Ireland, part 2

Tuesday, Sept. 23rd. We had another long drive today, from Dingle all the way across the south to Mary’s house in An Rinn. My mom took a turn at driving, and she turned out to be very good at it. She really liked driving the Jag. (Dad is so jealous, btw.) Anyway, we broke up the trip with a stop in Killarney, which isn’t really much to see, but all the tourists go there because it’s one of the famous town names. We took a tour of Muckross House, which was the first of many really old places we visited. They also had pretty gardens, which we also saw many of.

We got lost due to some detour – Ireland is FULL of detours, btw – every other road is under construction, and unlike here, where you can just go around the block or so to avoid it, you have to go miles out of your way. And of course, the roads are poorly marked, so if you get lost, you could be going in the wrong direction for hours and never know it – and even if you DO know you’re wrong, you have to go for miles before you can find a place to turn around. But finally, we found Mary’s house, after stopping for directions at a gas station and procuring frozen pizza for dinner (which my mother proclaimed to be the best frozen pizza she’d ever eaten – I think she was really, really hungry).

The house is absolutely beautiful, as is the land surrounding it. It’s right on a cliff overlooking the sea, and plunked down in the middle of fields and cow pastures. We actually had cows for next-door neighbors. They’d moo at us and Meg and I would moo back. And OMG, at night! It was sooo dark, and you could see a million stars. Not even in the remotest place I’ve ever been in the US have I seen this many stars.

Wednesday, Sept. 24th. Kind of a resting day. Meghan and I slept late while my mom and Aunt Lynne went for a walk around our “neighborhood.” (We really did have neighbors on one side, but everything was so spread out that it was a hike to the nearest store and pub.) Late in the afternoon, we took a trip to Dungarvan, which is the closest real town to where we stayed. They have castle ruins, of course (you’d think it was a requirement in Ireland that each town be ridiculously adorable and have some sort of interesting ruin), and were again on a harbor where we saw a little seal or sea lion hanging out.