Killarney with my Smicks

Let me tell you, there is nothing better than hopping on the bus with Eugene, our driver, and hitting the road to go to southwest Ireland. We spent a weekend in Killarney, CO. Kerry to see Dingle, the Ring of Kerry, Killarney National Forest, and Muckrose House. Not to mention, our Irish were playing Stanford.

We got in late Friday night and immediately fell asleep. Saturday morning, after the most delicious traditional Irish breakfast, we hit the road to drive the ring of Kerry. It was absolutely beautiful being down by the water and it didn't rain on us once. It rained while we were in the bus, however, the moment we parked and stepped outside, the rain would stop! Lucky, right? We literally spent all day in the bus driving the Ring and even found ourselves in front of this little cottage on the side of the road, asking for directions on how to get to the Skelligs. The cutest little old man simply pointed past our bus. His home had a great view of the Skelligs, which are these islands off the west coast of Ireland that were home to some of the most secluded monasteries in Ireland. The islands are beautiful, and I'm sure that they are quite intimidating during a bad rain storm.

The little beach we stopped at for lunch
on the Ring of Kerry

The private beach at Derrynane

Climbing on the rocks on at the beach
at Derrynane

Our tour of the Ring of Kerry led us on a tour of Daniel O'Connell's childhood home. O'Connell is known as the Liberator in Ireland and was a key political figure in Catholic Emancipation in the 1820s and worked on repealing the Act of Union of 1800. He was this great barrister turned politician. He had a beautiful home right on the water. We climbed all around the rocks at that beach and took in the wonderful sun. I'm sure Roberta, our coordinator out here, would've had a fit. She's not a fan of us climbing and crawling places where we can get hurt. I understand that completely, I'm sure. We ended our tour by going through Killarney National Park, where Kimber, Katie, Pat, Alexis and I decided to climb up this huge tree. I'm sure it must be like watching 12 children running amuck for Roberta.

Our set up for the game

After dinner and some rest, our group headed out to a sports bar to see if we could watch the Notre Dame vs. Stanford football game. Alas, Ireland still doesn't get NBC, so we were forced to return back to the hotel lobby to stream it from our laptops. What a game! We were on the edge of our seats by the end of it and probably woke up the entire hotel when Notre Dame won. We took the win as a sign to celebrate and walked back to the city centre. It was a great night and a great way to celebrate a phenomenal win!

On Sunday, Roberta surprised us with horse and carriage rides through Killarney National Park to Muckrose House. It was a chilly morning, but it certainly beat taking the bus over to the house. There were a ton of people walking and running through the park and I was shocked at how much brush was everywhere. My mind kept going back to how this entire park would be lost if a cigarette wasn't put out properly. My carriage was laughing at my California mindset (I'm sorry but it was October, and that's definitely still fire season back home). Muckrose house was quite extravagant. Queen Victoria visited and stayed at the house. That was cool. We saw the bedroom she stayed in and got to learn about the great lengths the owners had to go through to prepare for the queen's visit.

I loved Killarney. It certainly is one of the places in Ireland I could see myself living in if I wasn't to live near Dublin.

Muckrose House! The pain pathway Queen Victoria would
have taken when first arriving at the house

Our Horse!