incredible.

I got to drive back to the campsite (vroom vroom), where we finally sat down to eat the picnic lunch we had prepared that morning. I went to the camp reception and bought electricity for the night, and we realigned our tent so we could get access to a plug and charge our cameras before going to bed.

That night, it rained. Hard. Fortunately, my tent is waterproof on the side that I sleep on. Sylvain was less fortunate. Since it was wet out, we had breakfast in the common room. It didn’t feel like camping, but it was nice to sit down for a bit. We decided to stay in Kerry for two more nights to see both The Ring of Kerry (a famous road tour around the Iveragh peninsula) and the Lakes the following day.

Our first stop was Tesco. I love foreign grocery stores, with all their crazy brand names that the locals think are ‘ordinary’.

We wandered a bit up and down a spit that looked over the Dingle peninsula from the day before, and then picnicked at Caragh Lake. The tour was supposed to go around the peninsula, but we missed a crucial turn and went straight into the heart. This is apparently hiking and rock climbing country, and we saw quite a few bikers as well. When we got back on track, we found ourselves at another stone fort — Cahergall — which had been restored sufficiently that it was safe to walk on. There were little staircases zigzagging up and down the circular mortarless stone walls, which were tall and thick enough to have one or two little rooms built inside. We could see another round stone fort in the distance, as well as the square ruins of an old castle.

Later on in the day, we drove over the bridge to Valencia Island, which is just on the edge of Ireland and one of the important sites in the history of radio. We found an old slate quarry, where a grotto and waterfall had been excavated for a statue of the Virgin Mary. Neat stuff. I like caves.

Because we hadn’t had enough of stone forts yet, we went up and around a narrow road to Staigue Fort, nestled in a protective valley and looking high over the water. It was late enough in the day that we were the only tourists determined enough to visit. It was completely deserted, but we paid our 1€ into a little iron box (for “trespass”). The walls were mortarless stone (obviously a common construction technique for that period, about the fifth century) and about 5 metres high and 4 metres wide. It had the crisscrossing staircases up the inside, but we were asked not to climb them. The View Was Incredible.

We drove back through Killarney park, but it was dark and we didn’t see anything.

We slept in late the next day. I woke up before the others, but I had forgotten to prepare a euro for the showers, so I sat in the common room writing postcards until camp reception had opened. Sylvain and Veronique joined me afterwards, and we started planning the next stages of our trip. This was very difficult, because we didn’t want to pass by any of the important sites, and all the sites were important to us. We finally decided to cut out Northern Ireland entirely and do as much as we could in the south and center.

This was to be our last day in the southwest, and we stayed close to Killarney. We ate at the Danny Mann Pub, which was deserted at lunchtime. This was my first restaurant meal in Ireland — Sylvain and I had the fish and chips and Véronique had the lamb stew. It was magically delicious! I believe Véronique won this round, since I didn’t find another Irish stew that looked as good as hers. Sylvain and Véronique had the Apple and Bramble crumble, leaving me to explain what bramble was (I think it’s where they threw Brer Rabbit or something). I had the Bread and Butter Pudding for dessert, since the waitress couldn’t explain what it was (it’s a bready cake with raisins and custard).

We drove off to the Ladies View, which looks over the Lakes of Killarney, the forests and the mountains. It’s named after a visit from Queen Victoria and her entourage, who were taken with the view. The View Was Incredible. Well, it was.

A couple of steps away and we visited Moll’s Gap, which is a pass through the mountains in the area. TVWI. In the middle of gawking and gaping at the incredible view, Véronique recognized some carnivorous plants off the path. Hooray for carnivorous plants! We spent some time ignoring the incredible view and taking some macro photos for a change. Then we went to the Moll’s Gap Giftshop. Sylvain bought a sweater and I bought a keychain that said “Ryan” with my very own coat of arms. I normally don’t encourage the commercial bastardization of the important work of Heraldry, but it had white lions on it, and hey, I’m a tiger. So close enough.

