I took about 1600 pictures in Ireland over the last two weeks, and I’ll be editing and processing them for weeks to come. Still, I thought I’d pick out a few dozen shots to give a flavor of the country.
| First, Dublin, the capital. It’s a great walking city, and boy, did I do a lot of walking. Dublin’s one of the world’s great Georgian cities (mid- to late-18th century). There are many sections of Georgian terraces remaining - what we would call "row houses". While the houses in each terrace are pretty much the same along the street, each door is different: |
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| The story goes that late one night a Dubliner had had a bit too much of the black stuff... | 
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| ... so when he came home, given the similarity of all the terrace houses, he stumbled into the wrong house and into the wrong bed. The following morning, all the women of Dublin went out and painted the doors different colors. An alternate story says that upon the death of Queen Victoria, the Irish were ordered to paint their doors black in mourning. They immediately went out and got the brightest colors possible to repaint their doors... take your pick. | |
| "Cockles and mussels, alive, alive-o" - Molly Malone still pushes her barrow. |
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The General Post Office (GPO) was the place where the 1916 Rising started. It was destroyed in the rising, but rebuilt after Independence. There are still bullet holes in the columns. |
| The monastic ruins at Glendalough in County Wicklow: |
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The Rock of Cashel: Once a royal fortress, then given to the Church in the 12th Century. Now, filled with ruined churches. |
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| The town of Cobh (pronounced "cove") in County Cork was the last port of call for ships sailing from Britain to the USA, and the place where most Irish emigrants left Ireland for the New World during and after the Famine: |
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Kinsale is another town on the south coast, not far from Cork. Its narrow, winding Main Street traces the old coastline -everything to the right is built on fill. |
| There are literally thousands of prehistoric remains in Ireland - this is the Drombeg stone circle, dating to the early Bronze Age. The burned remains of a young boy were found in the center of the circle. |
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| Glengarriff, on the Ring of Beara, the southernmost peninsula on the West coast, split between County Cork and County Kerry. |
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Kenmare is at the northernmost point of the Ring of Beara (that’s Beara in the background), or the southernmost point of the Ring of Kerry, the next peninsula north. This is the view from my window at the B&B I stayed in. |
| Rush Hour on the Ring of Beara: |
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A horse-drawn jaunting car at Muckross House in Killarney National Park: |
| Ross Castle, also in Killarney National Park: |
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| Next, a few pictures from the Dingle Peninsula. I spent two nights in Dingle Town - "An Daingean" is its official name, now, because this part of Ireland is part of the Gaeltacht, the Irish-speaking part of the country. Not to worry, everyone speaks English, too. | |
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| The Cliffs of Moher in County Clare are up to 600 feet high: | 
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| I spent two nights on Inishmore, the largest of the Aran Islands. This is a picture of Kilronan Harbour at sunset: | 
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The "Black Fort" (Dun Dúbhchathair) - after 3,000 years, it's still overlooking the sea on the northern coast of Inishmore. |
| The Connemara countryside: | 
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Kylemore Abbey - today a convent of Benedictine nuns and a girl’s school, it was built in the 1830’s as a private home: |
That’ll do for now, I think...
