2011/04/24 Hidden Dolmen

Although Tramore itself was not as pretty as expected, the area still has a lot to offer. Matt loves 'old shit' and therefore he was really excited about the Dolmen of that area. Basically, Dolmen are several thousand year old stones of which nobody really knows how they were set up without any tools.
We started driving by following our map that confused us only after a few miles.
We saw signs which were leading into contradictory directions, and after a citizen told us that the state had sold the Dolmen, we were speechless and almost gave up.
Certainly, this guy was joking and showed us the way to our first stone: Knockeen Dolmen.
After climbing a gate,
and crossing a meadow (with a curious bull),
we found the Dolmen that had been basically locked up by the land-owning farmer.
Behind the Dolmen (in the bushes) we found an old chapel and a graveyard - pretty!
We continued our Dolmen drive and were able to locate several others.. unfortunately access to them was prohibited by the farmers.. since they are all set up on nowadays' farmland.
Off we went further West towards Cork through the countryside;
we decided to have lunch in Dungarvan, and I am pleased that we did because it was a beautiful little fisher town.

Cork was nice, too - but since the English market (that we had been looking forward to) was closed and it started pouring heavily (by the way: the only time during our trip)..
we continued to Killarney - our place to be for the next two nights. We had booked a room at the Gleannfia Country House, which took our breath away when we entered the driveway. It is close to town center, although it still lies in the middle of nowhere surrounded by rivers, meadows and trees. The whole interior is charming, and hanging out in the lounge was such a pleasure. The owners are an elderly couple - very nice and somewhat quirky (which is part of the house's charm).
If you ever go to Killarney, you have to stay at this B&B - it's simply awesome!!

2011/04/23 Getting started

After scratching the car's side, breaking the right mirror, and almost killing both a biker and my husband (through a heart attack), I had adjusted to driving on the wrong (excuse me: left) side of the street. It is still hard to believe that we made it to our first stop: Wicklow.


This little town offered everything that I thought Ireland would be about (if I had only known that this was just a teeny tiny bit of everything):
the wild Atlantic ocean,

steep cliffs,

and the greenest of all greens.

We spent the afternoon there, and after a little rest we toured on to Tramore. Since we were looking forward to peace, tranquility and a beautiful B&B we were somewhat disappointed after all. The Atlantic Breeze B&B had looked awesome on the website pictures, but turned out to be way shabbier. The hosts were great, but we had nowhere to hang out and chill.
Moreover, Tramore has a beautiful beach,
but they managed to turn the whole town into a disgusting entertainment center with slot machines, rides and water parks. Great for teenagers, but really not what we had been looking for.