If you’re not living in Dublin, one of the main reasons to go to the big city is for admin purposes. Reasons could include: fetching someone from the airport (we went to collect our acts who came over from South Africa), getting a cheap flight to a holiday destination (since Dublin is the biggest Irish airport), applying for a […]
Exploring Ireland
Courtmacsherry
The reason we ended up at Courtmacsherry was to get some exercise. The weather however could not have been more unpleasant (hence only a few photos). We started the hike with a view over the bay in the opposite direction of the beautiful ruins of Timoleague Abbey. As we walked through the forest (which is […]
Blarney Castle in Summer
The first time that I visited Blarney Castle was in winter. The second time I visited was during a glorious heat wave (the weather insisted on short sleeves and the sky was a beautiful blue late into the evenings). Summer sun filtered through the bright new season leaves, rhododendrons bloomed in all shades and the Golden Rain […]
The Burren Perfumery
It was still just early spring when we stopped over at The Burren Perfumery, so my photos of the garden don’t quite do it justice. You can still get an idea of the place though and it is lovely, even before the season is in full swing. The perfumery was founded in the karst landscape of the Burren around forty […]
The Burren
“Of this barony it is said that it is a country where there is not water enough to drown a man, wood enough to hang one, nor earth enough to bury them.” – Officer Ludlow The Irish Gaelic word for this unusual landscape in County Clare is Boireann, “great rock”. It’s about 250 square kilometres of limestone […]
The Paps of Anu
Anu (or Danu) is known as the ancient mother goddess of Ireland. The Paps themselves are kind of boob-shaped and each summit has a large, prehistoric stone cairn on it -hence the name: The Paps of Anu. Connecting the two cairns is a line of stones that was perhaps once a processional route. Last year around […]
Exploring Cobh
One rainy day, we ventured out to visit the beautiful town of Cobh. The first thing we did was check out the little stony beach nearby. The stones made it really quite difficult to walk across but we managed to hobble to the tiny harbour and have a look at the boats and ropes, anchors and crayfish nets. […]
Glanagear Woods
If you’re heading in the direction of Killuvullen, from the south (Cork), you’ll drive past a parking area with a sign marking the Glanagear Woods at the foot of the Nagel Mountains. The trail is part of a bigger network and can be followed all the way to Ballyhooly! It could take up to five hours […]
The Ring of Kerry in Winter
My dad came over to stay with us in Cork for a few days and I took the opportunity to take him on a drive to Kerry. It was the third rainless day in a row (imagine that)! Sadly we didn’t have time to drive the whole Ring of Kerry but we stopped over for […]
Walking the Killavullen Loop
A little while back, we took a drive to the north to try out a 12km loop hike. Although it was sunny and there hadn’t been any hard rain for a while, it was very waterlogged on the uphill section but the rest of it is really easy walking, so we didn’t find the hike […]