The alarm went off way too early this morning, or so it seemed. After breakfast we hit the road again. Our first stop was in Kinvara. A little village with a harbour. Justine was wanting to sate her daily desire for photos of some boats. Boat wise it was unimpressive today, however it is another fine example of a small Irish Fishing village. As we were walking around the harbour Justine kept attracting the attention of a small round Irish man of obvious Viking descent. Every time I turned around this guy was talking to her, and every time I wandered over to join them, he would disappear. He did tell us that they had their Cuckoo Festival here yesterday, which sounds like it doesn’t have so much to do with cuckoos as it seems to be more about a gypsy fair. This guy seemed to be more obsessed about a particular event that took place last night, than anything else through the day. He told Justine that there was a ‘Girl Fight’ induced by alcohol. He wanted to know if Justine had ever seen one. No matter what the topic, he seemed to veer back to the ‘Girl Fight’. Strange chap.
BALLYVAUGHAN : County Clare : Republic of Ireland : Population 224
Situated in the northwest corner of The Burren, an area of great rocky expanse, considered by many to be a unique landscape. It has been tagged Ireland's 'Gold Coast' as a result of the huge boom in property prices in the area. Demand for holiday homes has seen the average house price in the town rise from €45,000 in 1995 to €480,000 in 2005.
We stopped at Ballyvaughan for morning tea (we needed it after our late night). A pretty little village with brightly coloured stores and thatched roofed houses.
From here we drove through the edge of the Burren National Park which is more of the stone fields, like what we saw on Inishmor yesterday, and indeed part of the same field. Our guess is that this has been made a National Park, as there is absolutely nothing that you could do with it. It is 99.5% stone and rock. The 0.5% is the minute amount of moss and lichen that manages to gain a grip on some parts of the rocks.
POULNABRONE DOLMEN : County Clare : Republic of Ireland
The dolmen consists of a twelve-foot, thin, slab-like, tabular capstone supported by two slender portal stones, which lift the capstone 1.8m from the ground. During excavations they found that between 16 and 22 adults and 6 children were buried under the monument.
We stopped at the Poulnabrone Megalithic Tomb, after saying that we weren’t going to stop at any more for a while, however this one was on our way (well almost). Another vast expanse of stone and placed in the middle was a small dolmen. It doesn’t sound much, but it was very cool.
We were heading in the direction of the Cliffs of Moher, with every intent of going to see them, but we didn’t. We arrived at the entrance to be greeted by lines of tour buses, and throngs of people. We had also read recently that they had put up walls that were too high, and too far back from the cliff edge to enable seeing them properly. The entrance fee was the clincher. We decided that since we had seen Slieve League recently we would give it a miss. Instead we proceeded on to Spanish Point where we stopped for a clamber over some big slabs of rock tilting over and running down into the ocean. It was a very cool spot, and hardly anyone there.
We have been told, and read, that there are some white sand beaches around here, so our next mission was to find one and go for a walk. As it transpired it was more of a mission than we anticipated. We drove along parallel with the coast, diving in along any road that looked like it held the promise of a beach at its end (we can’t always rely on the road signs). Time and time again we ended up going down roads that petered out into farm track lanes and still no sight of the water that we desired. We progressed along the coast as far as Kilkee before we gave up.
We headed back on the southern edge of the peninsula towards Killimer, where we were to catch the car ferry to Tarbert. This was uneventful, a twenty minute ferry ride that saved us two hours of driving time. The alternative was to drive to Limerick (we had no desire to go there) and then back along the other side.
CARRIG ISLAND : County Kerry : Republic of Ireland : Population : 10
More cows than people and overshadowed by the ruins of a castle built in1490 and destroyed by Cromwell in 1649.
From Tarbert we drove the short distance to our destination for the night, Carrig Island, at a B&B ‘Castle View House’. A fantastic B&B situated on a small Island accessible via a small causeway. It was one of those places where they make you feel at home. After dinner (which they offered) our host sat and talked to us about everything from the price of cattle, EU subsidies, to the Irish economy. He is also the key holder to the nearby castle. One of the many castles that Cromwell destroyed. The more we hear about Cromwell, the more he sounds like a right royal bastard. We read tonight that he instructed his men here in Ireland to destroy every harp that they found. What a way to win hearts and minds. Then there was the case that heard about the other day where he found the 100 villagers hiding in the caves, and he killed each one that he found. Yet again we have found that the hero of one nation is the villain of another, it’s all a matter of perspective.
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