Tag: Larkinley Lodge

Killarney Wandering

I remembered that I had loved Larkinley Lodge last time I stayed in Killarney. In fact, it was one of the reasons that I decided to spend some time in Killarney again this trip. But man, wonderful as that first stay was, it’s nothing compared to how great it is this time. Last time was a flawless B&B experience; this time, it’s like I’m a favourite family member come to visit for a few days1. Toni and Danny have been so friendly, welcoming, and helpful it makes me want to move here.

So, if you’re coming to Killarney, and you don’t stay at Larkinley Lodge, I just don’t think we can be friends anymore.

Anyway.

This morning, I went down to the tourist office to catch the shuttle bus out to some of the places near Killarney I had wanted to see last time but didn’t really get the chance. First stop was Ross Castle.

Here’s a picture of Ross Castle, with the lake and the mountains in the background. I’ve been here before and, just like last time, I didn’t actually take the tour of the castle. I had other things on my mind.
Here’s another picture of the castle to make up for it.
And around the front of the castle, there was this truck parked, and I was feeling whimsical, so I tweeted “Fully restored 15th-century siege truck.” And, of course, one of my friends replied, “Not a period shade of blue, and the sleeper cab dates from no earlier than the 16th century.”2

While I would have liked to have toured the castle, my main goal at this stop was the island of Innishfallen. This started with a small abbey founded in the 6th century that grew into a famous site of learning and scholarship for close to a thousand years. The lake became known as Lough Leane, the Lake of Learning, and it is said that the High King Brian Boru was educated there. It is also where the Annals of Innisfallen were written, documenting almost a thousand years of local history.

The original abbey buildings were timber, so they’re all gone, but the stone buildings that replaced them in the 10th century are still there.

It’s not a huge abbey, nowhere near the size of Jerpoint, for example, but still looks pretty cool.
I thought this archway with the wildflowers growing in the stone was kind of neat. The purple of the flowers doesn’t show up as well in this picture, but I still like the colours of the stone.
This church is up on a little promontory some distance from the abbey.
It’s roofless and empty, except for this small Celtic cross. This was, apparently, found by some local fishermen, and dates to about the 14th or 15th century, if I remember correctly.

So, the trip out to Innisfallen was nice for another reason. I had to wait around for a while at the pier for one of the boatmen to take me over – taking a single passenger is not ideal for them, as they charge by the passenger. They were happy to take me, but hoped for a couple more people to join the trip.

No takers showed up, and finally one of the boatmen, Charlie, I guess got bored of sitting around and ran me over to the island. He had a dog with him – it seems like about half the boatmen had dogs with them – so when I climbed into the boat, I let the little fluff ball sniff my hand and scratched her ears to say hello3. She then ignored me for the entire trip across to the island.

On the way back, when I climbed in the boat, she looked at me, climbed across to my side, snuggled up against me, and began nudging my hand to pat her. She kept nosing at me whenever I stopped patting her.

Her name was Bella. I love dogs.

Anyway, I caught the shuttle bus again, and went off to the Torc Waterfall. The driver gave me directions on how to walk from there back to Muckross Abbey where he’d pick me up in a couple of hours, and I went to find the waterfall.

Okay, it’s about a 200m walk from the car park to the waterfall itself. It never occurred to me – but it should have – that hiking to a forest waterfall at the edge of the mountains would require negotiating hills. I stopped a couple of times along the way to take pictures, and not at all to catch my breath.
The actual waterfall was very pretty, and worth the effort.

The walk back down from the waterfall was easier, and then I found out it was about a 2km walk to Muckross House and Gardens. That was a little farther than I had expected, but so be it.

A lengthy portion of the walk was along the shore of Muckross Lake, and I noticed that the fence on the side of the path had only single strands of wire mounted on plastic pegs nailed to the post, “Hmmm,” I thought, “that looks an awful lot like an electrified fence. But surely there would be signage!” It was another half a kilometre or so before there was, indeed a sign that the fence was electrified. I was very pleased that I hadn’t given in to my experimental urges earlier to find out if the fence was hot4.

I figured the fence was there to keep cattle in the field, but a ways along, I saw the actual occupants.

These are Irish Red Deer, a large species native to Ireland. They’ve almost gone extinct a couple of times, and the Killarney National Park is one of the sites where there is a breeding project to revive the species.

I made it to Muckross Gardens, first.

It’s a pretty, formal garden. The weather was clearing up by then, so there were lots of people wandering about.
Next came Muckross House, but I was running out of time. If I didn’t make it to the pick-up point at the abbey by 2:30, I’d have to wait for 5:00 for the next bus. So, I didn’t go in. Maybe on Saturday.

And then it was another 1.5km through the woods and over hills to Muckross Abbey.

I only had a short time to look at Muckross Abbey if I wanted to make my pick-up time – it was still almost a kilometre to the bus stop. But it was pretty cool.

I caught the shuttle bus back to town, and ran a couple of errands. Most importantly, I wanted to find where my Ring of Kerry tour leaves from tomorrow so I’m not wandering around or rushing in the morning. And, while I was there, I figured I might as well pay for it5.

And then I had some dinner, and came back to Larkinley Lodge to do up this post.

Which is now done.

  1. My actual family members may be asking themselves how I could possibly know what it feels like to be someone’s favourite. First, shut up. Second, I read a lot. [↩]
  2. THIS IS WHY WE CAN’T HAVE NICE THINGS, CLINT!! [↩]
  3. As all my friends know, I’m a big softy when it comes to dogs. [↩]
  4. There was a lengthy internal debate on the subject. It was close. [↩]
  5. They take a credit card to reserve a spot for you, but you need to come into the office and pay to actually get your ticket. [↩]

Travel Day

Not much of a post today, as I spent the bulk of the day either waiting for or riding on a train. This means that not much interesting happened.

One thing I noticed was that I was dreading putting on my full backpack to haul around all day. It made me start rethinking my luggage choices – or my travel style. I didn’t weigh my fully packed luggage before I left, and maybe I should have, because I spent most of my first day wondering exactly how heavy it was.

It felt very heavy. But I think a lot of that is the fact that I was pretty tired after the overnight flight, and also I had walked a long, long way carrying it through three airports and far more of Dublin than I needed to.

Today, when I put it on, and fastened the belly band, it didn’t feel that bad. The walk from the hotel to the train station was still pretty taxing, but it didn’t wipe me out as badly as I had feared. So, maybe I’m getting used to all the walking.

The whole day wasn’t nearly as much of a strain as I had built it up in my mind. There was a lot of waiting on metal benches at train stations, where I didn’t have to carry the pack. And train station sandwiches over here are so much better than the kind of sandwich you’d get in a similar place back in Canada. I got a lot of reading done and, when I arrived in Killarney, I was especially pleased that I was able to find my way from the train station to Larkinley Lodge without any problem.

And now I’m settled in for the evening, and actually looking forward to getting to bed before midnight.

Yeah. I am old and pathetic. Even on holiday, I’m looking forward to a good night’s sleep.

Tomorrow, I’m off to see Ross Castle, Innisfillen Island, and a few other sites around town. I’ll have more pictures for you tomorrow, I expect.