We had breakfast in a beautiful diningroom. Tender homemade scones, eggs, toast, sausage and bacon.
Our first stop of the day was Ross Castle.
Ross Castle is a 15th century castle built around the 1450's. It was used for about 200 years, then left to fall into disrepair. In the 1950's a group of American businessmen bought the castle and the land with the intention of developing it as a holiday destination. One of the businessmen realized it would be wrong to do that. He bought out everyone in the group and set to renovating the castle. He pulled in the Irish government and they spent 20 years renovating the castle with Irish craftmen and artisians. When renovations were complete, he handed the castle and the land over to the Irish government. It was nice to hear of an American doing something to preverse history versus making money.
It was at Ross Castle that I finally felt like, "oh my goodness, I'm here!" I think it's because I'm finally on Irish time and not operating on a deficit.
Before heading out of Killarny, we stopped for some picnic food and headed toward the Dingle Peninsula. I was behind the wheel again today. This was all going to be familiar road for me and I wanted Ellie to get to see it all.
We finally found our way into the city of Dingle. We arrived at 2:35 and to make the ferry in the next stop, we had to leave by 3:00. Tensions were beginning to rise and we all realized the schedule was too tight. We need to have some give in our schedule. We decided to skip the Cliffs of Moher and take a more leisurely pace.
We shopped in Dingle for awhile before decided to head out.
I suggested we take Connor Pass. It's a beautiful drive with amazing views.
This was all looking familiar to me. We came to a stop along the road and I knew there was a mountain lake just a short hike up. When Todd and I were here, our friend took a picture of us standing in the stream.
It was as breath-taking as I remembered.
The mountain roads were just as I remembered. walled or cliffed on one side, cliff drop on the other side and narrow (at times only one lane). The ferry runs every hour on the half hour and out GPS was telling us that we were going to arrive at 6:23, then 6:27, finally 6:29. If we didn't make it, we were going to have to wait an hour. For those who know me well, you'll not be surprised that I drove like a local. I also prayed hard. Not a trusting prayer mind you. It was more like, "Lord, we really need to make the ferry. You will please help us? I mean, I know you can, but you probably won't". Oh me of little faith.
They had just closed the gate when we drove up. I stopped at the queue then inched forward. The very nice Irishman saw us and opened the gate. I honestly think it was about 20 seconds after we got on that the ferry was moving. "Thank you Lord". A 20 minute ferry ride and we were on our way.
The next leg of the journey felt like it took forever. We tired twice to stop at a pub for dinner, but they weren't serving or were already done serving. I really didn't want to arrive after dark to Galway, but we did. I'm so ready for bed. It's been a long (but good) day.
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