We breezed through Torc Waterfall, which was merely nice after a day of incredible views, and headed to a long hike through Dunloe Gap. All of our guidebooks emphasized that you can’t drive through Dunloe Gap — which isn’t only technically true. The roads were fine, and there were plenty of motorists that passed us, but I was glad to walk. TVWI. There were lush little lakes and collapsed cliff faces. You could hear underground rivers. If we had walked far enough, we would have made it back to Moll’s Gap, but we turned around at the halfway point so we could get back to the car before it got dark.

We had hooligans that night, with that noise they call music and the shouting. Another camper asked them to keep it down. So they did.

The Burren, Connemara, Aran Islands

The next day was a travel day, on to stage two of our trip — towards a campsite at Spiddal, near Galway. We hadn’t realized that it was a bank holiday, and a long weekend for the Irish, so our trip of about 240 kilometers took us five and a half hours. It warmed up to 24 degrees, but we were stuck bumper to bumper in the car. We hate the city of Ennis. I’m sorry, Ennisians, but not as sorry as your traffic management.

We were camping in Spiddal, one of the strongly Gaelic regions of Ireland, where the language is currently spoken. Most of the campsites near Galway were full because of The Galway Races, a famous annual horse racing event. Our campsite was much smaller and muddier than in Killarney, but we found a quiet and enclosed spot to set up our tents and unpack. We took a quick trip through the little village and to the grocery store to get some provisions, planned our next day and then went to bed.

Our next destination was backtracking slightly to The Burren. Geologically, the area was originally a vaste wasteland of limestone, a single sheet covering everything. Hundreds of thousands of years of erosion wore away fissures and cracks which were attacked and filled by an amazing variety of plants. Mediterranean and Alpine species coexist here, many of them rare.

Newtown castle was abandoned. Corkscrew hill was mislabeled.

But we made it to Aillwee cave. I love caves. I like the fact that there’s a hundred metres of mountains above your head and if you turn off the lights, it’s 100% dark. No exit signs, blinking digital lights or little red equipment indicators. Aillwee cave is not an insane geological fairyland though — it’s a fairly young cave, only about 8000 years old, and much of that was spent submerged. It’s still partially submerged every year (all the electrical fittings are specially waterproofed). Thus, there were only a few formations, stalactites and stalagmites. One of the interesting features of this cave is three hibernation pits for brown bears, where some ancient brown bear bones were found. I didn’t know that this was odd until the guide pointed out that this was the only cave with bear remains in Ireland. There aren’t any bears in Ireland. They don’t know what they’re missing… Nice gift shop, though.

We passed a long time wandering around The Burren. It goes on for as far as the eye can see — covering hills and plains, an incredible view — but the tiny details are also interesting. The fissures are wildly sculpted but shallow, and the plants are bright and hardy. Walking on the layers of limestone gives a hollow, knocking sound.

Driving on, we stopped at Poulnabrone, the most famous dolmen in the area. I think this was a prehistoric grave, made of a few enormous stones in the shape of a door. Sylvain and Véronique dodged around and around the tomb, trying to take a decent picture without any of the busload of tourists in it. I gave up early and took a picture of the busloads of tourists swarming over the thing.

We found a perfumery that specialised in the fabrication of perfumes and soaps out of plants growing in the Burrent. I stopped for some gift shop stuff from there.

Leamaneh Castle was closed.

We continued on to see the sculpted Kilfenora High Crosses. They had been taken away for restoration. The 12th century cathedral was closed for renovation.

Our last stop of the day couldn’t be closed — the Cliffs of Moher are an incredible view among incredible views — it’s a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It’s frighteningly high at 183 metres, and only a bit is open to the public, because the rest is “closed” and “dangerous” and “fenced off”. We did our safe walk behind the fence, and then followed a tour group of elderly ladies up and over it to get the real view along the muddy and slippery dirt path.

At one point, I stood at the edge of one of the rock shelves with my back to the cliff and took a picture of my foot over the void. I normally don’t have vertigo, but that did it for me. Shivers.

I tried to explain to Sylvain and Véronique that the litter barrels were technically inaccurate, because once garbage is off the ground it ceases to be litter. They weren’t very impressed.

Back to the campground, and retired to the camp kitchen to sit up writing postcards and recharging our cameras.

