Fifi is home ....

Home after many weeks of travel and wonderful experiences and looking forward to catching up with friends and family over the next week. It seems very strange to be using a big keyboard and screen after making so many blog entries on my trusty Dell Mini - what a little treasure she turned out to be, helping us to keep in touch with you all.

Brief synopsis of our last couple of days in Ireland:


Saturday 30th May

Sadly farewelled Valentia Island and Portmagee - noting it as a place that must be revisited. We realised that we needed to make some headway on our journey north today, as our plan is to visit Baileeborough, north of Dublin, from whence the Montgomery brothers departed for Australia in the mid-1880's, and we have no idea how the long-weekend traffic will affect our trip. We drive back along the northern side of the Ring of Kerry and cut across west past Limerick, trying to stay on the smaller roads and enjoy the journey. We have decided on several pieces of advice to follow the Shannon River nad drive along the western banks of Lough Derg and north to Lough Ree before we start to look for somewhere to stay. It's strange being away from the gentle hills and craggy cliffs that have been a part of our daily scenery this week. We eventually locate a B&B by stopping at a restaurant and asking for suggestions - a young woman tells Peta of a place that is in the street where her parents live, about 10 minutes south, and calls for us to find that they have a room. The people are very friendly, the house is a bit ordinary, but we are comfortable and sleep relatively well.

Sunday 31st May

After breakfast and packing the car we walk to the end of the road and along the shore of Lough Ree. Tom, our B&B host who is a scholar of Irish history, has told us that there was a monastery established on one of the islands by St Kiernan in 570AD. We meet young families with their children and a lovely old gentleman walking his 3 little dogs - a very old King Charles Spaniel, a middle-aged rescue dog and a young yorkie terrier bought when it was thought the spaniel was about to depart this earth, but who had now instilled the old dog with a second lease of life.

We continue our drive north and stop in Longford to access an ATM and also discover a very funky bar where we have lunch and access their wifi to look at accommodation for the night. We decide we need a night of luxury before commencing what will be a 40 hour door-to-door trip for each of us, and Peta books us into a castle ... how exciting! While lounging on leather chairs and consulting the great Internet, we hear a roar and a huge convoy of tractors passes by .... small, large, middle sized, new and old, they are particpating in a fundraiser and everyone stops to watch.

Back to the task at hand. It is a stunningly beautiful day and we drive through or near an enormous numer of Bally.... towns (including Ballyjamesduff), following directions texted to us from Adelaide, to Canningstown where we speak with a gentleman who is aware of the Montgomerys and points us in the direction of Knockbride where Peta wants to visit the church cemetery. The countryside is beautiful, with gentle hills and flowering hedgerows, and we find the church alongside a little lough. No-one is around and we take our time wandering in the afternoon sunshine, discovering the Montgomery and Maxwell plots almost immediately.

We then head to Cabra Castle, feeling very lucky to have booked one of 2 remaining rooms available for the night (out of 102). When we get to our room in the sort of courtyard/mews area, we discover the rooms are sectioned into 'houses', and ours is called 'Sarah's House' - it was just waiting for us! Our room (upstairs again, there is just no escaping the lugging of bags even on the last night) has 2 double beds and a large bathroom with a lovely deep bath - luxury for weary travellers. We spruce up a bit and have a latish dinner, treating ourselves to a little Moet and Wolfblass red. The night is not as restful as we had hoped as Peta is suffering from what she claims is Puffin Flu, and although she has been diligent in taking her medication, the lurgy gets the better of her.

And then it is time to leave .... our bags are packed after the discarding of some no-longer-needed and some I-never-want-to-see-it-again items, and we drive the hour and a half to Dublin airport to head home.

Taking the time to relect on the long flight, I have strong memories of beautiful landscapes, and realise that I no longer have much interest in cities. The noise, expense and fast pace hold no attraction for me at all. In terms of shopping, it is hard to find anything that is not available in Australia, and in terms of history, there are so many sites that are readily accessible in the countryside where you don't have to queue with hundreds of others. Being able to buy fresh produce at local markets and cook our own meals, going to sleep and waking up to the sounds of

birds and cows, not feeling the need to race out of the door and 'be in it' .... my kind of holiday!

