Donkeys and the Ring of Kerry (11/21)

(Long)  

The Ring of Kerry is the most famous and picturesque tourist drive in Ireland.  We touched on it at the start of our road trip with Alex and Melissa and Andrew (you may recall the Torc Waterfall and Muckross House/Gardens), but this past weekend we decided to pull an all-dayer and drive it officially.  It's about 2 hours away, and the drive itself is 7 hours (111 miles, stopping every 10 minutes or so for another spectacular view).

The Ring of Kerry is notorious for being bumper-to-bumper on narrow roads, trapped behind tour buses going 10 mph.  That aspect can be miserable.  So one good thing about being here is November was that we saw about 10 cars all day and could stop anywhere we wanted.  Of course the tradeoff was being below 0°C (that's freezing for my US friends), and it rained all afternoon which clouded out a few of our views.

But before that, Lily had found a Donkey Sanctuary that was on the way, so we stopped there first.  The trip was about 14 hours start to finish, which the driver in me isn't proud of for 300 miles.

This post is heavy on photos, and read below for the craziest anecdote so far!

Donkey Sanctuary

We had about 3 days with mornings below freezing last week.  That meant a lot of scraping before going to work or on this road trip.  And I'm not sure there are ice scrapers in Ireland, so I used a combination of a credit card, a spatula, and a cutting board, and of course hot defrost on high.  None worked.

  

There were about 30 rescued donkeys that will hopefully be adopted as pets or lawnmowers.  It is a pretty sizable endeavor funded by donors, not just two donkeys in someone's back yard. 

The Swift (Taylor, not Jonathan) and Shakespeare fans among us all loved this little lady.  Every morning they get their name collars on, and when we arrived 5 minutes after opening, half had already pulled each other's collars off, including all the males, natch.

The donkeys were pretty cold and stationary, but I coaxed this guy to run laps with me.  It's not clear in this photo that we are moving at a reasonable clip and I have a 1/2 length lead.  "He is moving like a tremendous machine."

He edged me at the line, and we had a good laugh about it.  Not sure his name, since his collar had been pulled off.

Fun fact: donkeys don't have waterproof hair like horses, so they need shelter.  They were imported from North Africa long ago, and thus their hair is not adapted to rain.  Fun fact:  how dry is North Africa?  Our next stop after Ireland is to see family in Aswan Egypt, which is the driest inhabited location on Earth, where annual rainfall is often measured in minutes (less than half an inch per year). 

A good time was had by all.  Fortunately for me, we can't fit donkeys in our carry-ons.

The Ring of Kerry (the dry inland first part)

It turns out that half our photos are in the small section between Killarney and Moll's Gap.  That was around the time the rain started, so we didn't get out of the car as much after that.

These views were ridiculous.  Straight from Middle Earth (we just watched the trilogy again last week).  The entire Two Towers movie could have been filmed here, particularly the scenes with Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli pursuing the hobbits.

A different lake from the one above.  Hopefully on a phone you can rotate these 360, but maybe not once they are hosted on a website.

I feel my fire pose here is lost amidst the grandeur.

One specific lookout named for the female British royalty who found it stunning on their first trip to Ireland.

The same view without the sign.  This trip made me appreciate how beautiful brown can be, even though I'm sure most people would prefer green grass.

We weren't expecting snow-capped mountains.

Moll's Gap. It's a gap named after someone named Moll, probably.  I don't know.  I can't look up every. little. thing. for you people.

Grabbing some tasty snacks at a cute boutique at Moll's Gap.  Okay, fine, I looked it up. Moll's Gap is named after Moll Kissane, who ran a shebeen (an unlicensed public house (pub)) in the 1820s, while the road was under construction.  Moll's Gap is an example of a "glacial breach", where a 500 meter deep glacier broke through 25,000 years ago during Ireland's last ice age.  There.  Now you know.

Staigue Fort, one of the biggest and best-preserved ring forts in Ireland, which is off the beaten path.  The 12-foot thick walls were impressive.  (with Sam taking my picture, too)  As we drove the tiny mud path, we weren't sure this would be worth it, but it definitely was!

Why is the center so green?  I have no idea.  I can't imagine this site in the middle of nowhere is being maintained.  A better question might be with all the rain, how is any grass brown?

The walls were thick enough to house rooms inside them!

The Ring of Kerry (the rainy litoral second part) 

We stopped by a lake.  No trick photography here.  Kate is walking on the surface of a lake of liquid water.  The rain drops are dotting the surface.  No ice.

Not sure where all these divots came from, but it reminded me of - wait for it - the dead marshes in the Two Towers.

I can't remember why this bridge was cool, but kudos to Sam for the outside-the-car moving selfie.  Tweens, don't try this at home.  She is a professional.

The Atlantic Ocean.  The water was a nice shade of blue-green.

I think this is when Lily was coming to tell me she accidentally dropped her phone in the ocean.  Oops.

Some statue

We interrupt this photo roll for crazy story time.  The day is literally freezing and wet.  Every time we get out of the car in the afternoon, we get soaked.  So when we get back into the car, we crank the heat on high for warmth and dryness.  But I'm sure you all know the feeling where the car is TOO hot now.  And pretty humid.  So I'm down to a t-shirt in the car, and I just grab my wet raincoat whenever we decide to exit the vehicle.  Well at the statue above I am only getting out of the car for 30 seconds for a photo, so I just jump out in my t-shirt to sprint over and snap the shot.

Turns out there is another guy there taking a picture and he shouts, "Are you in a t-shirt in this weather?!?" and I nod sheepishly, not wanting to explain the rationale.  Then he says, "That's crazy, are you from Michigan or something?"  At this point my brain broke. I was trying to process if I was wearing Michigan apparel.  Or Michigan license plates (on my Irish rental car).  How did he know?  So I say "Yes, actually I am!"  Now I think his brain broke.  After a pause, he asks, "Are you serious??  I am too.  Grand Rapids!"  He was of Irish descent, born and raised in GR, currently working in Chicago.  We agreed to meet later at the Kerry Cliffs. 

It's nearly impossible to see but 7 miles offshore is a small island called Skellig (no N) Michael.  The island is a UNESCO World Heritage site with an ancient monastery of beehive huts, which were controversially used as a filming location in Star Wars VII: The Force Awakens (2014), where Rey goes to find [spoiler alert] Luke.  It appears there was little CGI; the structures really are that impressive.  Movie frames below.

Made it to the Kerry Cliffs about 10 minutes before closing (it's one of those odd historical sites that seems to be privately owned so you pay some guy in a trailer cash to go see it).  And yes, we ran into our GR friend again!

Views very similar to the Cliffs of Kilkee

I commented on the brown vegetation in an earlier caption, but here I had the same feeling about rain. It just felt right that it was raining.  It felt like the scene was complete.

Selfie time!

A huge gash in the mountain.

Due to the limited time, we divided and conquered to see the two viewing points.

After the Kerry Cliffs, darkness descended (Ireland is pretty far north of the US, so the days are short now).  We kept driving a while to complete the Ring, but the GPS eventually took us toward Clonmel and we stopped for food and gas.  It was a long but great day, and we are super proud of and grateful for our daughters who have been game for anything and are never deterred by weather or other inconveniences.  Seriously, never a pip of a complaint.