The region for the next day was Connemara, the boggy interior north of Galway famous for its mountains and scenery.

The first stop was Roundstone, a village on the ocean noted for it’s artisanal crafts — Gift Shop among gift shops. The music store we visited was worth the detour. I was seriously tempted to buy a big bodhran, but I left the percussion behind to focus on my tin whistling. If you’re into original pottery or decorative metalwork, this is the place to visit.

We spent the rest of the morning on a beach with clear water and white sand among black rocks. The sand was strange — it was made of tiny twisted worm shaped shells, and it was pokey on the feet. The water had carefully sifted this stuff based on size, so I spent a long time looking for pretty shells.

We did the route through Sky Road, which as an incredible view as promised, and headed up towards the north towards the Twelve Bens. These are twelve mountain peaks, and they are as well known in France as the Blarney Stone is in Canada. We stopped by the Kylemore Abbey, which was a manor and then a nunnery, and is now a girl’s school. The tour was very interesting, especially the abbey gardens which were used to feed the Sisters and were being restored from ruins today.

On the way back home, we stopped and checked out some of the peat bogs. Peat is a layer of dead vegetation that can only partially decompose in the extremely moist and acidic ground, which is dried and burned as fuel. It acts as a great preservative, so many ancient Celtic artifacts have been found undecayed in the peat. It also acts as a sort of quicksand, so many Ireland tourists can be discovered and studied in the future. You are not supposed to hike through this area without a seasoned guide.

I’d already been finding the road signage a bit hysterical in Ireland, but I’ve never been cautioned so much as in Connemara — Slow! Please go slow! Loose chippings! Major Road Work! Sheep! Horses! Narrow bridges! Slopes, bends! Won’t somebody think of the soft shoulders?!

Our next day was unique: the Aran Islands. We drove directly to the port at Rossaveal — picturesque route, incredible view, grey and green panorama spilled out over the world by the perfectly proportioned hand of God, blah-de-dah — and got on a foot passenger ferry (19€ round trip, 3€ parking) to the main city on the largest of the Islands. We hired bikes at the town of Kilronan (10€ for the day) and set off. We biked the length of the island, stopping in Kilmurvy for lunch. I had the Irish stew with rough Irish brown bread and Guinness in the juice at Nan Phidi’s Restaurant, and I introduced the French to carrot cake. Just like mom makes!

Our first tourist stop off the bikes was Dun Aengus, one of the most well-preserved prehistoric forts in Europe. It’s in the shape of a three layers of stone walls in a semi-circle against a sheer 80 metre cliff. In between the second and third wall of stone, the builders placed chevaux de frise, upended sharp rocks designed to be impassible for horses or carts. It’s unknown whether the fort was designed as a semicircle or whether the other half of the fort crumbled away into the ocean. I guess we could always ask a geologist, but meh — I’m already in my pajamas.

The cliff didn’t have any barriers. You could stand as close as you wanted and lean way, way over, and the only thing preventing you from plummeting to your death was yourself. Apparently there had been some fatalities, but not enough to wreck it for the rest of us.

We continued our biking along the island in the sun. It was beautiful weather, warm enough to discard extra clothing. The boys took off their shirts and Véronique was the cleverest of all — she had unzippable pant legs. Ingenious! We saw Clochan na Carraige; a clochan is a beehive hut, and this one sheltered a monk. Next was Teampall Breachain, where there were “7 churches”. There are, in fact, seven foundations but only two of them were churches. There was a graveyard spanning the ages from Roman inscribed stones to freshly dug with flowers.

The next church was Teampall an Cheathrair Alainn, which really summed up the Aran tourist experience. The Aran Islands belong to the same geological region as The Burren — flat and stone, but windier. Nothing would grow here for the earliest inhabitants, who lived by fishing. But generations of islanders built up tiny plots with rock fences that sheltered the ground from the worst of the wind. They added layers and layers of dried and decomposed seaweed, sand and vegetation to create their own compost and eventually land capable of providing basic agriculture. To get to these little churches, you had to follow the vaguest of signs to a point where you could drop your bike, and clamber over the little fences, sometimes with only the dust of previous tourist feet to guide you through the little rock maze of fences and stiles. We were lucky, we had a bit of help from a cottager with her border collie.