The Ring of Kerry (Part 2)

Friday 29th May

We have driven the south side of the Ring of Kerry today - from Cahersiveen to Killarney, then through the middle back home. The contrasts in the landscape - from wild Atlantic Coast to almost sub-tropical microclimates (huge azalea shrubs, palms) to leafy woods to soft green hills to barren granite mountains - is quite extraordinary. We were brave and drove through the middle, on very narrow one car width roads and through a steep pass. But the day has been kind to us - we woke to sunshine and it has been very clear (if somewhat windy). Have just had our evening meal of fresh haddock and chips at Murphy's pub and we're settling in for an early night in preparation for our journey into the unknown tomorrow. We think we will drive towards Limerick and then follow the Shannon north, stopping when we find somewhere appealing.

View from front of our B&B

Woolly friend

View from Moll's Gap in the south east of the Ring

The road less travelled (through the middle)

Fifi has a day off!!

This is Fifi's travelling companion (Peta) writing the blog at the end of Thursday 28th May from a little desk, at a little attic window, in our B&B at Portmagee. We arrived in Portmagee last evening and spent the night in a boutique B&B with stunning views over the harbour.

Unfortunately we were unable to extend our stay there (a real shame given the brilliant fruit and pancake breakfast!), but we were directed to a lovely establishment across the harbour and are now happily ensconsed here in our spacious, view-rich attic room!

Portmagee is an tiny fishing village in the SW of Ireland … picture postcard perfect really, and without the tourists. It is, as we discovered, the starting point for boat trips to the Skellig Islands, some 12 km off the coast and into the Atlantic, on which a clifftop monastery was built around the 12th century. It is also known for its birdlife so, being a bird person, I leapt at the chance to do the excursion out there today... trips were cancelled yesterday because of the bleak weather.

Fifi, however, was slightly nervous about the still-fiesty seas and the prospect of losing her pancakes, and opted for a land-lubber day in Portmagee, investigating future accommodation options and chilling-out (not literally). That's what I was doing on the high seas …
About 8 boats (taking 12 persons apiece) leave the tiny Portmagee harbour at 10.30 am and point their noses towards the two islands know as the Skelligs … small boats, I might add. I was on a boat with a group of russians, and some germans .. and several were pretty sick .. one poor woman looked as she was about to die, so ill was she.

I had a good possie near the bridge and stood up the whole way with my eyes fixed on the horizon (an old anti sea-sickness trick) and managed to get there and back without major queasiness. We donned wet weather gear to combat the significant splash from the swell and were all grateful for it.

What a stunning day it was .. we had about 2.5 hours on the main island (Skellig Michael), which is a black granite and slate outcrop, steeply-sided, minimally vegetated with the astounding remains of its 12th century abbey/monastery at the top. How they built it and lived there beggars belief. It was place for pilgramage too in the ensuing centuries.

Skellig Michael's other major attraction is that it is covered in birds … kittiwakes, petrels, guillemots, gannets, razor bills, and PUFFINS to name a few .. hundreds of gorgeous puffins who have little burrows all over the island and who have just arrived (in May) for their breeding season. Absolutely stunning. I could have spent days watching them and the other birds. Such grace in the air, such skill landing on slippery cliff faces on miniscule nests in high winds, real beauty in their natural environment. It was such a treat. The puffins will remain one of those special and unforgettable lifetime experiences.

The trip home was far less challenging (wave-wise) and included a circle around the second Skellig Island which is home to the world's second largest population of gannets … hundreds of thousands of them, making the black cliffs white – an astonishing sight.

Reaching land was rewarded by a wonderful cup of tea in one of the Portmagee pubs. Sarah and I then visited the 'Skellig Experience' museum, which is just down the road from the B&B... a very comprehensive display on the history of the Skelligs, both historical and environmental. Well worth the entrance fee.

The day was topped off by a fantastic dinner at a relatively local restaurant called Fushcia … run by two lovely people who have escaped the ratrace and settled here .. the dinner was up there with the best meals we have had on the trip. We might have to return tomorrow night, providing we think our waistbands can cope with it (which, I can tell you, is looking pretty doubtful in my case!!)...

when Irish eyes are smiling (sometimes)

Sunday 24th May
Dublin
Took a taxi from the airport to our hotel, which, it turned out, was across the opposite side of the city. The taxi driver was a chatty fellow who had spent a great year in Australia about 15 years ago, and had lived in Many for a while then travelled through NW NSW and central Australia down to Adelaide. He helped us with a few suggestions about where we might travel to over the next week.
The hotel we had booked, Butler's Town House, is in an older Georgian style house in an area similar to Kensington in London, so it seemed quite familiar to me. You walk up stairs to go in the front door, and it has a large guest lounge on this floor and the dining room and conservatory (where breakfast is served) is on the ground level. After lugging our bags up 3 flights of stairs and rearranging the furniture in our room to suit us (for some reason, in Europe they always put twin beds right next to each other – doesn't make any sense to me at all), we walked to a local Indian restaurant and shared some deliciously spicy things and a couple of beers. It was very strange not to have had any Asian flavours at all for a number of weeks.

