Ring of Kerry - Day 2

Disclaimer: I normally load pictures as the large size, but for these pictures, x-large seemed apropos.

Our second day in the Ring of Kerry began with a nice breakfast and a trip to the grocery store across the street from our hotel. I, again, had come down with an AWFUL cold and ran out of medicine the night before. Unfortunately, after little sleep in the hotel due to incessant coughing (Emily slept fine, don't worry about that, she is a heavy sleeper), my eyes were red and I was very exhausted. Still, not wanting to miss another adventurous opportunity, I boarded the bus and on we went!

Our first stop was a museum called the Skellig Experience. This exhibition explains the history of the Skellig Islands just off the shore of the Iveragh peninsula in County Kerry. Skellig Michael (the larger of the two) was first inhabited by monks that created a Christian monastery there sometime between the 6th and 8th centuries. The smaller island is home to puffins and other native birds that were part of the monks' diet. Skellig Experience shows a great movie to explain the history and has a nice exhibit with even more information. This stop also had a view: 

A short drive down the road we stopped at a picture point. Here are the products of that point, really unexplainable beauty was in every direction:

We then continued on our merry way to Geokaun Mountain. The bus dropped us off at the bottom of a not-so-high seeming mountain and we climbed, and climbed, until we got to the top. Though my calves were killing me, these photos were worth it!

 

We then made our way to a slate quarry. This was a sort of funny little stop but the Grotto with Mary was an unexpected surprise. Again, pictures:

 

At some point we had lunch. I can't remember when now that I look at the pictures, but the hotel continued to impress food-wise with a yummy Chicken Ceasar salad.

And then we went to two stone forts for some more exciting pictures, can you sense a theme?  The first fort is Cahergall Fort and was built around 500 A.D.. The second is Lenacalabuile Fort built in either the 9th or 10th centuries.These were really fun because you could climb on the exterior walls and look around. There were also some tunnels in the second one that one adventurous American climbed in and met a clan of Irish spiders -  I watched from a safe distance.

Another short drive away was Ballycarbery castle - which I must say, was one of my favorite castles thus far in Ireland. This castle, apparently featured in the Amy Adam's film Leap Year, was great because you could climb some crumbling stairs to get to the second floor (which of course all 60 of us on the trip did). At this point we were a bit wind-blown and very tired.

The castle was the last landmark we saw on day two and the bus dropped us off for a bit of shopping before we walked back to the hotel. Again the hotel delivered with a delicious dinner of tortellini and apple pie! Then the group had a sing-a-long and a trivia night in which my team competed valiantly!

The conclusion, tomorrow!

The Opinionated Lassie