We covered most of the island in the day, and headed back to the port to buy as much water as we could carry and take the ferry back. Hooray for the Aran Islands!

Clanmacnoise, Glendalough, Dublin

The next morning, we broke camp and stuffed it in the Clio, and set off in the direction of Dublin. By the end of the day, we needed to be at our next campsite, snuggled in the Wicklow mountains in the east of Ireland, just south of Dublin.

On our way, we stopped at Clonmacnoise, which I insisted on pronouncing in French (ending with a nwahz instead of noyz). This is a monastery founded in the sixth century, and we got to see one of the typical Irish monastery towers — a thin, featureless round tower with a conical top. The top at Clanmacnoise had fallen off, but we did get to finally see some high crosses. There were two complete stone crosses, about three metres high. One was covered in sculpted scenes from the scriptures and the other was more ornamental with elaborate knotwork patterns. The original crosses were from the 9th century and were recently moved (after more than a thousand years) into a visitor’s centre to protect them from the climate and tourists. Good fibreglass replicas were placed in the monastery ruins, which was pretty cool because you could go up and poke them without feeling like a vandal.

One of the churches in the monastery was still active, although only giving one service a month while searching for a full-time rector. There was also a large open air pulpit where the Pope prayed.

We ended the day in our next campsite — Moat Farm Camping and Caravan in Donard. It was great! Scenery, just off of a small two-pub village, plenty of well-kept, soft and clean grass for the tents and tons of space. The shower and cooking facilities were spotless, and they even let us leave our cameras in their office overnight so we wouldn’t have to move our tents to an electrical hookup. I think word of mouth is important — if you ever need to camp near Dublin, stay there.

We headed towards Glendalough monastery the next day, but like the pilgrims from a century before, we stopped in the Wicklow mountains at the Wicklow Gap. There used to be a stone paved path through the peat, and some of it remains. Today, the pigrimage path is a hiking trail.

Glendalough was founded by St. Kevin in the sixth century. It’s a monastic city, with a number of buildings, churches, a well-preserved round tower and of course, graves. There were several graves from the early eighteenth century in readable condition (although it’s possible they had been recut). The view was incredible. We took a lot of pictures, and took advantage of some of the trails between the monastery and the lakes. We visited a spot where St. Kevin is said to have meditated, isolated for days in his stone cell in the woods. There is a legend that a blackbird once laid an egg in his unmoving and outstretched hand while he contemplated and prayed.

That day, we also visited the Russborough house, once of the only “modern” stops on our trip. This is a mansion from the mid-eighteenth century, most recently owned by Sir Alfred Beit, one of the inheritors fo the de Beers fortune. It’s particularly famous for the white stucco sculpture ornamenting the walls and ceiling. We had a nervous, charming older lady take our group through the house pointing at each piece of furniture, dating and identifying it’s origin. In one of the rooms, we were respectfully asked not to tread on a priceless sixteenth century Turkish carpet. Apparently, despite the fact that black-hat carpet experts insisted it should be under glass in a museum, the still-living Lady Beit prefers it to be on the floor for the public. Darn those carpet experts anyway and their elitist ways!

The outside of the mansion was a dull grey, but I found another copy of the Farnese Hercules in the wings of the colonnade. This is the statue of Hercules leaning on a staff holding the golden apples behind his back, and now I’ve seen copies in three countries, including two chateaux in France and the original in Naples. The Irish revolution of 1796 was fought on the lawns in front of the mansion, and entered the house. It’s remarkable that the only damage to the building was from the soldiers boots on the floors.

The Powerscourt gardens had closed, so we went to see the Powerscourt waterfall. What a ripoff. 4€ each and ten minutes total to see a trickle of water blubbering down a little cliff. Not recommended.

We went to Bray Head, a panorama of the coast in the suburbs south of Dublin, where Véronique freed a toddler’s head from an iron fence. He was wailing and she was the only one to notice. He found his mother, but we had to chase them down because we still had his bottle.