Monday 25th May
We got up early (well, 7am) and after breakfast walked into the city to get a City Tour bus. I was surprised that I wasn't at all impressed by Dublin as a city – there were a few interesting buidings and the huge Phoenix Park looks as though it would be a good place to spend time if you lived there, but otherwise it was a bit dingy and higgledy-piggledy. It was very cold on the top of the bus and we hadn't really dressed for it – it had been 22 the day before, and was only 14 at this stage. We had a warming drink and then shopped for a couple of hours …. some of us more successfully than others (as attested to by the fact that Peta posted a parcel home the next day to reduce her baggage). It had been a long day and we had eaten a delicious lunch at an Italian restaurant in a very swanky new area within Arnotts department store, so we went into Marks and Spencers food hall and got a couple of salads for our dinner, hopped into a taxi and spent the rest of the evening in the lounge reading, blogging and downloading / uploading photos.

Tuesday 26th May
Late breakfast and a slow morning deciding where to go then to Hertz to collect our hire car which is a brand new Toyota Aurius – a nice little car that handles really well and just the right size for us and our luggage. We had googled 'prettiest villages in Ireland' and found a place to stay in Adare, which would take us towards the south west. Peta navigated us onto the motorway and off we went. When we arrived at Adare at about 5.30pm, we were disappointed to discover it was on the main road and a little like Berrima x 10. The town (not village) was busy and the place we had booked to stay was on the main road, so we continued driving and rang the owner to explain that we preferred to stay somewhere quieter. Then came the challenge of finding somewhere else. Suffice to say that it was not a great experience - the one you have to have at sometime on a holiday.

Wednesday 27th May

But then we found somewhere to stay around here ...

We drove south through Kerry to a little fishing village called Portmagee. We are here again tonight - Peta has braved the elements and gone 12 kms out to sea in a very small boat to visit the Skellig Islands and I have opted to stay on land for the day. I'm in charge of booking accommodation for the next couple of nights - it's a Bank Holiday weekend and the Irish are on the move! The weather is quite cold, wet and blustery but everyone assures us that Saturday is going to be gorgeous. This is a view from just above our B&B.

Dingle Harbour (below) - we stopped on our journey south for a coffee break in this lovely little village.

Our night in Bordeaux

Saturday 23rd May

Because Aer Lingus only flies Bordeaux to Dublin Mon, Wed, Fri and Sun, and we had to leave our cottage on Saturday, Pete booked us into a B&B called Chateau Julie just outside Bordeaux for Saturday night. We had looked at Google Maps to get a general idea of where the chateau is, and we had a Dordogne map that got us half way there, and somehow we had faith that when we got closer, we would just find it. Given our previous 2 weeks of missing road signs and many, many U-turns, you could consider that this as blind faith, but it worked.

The chateau is run by a Dutch couple and we had a very comfortable night - had dinner at what could have been a nearby bistro if we hadn't taken a circuitous route - and a late breakfast the next morning, followed by a couple of hours in Bordeaux before heading to the airport to return the car. We ate breakfast with a young coiuple who lived in Bordeaux but were having a night away. Frederique was French and his wife Turkish. It was interesting hearing his views about France - he was interested in how we had been treated by the French, and seemed relieved that we hadn't experienced the arrogance that has been displayed by past generations. He said that English ahd not been taught in school, and he was glad that France was now becoming more outward looking.

It was quite strange being in the white light of the city - very open spaces and pale stone - after the golden colours of the Dordogne Given the limited time we had there, we just walked along the river and through a park belfore leaving for the airport. Some of the following photos are of a huge fountain and monument in the park. As you can tell, we were a bit fascinated by the fountain. On our walk along the river we saw an area of paving that had been slightly recessed and there was literally a thin sheet of water that people were playing in - it looked heaps of fun.

but wait, there's more ... of France

Images from Castlenaud

Got a bit excited when I discovered the 'panorama' setting on my camera ...

But maybe I should read the instructions ...

think the locals would be distressed to see their bridge this way.

Beynac from Castlenaud battlements. It was a very misty day.

greetings from the Emerald Isle

Sunday 24th May

We're here in Dublin and have just discovered that we have free wifi in out room. It's 8pm and we're keen to find some dinner, so this is just to let you all know we are safe and sound and will be able to recieve email until Tuesday morning our time when we move on.