JandalsnAll

Ooo Im a slacker. I’ll slap myself on the hand. Leaving you all in suspenders wondering if Im dead or alive. Im sure you’re all worried sick. Dont blame you. But rest assured I am alive – a sluggish sort of alive at times but alive nonetheless.
So while you’ve been going out of your minds with worry Ive been from Kilkenny to Cork to Dingle with Skibereen inbetween. Last Saturday ? all the days blend into one here. I left Kilkenny for Cork, catching a ride with A – thats the English young Jonathan Creek lookalike. We neared Cork around midday and decided to head out to Blarney to see Blarney Castle and to kiss the dreaded Blarney Stone. Dreaded because who knows whats lurking on a stone millions of people have slobbered on. The castle itself is awesome. Not restored this one, and complete with dungeons and murderhole where boiling liquids were poured from a great height on invaders below – now this is what I came to Ireland to see. Dungeons, murderholes and slobbery stones.

We walked up several spiral staircases through the remains of the castle (excellent view from the top) to join the queues of other people keen to slobber on the stone. Now before I came to Ireland I had no intention of ever kissing the Blarney stone but I figured I was there and I’d paid NZ$14 to get in, may as well come away with something (no meningitis thanks). I began to assess the throngs around me, trying to pick out signs of any particularly hazardous bacterium so as to position myself so I am at least 7 seconds away when it comes to kissing the stone. The good old 7 second rule. Nothing evident to the naked eye but these things can go unrecognized. I was hoping there’d be a scanning process by way of cheekswab testing just before you get to the stone but there wasnt. And as this was a spur of the moment sidetrip, I hadnt had time to purchase any mouthwash – or industrial strength disinfectant. The moment of truth came as I approached the kissing stone. Adam went first, stood up, no sweating,tumbling or projectile vomiting – a good sign. My turn next. The process for slobbering on the stone is such: You lie flat on your back and inch yourself backwards, so as to hang upside down over a hole near the wall of the castle View image
. A guide holds you, you pucker up and plant a big wet one on a stone the size of a brick . I thought it would be much bigger – I hoped it would be much bigger – less chance of another bout of French bird flu, or American bird flu as it would most likely have been in this case. A stone so small can hardly remain sterile with so much slobber. Anyway I did it. And so far so good – though as I said these things can go unrecognized you know.I’ll keep you posted.

A and I arrived in Cork that afternoon and stayed in Bru bar and Hostel. A nice place, brand new but rather sterile in terms of hanging out with other travellers. And thats a bad sort of sterile. While there we met up with D, one of the ‘bloody Aussies’ from Kilkenny. Went on a search for traditional Irish music that night and ended up listening to some 90’s heavy metal band. They were awesome…I’ll take 90’s heavy metal over traditional Irish music anyday …. not. But good company. Stayed another night or two in Cork but the weather was miserable and there doesnt seem to be anything much in Cork. Oh actually D and I did catch a bus out to Kinsale, a little fishing town, and walked out to see Charles Fort which was amazing. Its right on the sea and huge. It was used to fight someone from somewhere back in the day – (go look it up if you really want to know), then used again in WW2, then occupied by a bunch of hippies in the 60’s – that I do remember. But you can peer out to sea through the watch towers and the gaps where the cannons were (whatever those gaps are called) and pretend you’re under attack. Very cool and reccomended.

So after Cork, I was intending on heading down and around the coast and up towards Dingle where I planned to spend Easter with Lex, Kane and co (friends over from London for the weekend). The bloody Aussie who has become my current travelling buddy and I chose Skibbereen (which is inbetween) just on a whim, to spend a day in or so before carrying on to Dingle. Well theres not much to see in Skibbereen but the name is cool. We had to hike 2kms from the town out to an adventure park hostel for the night. It was a great place to stay, and the guy looking after it was the only one there so we played cards and guitar most of the night then hiked back into town the next day and caught a bus back to Cork. It turns out buses dont go down and around the coast and to get to Dingle we had to catch a bus from Cork. So Skibbereen inbetween ended up being a bit of an expensive excursion because of the bus trips but if I hadnt have gone I wouldnt be able to keep saying Skibereen inbetween. So I’d say it was well worth it.

So finally to the present day. Its a beautiful day in Dingle. The best yet. Blue skies and a sea breeze. Yesterday I caught up with Lex, Kane, and their friends Jason, Amy and Min. Escapades so far include taking a boat trip out to see Funghi (like mushrooms) the dolphin, the local celebrity – just like real tourists. And a trip up into the hills, stopping for an icecream (you should have seen Lex’s face light up), stopping again at a waterfall, where we soon found out just who and who was not destined to be a world famous rock-climber – Lex utilizing the everpopular ‘bum-sliding’ technique as method of descent, and stopping again at a beach reminiscent of Papamoa. Not bad surf either. I took a photo for you Dad. Today is Easter Saturday and the pubs are open again so should be a fun night to be had by all – hopefully with plenty of local sounds. Stay tuned.

This entry was posted on Friday, March 25th, 2005 at 11:34 am and is filed under Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.