Republic of Ireland - Round The World Tour 2 2003 Day 171
Cahersiveen
Saturday 30th August
(log entry for day 170). I was too tired to write my log entry last night after coming back from the pub so I’m going to do it this morning.
The camp-site that we stayed in last night was at the start of what is called the Ring of Kerry. Actually, since the recommendation is to tour the ring in an anti-clockwise rotation, it’s more like the end of the ring than the beginning. The route is more or less a coastal road that travels around one of the rocky escarpments that make up the Irish West coast. The main road that travels the route is little more than a winding country track that is extremely uneven and causes the brick to bounce up and down and side to side almost uncontrollably. It’s also very narrow and we had a few interesting encounters with buses and other oncoming vehicles. After about an hour of ricocheting in and out of the various pot holes and dips in the road surface, Sandy was starting to feel a little ill and wasn’t really enjoying the breath-taking scenery that much as a result. It’s quite touristy here with every other building housing a B&B, restaurant or pub. Various tourist attractions dotted around the ring and on the peninsular itself draw in busloads of tourists (fortunately all adhering to the recommendation and going in the opposite direction to us). So far, we’ve managed to get about half way around and are now moored up in a camp-site in Cahersiveen.
We had a couple of stops on the way to admire scenery, stroll along the rocky beaches and to explore an old dry-stonewall fort amongst other things. It was an interesting day and there were some stunning vistas but all in all, I think we enjoy visiting castles more. The one castle that we did want to visit along the way was badly sign-posted and we ended up missing it completely.
As we passed through Waterville, we noticed a couple of Internet Cafés and so decided to stop and log on for a half an hour or so. There were a few replies to the last WorldTravel update and, of course, the requisite few jokes and Internet funnies from Lisa. There were also a couple of job offer e-mails that looked like they might prove promising. I will follow them up just to keep the contacts warm but we’re not ready to start work again just yet.
After a short drive from Waterville to Cahersiveen, we found a nice, out of the way, little camp-site and settled in. Like every other smallish town here in Ireland, the centre of town is littered with pubs and taverns. The West of Ireland is where some of the best traditional music is to be heard and there was a sign in the camp-site reception listing all the pubs where music could be heard on different nights of the week. Although it would mean a late night, I wanted to hear some traditional music and so we decided to go out for the evening. The only problem is that the pubs tend to liven up late in the evening – just when we are dozing off. We managed to sit and listen to a fiddler and accordion duet for a few numbers in one particular watering hole but the pub was not very lively and there were very few punters. To make matters worse, we were sitting perilously close to the musicians and certain high-pitched notes were piercing through us like knives. After about an hour, we called it a night and left. Perhaps we will have better luck tonight instead.