We drove around the mountains and found the Glenmacnoss waterfall, which was free but mostly inaccessible, and we visited another Incredible View at Sally Gap, and then found our way back to the campsite.

Our last full day in Ireland was reserved for the city of Dublin. We knew it couldn’t be done in one day, and headed straight for the center of the city to give it a good shot. We cut off several of the major attractions immediately for time constraints — no Phoenix Park, no National Gallery, no Guinness Warehouse tours.

We visited the exterior of St. Patrick’s Cathedral, but we were too fatigued from a week of entrance fees — the prospect of paying 4€ to visit a functioning church, well, it’s understandable when it’s a tourist attraction, but it’s not pretty. Inside the church were all the flags of the Knights of St. Patrick, the viceroys that ruled Ireland standing in for the King of England.

I thought I head read that only one of the two major churches in Dublin charged admission, so we headed off to the other. Christ Church Cathedral only had a strongly worded invitation to pay their 4€ fee, along with an apologetic note stating that these historic sites receive no maintenance support from the Irish government, and cost upwards of 100€ an hour to maintain. Polite, but no dice.

We walked on to Dublin Castle, which has been there since the early thirteenth century, although completely reconstructed in the eighteenth century. The tour was great (4.5€, 1 hour). Our guide was well-informed and entertaining, and incorporated much of Irish history, their struggle for and achievement of Independance and resulting current issues. We saw the room where the revolutionary James Connolly was kept before execution — he was injured, so he had to wait for five days while the law was changed to permit him to be executed by firing squad sitting instead of standing. We heard the story of Robert Emmett and his famous speech: “let no man write my epitaph”. We saw decorations from the days of the viceroys, decorated with the symbols of England, Scotland and Ireland: the Unicorn, Lion and Harp, or the Rose, Thistle and Trefoil.

We saw the “overflow parking” for the standards of the most recent Knights of St. Patrick for the most recent viceroys, since the spots in St. Patrick’s Cathedral had been filled. Of course, since the Independence of Ireland in 1922, there won’t be any more Knights, but we saw the coats of arms of the Irish Presidents they’ve had since (two of which have been female).

We ate in a pub, which was an obvious mistake. I had chosen a recommended restaurant from the guide, but it was closed for the day. I had the Irish Stew on the grounds that it couldn’t be too offensive, and it wasn’t.

At that point, we separated for the first time in Ireland. I went to check out the Book of Kells, a sixth century illuminated manuscript at Trinity college. The exhibit was relatively expensive (7€), but worth it. I finally learned that Ogham stones was an alternative way of recording text using a series of coded slashes. There were a couple of rooms dedicated to the art of book binding and ancient books, on the art and technique of scribes and illuminating, and on several of the most important illustrations in the Book of Kells. The last room actually contained the books, one opened to a page showing text (book of Luke describing the ancestry of Jesus) and another opened up to an illuminated page, the entire page decorated with precision and detail. I would have liked to see other pages of the books, but the CDROM was 30€. Forget that.

From the Book of Kells, you return to the gift shop through a long hall of old books. Apparently this hall was the inspiration for the Jedi library in that hackneyed and tired sci-fi film that won’t die the death it deserves. But that’s another subject (meesa gotta bone to pick!)

It was my last opportunity, so I bought my Irish sweater. I paid too much for an obviously machine knit sweater “in the style of Aran Islands”, but I really liked it. Hooray for Irish sweaters! I saw the Molly Malone statue and took a picture.

We wandered around the Liffey river and through Temple Bar, the famous pubbing district. It would have been nice to stop for a drink, but we were pretty tired and still had to drive back to the campsite, so we decided to check out one of the village pubs for a Guinness. Which we did. And it was good.

The next day — pack, drive to Rosslare, get on the ferry. This time we had a cabin, which is highly recommended after the painful cattle “reserved seating” on the way in. We slept, woke, wandered the boat, and got back to the insane heat wave that was terrorizing France. From 20 degrees Celsius to 40!

In conclusion, Ireland is fun, but there’s too much stuff to see and we didn’t drink enough beers. The end.