Thursday 24^th July                         KENMARE  -  NEWCASTLE WEST  -  FOYNES  -  ROOSKA EAST

Robyn writes: It’s been a travel day today, and one that has gone very nicely (which is always a relief!) Today dawned bright and sunny, which gives a huge lift to the spirits. They came right down, however, when I looked at my phone and learned that my Uncle Albert had died. He’d been unwell for some time, and so it wasn’t a surprise, but it was still an upsetting shock. Jo fortified me with a cup of tea.

                                                   A beautiful, sunny morning outside Kenmare

She’d got up early and had all her things packed and ready by the time we surfaced, so she went off for a walk up the hill, while we had breakfast and packed our things. Jo had put all our sheets on to wash for Emily, our landlady, so we left the house all organised and clean.

We drove down the hill from our house, through Kenmare one last time, and headed north to County Limerick. It’s a very pretty county, with mostly gentle rolling hills from what we’ve seen so far. By the time we got to Newcastle West, we were ready for morning tea, so we found the centre of the town, got a park, and discovered Marguerite’s Bakehouse, where we had lovely cuppas, coffee, éclair and apple slices. Irish morning teas are amazing, and almost always baked on the premises, unlike Australia where they often seem to all come out of the same factory.

                                                                Goodbye Kenmare

                                                We saw this interesting sculpture on the way

                                                       Marguerite's at Newcastle West

We also discovered Newcastle West’s castle – right in the centre of the town, it rejoices in the name of Desmond Castle. Tours were available and free, so Lex booked us one for 11.15 and went off to organise paid parking (the first hour had been free). This involved going to the newsagent and paying 50 cents for a scratchie card, which had the details scratched off appropriately and was displayed on the dashboard. Have never met one like that before!

                                                           Our parking 'disk'

The tour was very interesting. The castle was originally built in the 12^th century by descendants of the Norman invaders (as they did) and was absolutely huge – what is there now is only about one third of its original size. The original keep is actually next door, through a lot of foliage, and it’s still privately owned, as the owners refuse to sell it to the government! (To be fair, if I had a castle in the family, I would probably want to keep it too….) What we saw today was built in the 14^th century, and of course altered over the years. It was the seat of the Earls of Fitzgerald, the Desmonds, who were greater landowners than the English kings at times. It changed hands many times between warring family members and neighbours over the centuries, until one of them tried to rebel against Elizabeth 1. This went as well for him as you would have expected; he was executed and his head sent to London to be displayed on Tower Hill. The lands were forfeited to the Crown, and this was one of the factors which led to James 1 being able to start the ‘Plantation’ of Scottish settlers into Ireland in the early 1600s.

                                                                  Castle Desmond

                                                 Gerald Fitzgerald, 3rd Earl of Desmond

The Irish OPW (Office of Public Works) has taken over the castle, and they have been renovating it since they acquired it in the 1980s. They’ve completed the banqueting hall, and it’s been beautifully done in period appropriate materials such as oak. The ceiling is amazing. The hall had been burnt down twice in its history, so there was a lot to do. They’ve made a visitor centre out of the old coach house, and the current project is the Great Hall. Our guide, Daniel, took us around and certainly knew all about it.

                                                                    The Great Hall is the next renovation

                                                         The Banqueting Hall renovation is complete

                                  The courtyard including the visitor's centre in the old coach house

                                                                        Banqueting hall

After this, we were heading north to Limerick, when I put the address of our next accommodation into the GPS, and discovered that it was actually to the west of Newcastle West! Normally we check things like this the night before, at least, but yesterday was such a huge day, all we’d done was have tea, upload photos, do the blog and crawl into bed. So….sudden change of plans! Rather than turn around (we couldn’t check into the house until 3, anyway) I set a course to the little port town of Foynes, on the banks of the Shannon River’s large estuary.

We found the Foynes Inn in the main street, a very nice hotel which gave us a massive lunch! Jo had the Guinness Stew and mash (an apparently bottomless bowl), I had lasagne, chips and salad (delicious) and Lex had the biggest serve of bacon and cabbage (well known Irish culinary delight) we’ve ever seen. He has brought half of it home for dinner.

                                                        Lex ate this over two meals!

                                                                  The Foynes Inn

After lunch, we waddled out and drove to a lookout on the south of town where we could see the estuary of the Shannon river, and the port – which is quite big. They used to land and take off flying boats there in the sheltered harbour during WWII – they still have one on display in a local museum. We drove a little further along, and were surprised at how big and wide the estuary of the Shannon is.

                                                                 The port at Foynes 

                                                    Flying boats used to land in the sheltered bay.

                                             Shannon Estuary. Viking ships used to sail up here.

Then, we set a course for the Tesco’s in Newcastle West to get groceries for the next two nights. We were all so full from lunch that tonight’s is very light, but we have a chook and veges to roast tomorrow night. Then we headed for our new home, at Rooska East. It’s about ten minutes drive out of Newcastle West, along very winding roads. It’s called ‘Home with a View’, and it certainly is that! It’s right up high on the hillside with the most beautiful view of the valley. to the south, we can see as far as Limerick, about 20km away as the crow flies. Today has been warm, bright and mostly sunny with temperatures just into the 20s, so we and the locals are in raptures over it after the last few weeks of grey drizzle.

                                                             Our view!

                                                 Our lovely house

We’ve happily moved into our house, which is a very old farmhouse that’s been beautifully converted. It has 3 bedrooms and is very comfortable. Lex went off for a walk, but Jo and I have had a wonderfully lazy afternoon, done some washing and washed our hair. Sheer bliss after such a massive day out yesterday!

                                                              Lex's photos from his walk

                                                                    Beautiful view with fuchsias

Tomorrow, we’ll see what Limerick has to offer.