 Monday May
18:
So, we've picked up the replacement car in Cork
and we headed on down to Inish Beg, just north of Baltimore.
The GPS (we brought ours from home since it
has Europe maps in it; we named it Jerome)
did pretty well for us but there were a few places that the roads have
changed. We found that a combination of Jerome and the road
signs worked pretty well. One rather amusing place, I missed
a turn in a roundabout and, instead of just going back to it, we
followed the GPS instructions and ended up on what appeared to
be a cow path for 3 miles or so (picture at left). We
did pass one 80 kmh (48 mph - no way!) speed limit sign on this
"path" so I'm thinking it was "Old Route something or other"
that has
now been abandoned but was still on the old maps. But
the scenery was lovely and there were no other vehicles on it,
so we stopped a couple of times for pictures. And at the end
it really DID dump us off on the N71 which is where we were supposed to
be! We had a late lunch (2:30 PM) in Bandon, after we swapped cars, at a US-style 50's diner, complete with Elvis and Marilyn Monroe pictures. We were plenty hungry by then and the food was quite good. After a stop in Skibbereen at the Centra to get some groceries and replenish our cash from the ATM, we arrived at Inish Beg around 6. This was the longest drive day. It wasn't really longer because of the detour to the Cork airport, but we had planned to drive along the southern coast rather than inland. However, it was definitely worth going out of our way and missing some scenery to get rid of the horrible car. Inish Beg is a very nice place! A couple, Paul and Georgiana Keane,  bought
an island and turned it into a
lovely estate. We had a 2 bedroom modern apartment in the "Courtyard"
for less than we
have paid for 2 rooms everywhere else. It's
very isolated
(there
 are
no signs
on the main road - you have to know where to look for the turn to the
causeway over to the island) but it's only 4 miles to Baltimore.
Guests have access to almost all of the island - acres and
acres
of
gardens (part of the walled garden on the right),
free range chickens, bees and honey (though they lost a lot to
wasting disease last year). All organic and lovingly tended.
Because of the late lunch and the long drive, we declared tonight "down time." We just snacked rather than having a true meal, and took advantage of the kitchen, living room and wood stove. John and Fred watched a Gaelic football match on TV and tried to figure out what was going on since the commentary was in Gaelic! Tuesday was a beautiful morning! After breakfast we (separately) walked around the estate; there are lots of birds, gardens, lovely scenery by the river. Below is a view across the Ilen river and part of the wildwood garden. 
  Barb's
great-grandmother was Katie
Driscoll - her father, Michael
Dennis O'Driscoll, was born in Cork County in or near Baltimore.
We
discovered that the restored O'Driscoll castle in Baltimore
(Dún na
Séad which means "Fort of
Jewels" - originally built in
1215) isn't
open for public tours until June 1 but we took some pictures of the
outside (left).  After
we got home, I found a picture on the web of
what
it looked like before the restoration about 10 years ago (right) - that
had to
have been an amazing project. (See some photos of the process
here.) We had
to ask the kind man in the grocery store about the ferry to Sherkin
Island - schedules
were posted but there were no signs about where to get
it! Of course, as soon as we got on the boat, it
started to
rain! (This is getting old.)  We
saw the
Sherkin
Friary ruins (photo at left shows the omnipresent gorse in the
foreground) and ruins of another O'Driscoll castle (below right), then
spent about
an hour
in the  Island Rest pub having lunch (nice hot soup). About
the
time we were ready to leave, it POURED. John
and I walked
down
the road a bit and saw some
more views across to the mainland and began to see lots of fuchsia that
apparently flourishes in that area, but we abandoned all notions of
staying and wandering around the
island. John had
wanted to go
to the beach but it was clearly too wet for
exploration! So
we hiked back to the ferry dock in the rain.   When we
got back
to
Baltimore (harbor left), we walked around St. Matthew's church (Church
of Ireland - photo right),
picked up a few more
groceries and then, as the rain had stopped by then, we drove up to the
Beacon. It is just a large, white landmark that was in the
process of getting a facelift - a crew
was
scraping and re-painting it while we were there (below left).
We did the
mountain goat
thing and scrambled up to the top of the cliffs for some awesome
views. Notice the first two pictures below - they
were taken within 10 minutes of each other at the same place, just
looking in different directions. We experienced that a lot
in Ireland - it could be cloudy and stormy looking one moment and a
lovely sunny day the next minute, or in a slightly different part of
the sky.     When we
got back to Inish Beg, we walked through more of
the
gardens and orchards, admired some of the antique cars in Keane's
collection, got
some
laundry started and then went to dinner at the Síbín Pub in Rath - a
tiny town just off the main road to Baltimore (R595). That
was
probably
the best meal of our trip. Very good
selections, good food, great waitress. Entrees were from
€12.95 up to duck à l'orange at €40, but
we had great
food (and awesome desserts - see left) at the low end for around
€20 each
including drinks and dessert. Wednesday
morning we woke to more rain but by the time we were in the car, it had
stopped and
before too long it actually became sunny. A whole dry sunny
day! Our first stop was Skibbereen where I got stamps and
finally
mailed
the postcards I had been carrying around since Dublin; then got some
more cash at a nearby ATM. Then, at Paul Keane's suggestion,
we
drove to Castletownsend to the Church of St. Barrahane - at the
end of a very
steep, dead end, one lane road... we've found a lot of those
in Ireland. Anyway, we climbed up the 52 steps (one for each
Sunday in a year) and visited the old church. The parish
dates back to 1199 but the current church was built in 1826 of stone
from Horse Island (at the mouth of the harbor).
