Day 6: Wednesday (6/12/2013)

Another early start.  Today: exploring Dingle!

Breakfast at our B&B was extremely good.  I've really grown to love whole-wheat Irish soda bread, fresh butter, and tea to start the day.

We fired up the Vomit Comet and headed out onto the Dingle Loop, a fantastic narrow road around the outer Dingle peninsula with amazing views and plenty of interesting stops along the way.  Surprisingly, it wasn't raining--but we knew that wouldn't last.  So far Ireland's weather is turning out to be Seattle, only without all the sunshine and 15 degrees colder.

I too expect random children's
shoes in collections of prehistoric
artifacts.

The first stop: the Celtic Prehistoric Museum.  This was basically the display of one man's collection...inside his house.  The proprietor was actually from the Bay Area and spoke the lingo--he immediately asked if we were from the city, east bay, or south bay.  It turned out he did his undergrad at UC Santa Cruz. The collection was extremely eclectic, containing everything from goddess figurines from 2,000 BC to 18th century leather children's shoes the guy found while digging in the muck below his houseboat in Amsterdam (why would you randomly dig...oh, never mind).  Overall, it was a worthwhile stop.

It's about to slide right off the cliff.

Next we stopped at Dunbeg Fort, a series of defensive earthen walls and ditches surrounding a stone wall, surrounding a series of small buildings right at the edge of a cliff--and in fact, falling off the cliff bit by bit.  The fort is built in the Iron Age of Ireland (~400 AD).  We wandered the ruin before crossing the road and watching the video on it.  Um, enjoy the amazing reenactments by local actors.

The rain held off through about noon, then started really letting us have it.  Undaunted, we donned scuba gear and continued.

She's a feisty one.

We next went roughly 50 yards up the hill to a thatched cottage abandoned by a family named Kavanaugh 150 years ago, during the famine.  I was initially dubious, but after exploring the complex and the surprisingly informative exhibit that explained the potato famine, I think this sight is underrated.  It's very interesting, although it could probably do without the freaky mannequins.

We continued up the road to a group of beehive huts, or clochans, while stopping at several viewing points for pictures--amazingly beautiful views despite the rain.  The huts themselves are worth viewing, and in amazingly good shape.

Speaking of that, I wonder a bit about the appearance of several of these "ancient" ruins.  While viewing the clochans, we saw two workers from an "Archeology crew" (according to the sign) disassembling other pieces of the fort (using pickaxes!) to rebuild a building within the walls.  That's archeology?  Really?  Hmm.

Thanks to the rain, we continued through several pull off views (which now had very little visibility) until we reached Ionad An Blascaod Mór (Great Blasket Centre).

Here, we stopped.  Until now, I had no idea about the Blasket islands or their role in the rediscovery of Irish culture.  The islands (the westernmost point of Europe) were left behind by progress as the residents there spoke/wrote Gaelic daily as they struggled against the elements to survive.  Greater Bhasket island was only abandoned in 1950 as the population declined.  The islands are a ruin today, but their role in the documentation and rediscovery of Irish culture was absolutely vital.  The center was absolutely worth the stop--we learned quite a bit about these amazing people.

The Gallarus Oratory

From there we continued on through the rain to the Gallarus Oratory.  This is essentially a funky-looking church built out of stacked rocks.  Technically, the construction is supposed to be drystone--but if you look closely at the interior, there is definitely mortar or caulk crammed in the seams.  A later edition?  Preservation work?  Who knows.

We continued on with the intent to stop at Kilmalkedar (Cill Mhaoil-cheadair), but the tour buses were so dense by this time that combined with the rain we just viewed it from the roadside, and continued back into Dingle.

For dinner, we hit the Murphy House pub with Allie and Paul, two of Mary's good friends who also happened to be in Dingle on their honeymoon.  Really nice folks--we had a great time over dinner, drinks, and of course, Irish music!

The music at Murphy House was more lively, but technically less adept than the previous night's music at  John Benny Morrisey's.  This time, it included singing.  The highlight of the evening was the performers singing an involved song about Ally cheating on Paul with me while the crowd giggled.  Awk-ward...

Stuffed and drunk, we reluctantly ended the night and crashed.