A Tour of Kerry

Hey y'all! Sorry for my blog absence in the past two weeks but I haven't had too much to blog about until now.  This past weekend I went to the Ring of Kerry with Natalia.  The Ring of Kerry isn't actually a ring or an island or anything you would think of when you think of "ring".  Kerry is a county in the southwest of Ireland.  Its one of the few places in the country where you can find mountains and the seaside views are absolutely beautiful!  The Ring of Kerry refers to the 112 mile route traveled around the Iveragh Peninsula through all of the coastal towns in County Kerry.  We stayed in Dublin on Saturday night and woke up bright and early at 5 am Sunday morning to join our tour group and we were off to Kerry!

Four hours later we started the tour in Killarney.  We made our way through a lot of small villages and stopped at many different photo ops on our trek around the Ring of Kerry.  My favorite stops were the village of Waterville and Killarney National Park.  Waterville is definitely what you would call a village.  The whole town was about the size of King Street.  Any place that makes Boone look like a booming metropolis is village material!  Charlie Chaplin used to stay here with his family in one of the hotels.  He came so much that the town put up a statue in his honor and hosts the Charlie Chaplin Comedy Festival every year!

This man let people take pictures with his animals.  He also pulled a small puppy out of the donkey's basket.  Oh tourist attractions.

Dingle Peninsula

Waterville Beach

Downtown Waterville

Charlie Chaplin!  Apparently he used to spend his holidays in Waterville.  Who kne?

Ballinskelligs Bay- America is straight ahead!

The remains of a potato famine village

Downtown Sneem

Kelly's Bakey in Sneem!

 Everything we saw in Killarney National park was breath taking.  I especially loved Ladies View.  When Queen Victoria visited Kerry the lord at the time (I forget his name!) told her she MUST go see the lake of Killarney from this special spot in the park.  Queen Victoria told him she was far too busy to go see these lakes so she sent her ladies-in-waiting.  When they returned and the queen asked how it was her ladies told her it was a view fit for any lady to see.  And it was beautiful!

Ladies View, Killarney National Park

Ladies View

Torc Waterfall, Killarney National Park

We finished the tour and made our way back into Dublin and finally got home to Stamullen at midnight Sunday!  I've been tired this week but it was worth the lack of sleep to see all the great places on the Ring of Kerry.  Pippa is officially walking!  She still crawls the majority of the time but she loves walking to people and even walks around on her own without any encouragement until she falls.  The girls are both doing well in school but we're all going a little stir crazy since it has rained nonstop the past two days.

Natalia leaves tomorrow- a fact which I'm still trying to wrap my head around!  Her family's new au pair arrived today so I'll meet her tomorrow when I tell Natalia goodbye.  And three weeks from today I'll be landing in Raleigh to be home for an entire week!  Hopefully I'll have some more updates for everyone before then!