Our trip to
Well
we finally made it! (Picture link)
Things we
noticed,
Green
Expensive
Sheep
Colored houses
Colored doors
Pubs
Beer kegs
Food (not too great except for the breakfasts!)
Garda, not many (that’s police)
Wrong side of the road
Round abouts everywhere,
few traffic lights
Pickpockets
Cows
Narrow roads
Breakfasts
Friendly
Beautiful beaches
Ruins
No ice
Never heard of iced coffee
Mountainous sometimes
No trees
No wood houses
Our trip
5-5 leave
5-6 arrive
wander town, take short nap at
5-7
5-8
5-9 Joellyn drives (Tom can’t, no license) to
Castlecomer and on to Kilkenny
5-10 On to Kinsale via Youghal and
5-11 To Kilarney along the coast, through Skibbereen
and Bantry
5-12
5-13 Up along coast through
5-14 Castleconnell and Mountshannon and then to
5-15 Fly out
Interesting story
We arrived in Castleconnell without a clue as to
where we were going. We had the name of
Joe Carroll from Mark and Cathy. So we
started at the post office and they told us where he lived so we followed their
directions and for lack a real direction decided to try a house with at least
the right colored car in front of it.
Knocked on the door and told the gentleman that opened it that we were
looking for Joe Carroll. He said “well
you found him”. So Joe had us in and
told us a lot of what he knew. He and
another person had written a book on the history of Castleconnell back in 1991
which included info on Mountshannon. He
gave us a photocopy of the pages from the book and told us they were in the
process of updating it. He told us how
to find Mountshannon. We followed his
directions and found the gate to the property owners home but could not find
any other access. Mountshannon is a
protected historical property but there is no access and it is on private
property. So I rang the bell at the gate
and when it was answered I told them who I was and why we were there. They said come on in. And the gate opened and
we went in. We met Maria Tobin who with
her husband had purchased it about 2 years ago.
They had wanted to build in the area but as they were not both native to
Castleconnell they could not build. We
wandered through the fields and thru the ruins including the old cold storage
chamber out back..
It asked about the strange looking tree and were
told it was a monkeytail tree. It was very interesting. Maria told us there was a local pub (Herbert’s ) that also had a photo. Once we were driving again we came across
Michael Herbert’s pub and, as I could use a beer by this time, we stopped. Some folks were outside and we asked if they
were open. No, they were doing
renovations but had some suggestions as to other places we could stop. I told them we were looking to see the
picture and they said come right in. It was a cute pub to which they were
trying to add some more cooking/restaurant facilities. The pictures were in the main bar room, and Blaithiw said she thought she had some other photos and
went looking for them She did find a copy
of the book “In Ruins- The once Great Houses of Ireland” which had Mountshannon
on it’s cover and also an article inside.
She said “here’ it is my gift to you”!!!
So we really made a lot of progress for a day when we really had no idea
where we were heading!!
Pictures: Took about 1500 but you only get to see a
few……….