So far!

It's now the next morning and I'm back. Going to try and add some pictures here. Plain unadulterated non-edited ones at that!
Here's Bunratty Castle with the pub where I had supper the other night , accompanied by a wee glass of Guinness! It was good! The castle stands in a large park that has been trurned into a folk museum with buildings from other parts of the country rebuilt here. You can also banquet medieval style in the castle! I chose the cheaper option - in Durty Nelly's next door! No idea yet what "durty" means or whether it is just what you think it is! Anyway it was very nice, so I wasn't complaining!

Onwards then, to the town of Adare where you can see some "pretty" thatched houses from the 19th century.

The church, once a trinitarian monastery, is very beautiful too.

I drove south to Killarney which was hoaching with people because of the Fleadh - Flah - a big music festival.
No place to stop so I just had to drive on to look at the lake and McGillycuddy's Reeks, the highest mountains in Ireland.
I once climbed Carrauntoohill with my visually impaired friends, the Milton Mountaineers. It was quite a slog with some hairy moments on hands and feet scrambling up the Devil's staircase. Not this time though! I was content with the view from afar.

The meadows from my viewpoint are covered in wild flowers.

In the Ireland of my childhood the houses in the villages were painted pastel shades of pink, green, blue, yellow, but today any colour goes, and it doesn't matter what colour your next door neighbours choose. Actually I like it! This is in Glengarriff, and this is the village where Ian's family and mine met all those years ago! I texted Ian, in France.

The famous sight here is the island garden of Garinish, reached by one of a collection of little boats. I chose to go from the Blue Pool, not looking too blue as the sky was quite grey, and we did get rain later.
On the way we passed some skerries with seals posing for photos - well, not really but they are naturals in front of a camera!
I will show you a couple of photos from the garden but I could do a whole week's worth of blogs from there with the photos I took!

This is the most famous picture of the gardens - the Italian garden., and the view from the highest point of the garden.

Yesterday I drove round the Beara peninsula, one of the several fingers of land on the south west corner of the country.
Beautiful seascapes here!
Great views altogether.

History abounds - stone circles, ring forts, more recent deserted hamlets on the hillsides....

....more coloured houses...

and some lovely effects of the weather.

So, eventually I reached Kenmare, where I stayed last night. Today I plan on driving round the next peninsula, probably staying tonight along the coast somewhere, so time I was off!

Talk again soon!