Tuesday, 20th January: Dublin - Cork
<--First B&B breakfast complete with black and white puddings (the ones made out of something's liver. Not frightfully bad)
Tuesday morning, off we go in the rent-a-car, embarking on Castles and Other Historical Monuments Tour 101 by Grandad. This kind of tour involved a checklist of sites, where we spend a limited amount of time at each one and continually having to drag Jen out from her 'artistic photographing' time.
Some interesting sights found on the way:
1) YIELD: the irish Give Way sign;
2) Emo Fuels: for those of us depressed by modern day fuel prices;
3) Hmm.. there is a tractor in our road..
[Must be noted that Irish speed signs are only to be followed by completely suicidal drivers. 100km/hr speeds should not be for tiny little country roads (thought they call themselves main roads) only 1.5 lanes wide, winding this way and that, where you have to car-hug the hedge if there's something else coming and tractors are a frequent occurrance. Even my lead-footed grandad had to admit defeat.]
First place for a historical visit was Glendalough, just south of Dublin. Site of a millenium-old Round Tower and cemetary. Can't remember any of the dates - Never was too good at history. But I can remember how beautifully evocative the raw stone looked through the camera lens.. mhmm
An hour or two later - oh what's that? - another stop on our historical tour and this time a castle (word spoken fondly). It was officially shut down for the winter, like all sensible things are in these parts, but that didnt stop us from perching by the moat's fence or in my case, scrambling the ruined stone stairs like a rampant billygoat. Note the random timber door up ye' high. Access difficulties much??
Our historical sightings schedule for the day took a spontaneous turn when Jen reads in her plump little travel guide (cheers to Cat and Steena!!) that we are heading in the vague direction of a coffin ship interactive tour. No-one's not gonna let me board a coffin ship! So Jen has her way and the team head through the Dunbrody immigrant ship of New Ross (so called coffin ship because of what happens on the too-long journey over) where we are approached by steerage passengers and first class ones alike, giving insight into the gruelling trip to America in the height of the potato famine.
Taking the helm!
For B&B this night, we had arranged to stay with some distant distant relatives, linked to us by the ancestoral name of Hickey. 'Short walk into town to get dinner' they said. Well for an elderly couple their definition of 'short walk' was quite impressive. Or maybe we took a wrong turn. Cos after about 20 mins the three of us ended up in an industrial-looking street with only some young skinheads in sight. But the skinheads turned out to be very helpful, as on request they pointed out the hotel that was meekly staring at us from further down the road. And so we arrive at the station of our first real Guinness. As in brewed and bred in the motherland. I hate to be shallow, but to my naive palate, it tasted little better than the smooth tar at ye old Irish club back home.
Wednesday, 21st January: Cork - Portmagee
Wednesday, 21st January: Cork - Portmagee
Another inspection at the travel book show us a tiny little place on the map called Castlefreke. That sounds like my kind of place! I am sorry to say though that the irish road signs were not too kind to us and had us severely questioning whether this place actually existed.. Turned out it wasn't a town. It was a forest recreation area. With one castle atop the hill. Oh well, need a photo with the sign - Castlefreke, that's me!! 
We stop at a cliff a little way down and omg my hair almost gets uprooted, it's that windy.
Ok, on to Rosscarbery, place of my great-great-greats, the Hickeys of olde. Cute little hilly town in the south of south, with lots of curvy stone walls. Grandad says last time they were here they found the family plot in the graveyard, a big white cross 
bearing the family name. So despite the drizzle and wipe-you-out winds, we go ploshing through the muddy cemetary in search of our ancestoral garden dead bed.
bearing the family name. So despite the drizzle and wipe-you-out winds, we go ploshing through the muddy cemetary in search of our ancestoral garden dead bed. A thorough combing over the whole graveyard and no Hickey white cross found... Just as defeat was in sight, what is this?? Our big white cross had seemed to have a turn for the darker since last time and was decidedly grey. Chuckle. Time is cruel. Even to tombstones.
Still cheerfully wet and windy when we arrived at the famed Ring of Kerry. I'm sure the site would be packed on a dry summer's day but today we were lucky, or maybe just crazy, cos bar the sheep we were the only living souls on the place.
So we went billygoat scrambling again! You can actually climb right on top of the ring and be rewarded with full throttle wind and a refreshing view of the woolly neighbours and their property.
Video footage 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bPYedMf_XBE&feature=channel_page
As we trundled into the little village of Portmagee and its 
randomly placed cottage ruins we went on a search for the old lady my grandparents stayed with last time. Following what we thought were simple directions we arrived at the house we thought was the right one. An elderly man in tweed cap and jacket and a not so sober state tottled out and told us it was the next house, but he was heading there now so he'll just invite himself into our car and we'll drive 5 metres up the road together. How heartless we are to refuse a tipsy elderly man passage. I had to laugh. The search has a happy ending, as not only did we get in contact with grandparents' friend but joined her and her grandchildren for dinner in the local tavern. The girls, home from the local primary school, tested my limited gaelic and we played a continual 'hide the pepper sachet from eachother' and 'which sachet out of these is missing now?' all round the tavern. I had clearly defined myself to be on the children's table and wasn't minding it much!
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