The church is known for its stained glass windows - several
by
the well-known Irish Arts and Crafts glass maker Harry Clarke (example
to right shows Louis IX
on left; St. Martin of Tours and a beggar on right). After that
we headed to Liss Ard gardens.
We were told that this garden is not
really "kept up" any more - there is no admission charge and no formal
tours - but posted maps and signs point to the various areas: waterfall
garden,
wildwood, water garden, arboretum, etc.  At the crest of the
rise is the Irish Sky Garden (also known as the Crater). This
is man made but patterned after a meteor crater in Arizona.
Access is through a long metal tunnel and climbing up steep
steps. In the middle of the crater is a large rock slab
formation (I think it looked like a coffin - see photo at
right.) Apparently
people
are supposed to lie
down on it and look at the sky. I can understand it might be
impressive at night but during the day it's just a big bowl shaped
grassy area with a rock bed in the middle. So much for my
imagination. That was a
loonnngg walk and we were ready for lunch at Glebe
Gardens and Cafe
in Baltimore. This was a lovely little place - in May it is
open
Wed-Sat; beginning June 1 it will be open every day for the summer.
They grow their own food and everything is organic. We had
soups and sandwiches;  I
had a fishcake and salad that was very
yummy. Then, for €5 each we had the opportunity to
wander
the
gardens - they have veggies, flowers and a cutting
garden. We recognized many of the things we had just
been served for lunch!
Woody, a friendly dog, followed us around with a ball and
sticks.
:) Among the other flora and fauna were a white hen
with 2
black chicks in a
portable hutch, lovely irises in bloom,
amazing fuchsia, and huge globe artichokes that they just use for
the flowers. During the summer they also have
entertainment
in an outdoor amphitheater. I actually got sunburned today
because it has been so rainy it never
occurred to me to take the sunscreen. From now on, it stays
in my
purse! Fuchsia Iris Garden River Art?     Just outside of
Baltimore, on the way back, we detoured to Lough Hyne (left) -
a lovely lake. Access is via one of those two-way, one-lane
roads! Today must have been a school outing because it was
full of (roughly) 13 year olds - mostly giggly girls. We
walked around a bit - the lake is ocean fed and so has salt water flora
and fauna. We watched a man swim across it - he must
have been FREEZING. There was one swan who seemed
interested
in the people but hissed at dogs. We enjoyed the various
wildflowers and
gulls. We got back to Inish Beg around 4 PM - I put another batch of laundry in, John went for a walk. Fred, John and I went to swim before supper.  The pool
building (below) is a very nice facility - there is also an exercise
room
there. But
water was colllldd. I did about 16-20 lengths and called that
enough. I was getting plenty of "walking" exercise but that
works
different muscles. We decided not to go to dinner that night,
but
instead finished
up groceries we had on hand: ramen, oatmeal, popcorn - a fun
evening. We watched the movie Michael Collins
which fit with
the history we had learned in Dublin - interesting though disquieting.
(The owners of Inish Beg have a large video collection that
they
kindly make available for guests to borrow.)  Thursday dawned
another beautiful sunny day! We left around
9:30
AM, after getting packed and cleaned, and headed to Bantry House and
Gardens. John and I climbed the 100 steps to get various
views of
the house, gardens and bay. It was interesting to me how
much
the views changed as we climbed up. The gardens were lovely -
I
was quite taken by the huge wisteria "ring." We also toured
the
house - the first part was built in the early 1700's. The was
home to the wealthy: check out the elaborate dining room on the left
below; in the center is a parlor that included
a tapestry made for Marie Antoinette on her marriage to (the eventual)
King Louis XVI; and on the right we had fun "pretending!"     We had
lunch
in Bantry at a pub on the main square (its name is lost in my
memory - even the receipt doesn't have a name).
Good food, friendly people.
Then we went on to Glengarriff and Garinish Island (aka
Ilnacullin)
.
This is a 37 acre island in Bantry Bay purchased (from the
British
War Office) in 1910 by Annan Bryce, a Belfast businessman, who
commissioned the formal gardens; the island was then bequeathed to the
Irish
people in 1953. We found the ferry easily (it was well signed
and
right on N71); it cost €12 for the round trip boat
ride but entrance to the gardens was free with our
Heritage
cards. We passed "seal island" on the
way over (photo left) and saw many of them sunning themselves on the
rocks, ignoring the silly
photographers. We spent about an hour and a half wandering through the
island - there
is a path laid out with "stopping points" that takes you
through
all of the various sites. I also climbed the Martello Tower
which was commissioned by the British War Office in the early 1800's as
a precaution against a Napoleonic invasion. I was
disappointed
in the view from the tower - the walls were so thick that I couldn't
see the ground over them! There were other nice views of the
bay
and
the Caha mountains, however (see left below). The center picture is one
of the hundreds of types of rhododendron that were in bloom and on the
right we pose at the Temple. 
 From Glengarriff, it was just a short drive north to Kenmare - Part III. |