After an evening BBQ and a session in the hot tub in the sunshine we went to bed excited about our trip the next day. Unfortunately, whilst the new unbobbly sheet was an improvement, I still couldn’t sleep very well. It was very hot in this modern house and I woke up with the dawn chorus at about 4-30am…
We had decided to do the The Ring of Kerry in a day despite the fact that my guide book says the slower you do it the better. In fact I’d definitely read somewhere that it was best to take 4 days. Slightly concerned about this I’d plotted how long it would take to drive between the different stopping points and it added up to roughly 4 hours. We would have plenty of daylight and the only time limit that we were on was that Jane and I needed to be back for the England Euros game at 8pm.
We set off at 9am and the weather was very poor. No rain was forecast but it appeared to be one of those days when we were just sat in the middle of the cloud with constant drizzle. Our first stop was about an hour away, The Kerry Bog Village. We had wondered whether we’d need extra time here and the line of about 10 coaches indicated that it was indeed very popular. The reception staff were very Irish and friendly and we were soon inside this authentic 18th/19th century Irish village. However, it is literally a collection of cottages with old tut inside. There is no explanation of anything and we came away feeling very uneducated. There was a random collection of animals and Pam is going to report them to the ISPCA for the conditions in which their sad looking bog ponies and bored Irish wolfhounds were being kept. There was, of course, the obligatory shop full of green souvenir tat which I’m sure was very popular with the American college kids.
Onwards…..next stop was Rossbeigh Strand which is a finger of pebbles that sticks out into Dingle Bay with magnificent views. It was nice but although we had emerged from the cloud it was still fairly murky. Pam and I managed to find 5 tiny pieces of sea glass between us so we were happy!
On the way to our next destination we stopped at Mountain Stage Viewpoint -still cloudy but with glimmers of sunshine on the Dingle Peninsula. We arrived at Cahershiveen at about midday and went down to the marina which was quite pretty with the lovely green waters. It was around about now that certain members of the group had a sudden and urgent requirement for a cup of tea and maybe…something to eat. Like NOW! So we went back out to the town where we found the rather marvelous Lazy Cat Cafe. This was a trendy Ukrainian Cafe with fabulous scones and cakes and a decent flat white. Hurrah. Pam’s Napoleon cake in particular was very good!
After refreshments we went back across the bridge in search of Ballycarbery Castle down by WhiteStrand Beach. By now the sun was fully out along with the water in the estuary. It was very lovely even though we couldn’t actually visit the ruined castle. Apparently it once belonged to the McCarthy clan and is still privately owned. We also found the Cahergall Ring Fort which a nice lady at the marina had said was a ‘must’. It was built around 600AD with walls 6m high and 3 m wide! Of course we had to climb up it although it was rather scary, the views from the top were fantastic!! The other highlight here was the man sitting on the back of his van showing passersby his lamb. Presumably the idea is that you take an interest , have your photo taken with the lamb for which he charges you a few Euros and if you don’t pay he bundles you into the back of the van and holds you for ransom. We didn’t fall for his Irish tricks.
By now it was starting to feel like we weren’t making progress fast enough…but we still wanted to visit Valentia Island. It was a lovely drive down the narrow lane to the harbour at Reenard Point where we caught the car ferry the short distance (5mins) to Knightstown on the island. It was a very pretty harbour with great views all the way back to the mountains in the mainland.
But crack on we must as we sped directly along to Portmagee where a bridge takes you back across to the mainland. I didn’t even stop at the farm offering their own ice cream and Pam didn’t spend long in the Skellig Experience visitor centre as it’s displays focused on puffins and not Star Wars (which had partly been filmed on the Skellig Islands). We took a few photos of the colourful harbour at Portmagee and then drove through on our way upto Kerry Cliffs.
Now there were a lot of people parked up here and the signs suggested that it took just 10mins to walk up to the cliffs but that you needed to spend an hour here. Hm…..did we have time to do this……..? Well I’m very glad we did because the cliffs were an easy walk and it was spectacular with views over the 1000ft cliffs and the wild Atlantic below as well as the pointy Skellig Islands.
By now time was pressing on as it was about 3-30pm. We needed a new plan…..those of us who wanted to watch football (Jane and Julie) would need to really start to hack it, whilst everyone else could go at a more leisurely pace. So we split up in the cars, Jane and I still determined to complete the Ring of Kerry route which according to my calculations would still take nearly 3 hours!!!
The rest of the driving went by in a bit of a blur but it was spectacular with climbs up giant mountains and cliffs at Coomanispic, beautiful turquoise bays at Derrynane and long, long stretches of road all the way to Sneem where we finally decided to stop for tea. We went into D Oshea’s Bar which is a colourful pinky purple colour and it was very smart inside with views out the back over the estuary. Jane enjoyed her first pint of Guinness and Colcannon and Ham whilst I had a little half of red ale and sausage and mash! Perfect and after making friends with the American locals at the next table we felt ready for the final stretch of our journey. Meanwhile Pam, Adrian, Joyce and Enid had also arrived in Sneem and were eating a seafood platter at The Stone House.
It was a beautiful evening as we continued miles along by the sea to Kenmare and then up into the mountains of the Killarney National Park. By now the roads were relatively quiet and we couldn’t resist stopping at various viewpoints of Moll’s Gap and Ladies View. We were due to come back here the next day…but what if it was raining?!! It was truly beautiful and a shame to be driving past it all at rally driving speeds. Hey ho…looking forward to doing it at a slower pace tomorrow.
We drove through Killarney itself, bypassing the town centre. It seemed to be a very big town and very ‘corporate’ looking. I’m glad we are not staying there….
Now we were back on the familiar N22 and I drove at 120kmph all the way back to Tralee, only slowing down for white vans parked at the roadside in case they were doing speed checks. I swerved into the drive at 8-07pm. We hadn’t missed much and naturally England went onto have a dismal 0-0 draw with Slovenia. Thank goodness we’d taken the opportunity to stop and look at the views in the way home!
The others arrived back at half time having stopped at all of the viewpoints along the way as they’d recovered from their earlier scenic overload!
My recommendation….don’t try and do the Ring of Kerry in a day. At least plan to stop one night somewhere half way along…Derrynane Beach would probably be top of my list.
Where shall we go to next? 