After an early morning photo processing session, I got the rest of the family out of bed and ready to go. First stop was across the street for a full Irish breakfast (hold the meat for me and Chloe). We then hopped in the car for a day circling the Ring of Kerry. Unfortunately, we took the wrong road out of town and didn’t realize it for 15 minutes, putting ourselves even further behind schedule!
Once we were back on the Ring, we stopped at Kenmare Bay overlook, where the girls and Rob went down a steep trail to the water — I still had on my Birks, so I looked on from above. Driving further on, we turned off the road to see the Staigue Stone Fort. When we arrived, the other tourists were all leaving, so we had the fort to ourselves for a while. Unfortunately, we met lots of cars coming up on our way down the single track road. What an adventure, looking for places to pull off the road!
The weather turned gray and cloudy and foggy, so we skipped stopping at many of the beaches and overlooks, and soon we encountered the tour buses traveling the opposite way on the ring, making driving tricky. Chloe demanded ice cream, so made a stop at a gas station for some soft serve, then drove down to Rossbeigh Beach. Windy and rainy.
Camille chose the Kerry Bog Village Museum as her stop. A cute little place with some thatched houses filled with historical items related to life in the bogs. The Kerry Bog Pony baby was a cutie too. The drive from there to Killarney was not as exciting, and the traffic in Killarney was awful. Soon we hit the park and the drive was better.
We found a parking spot in a lot near the lake. Rob and Camille walked over to the waterfall while Chloe and I headed down to sit by the lake and enjoy a moment of quiet. As we left, we began encountering the buses finishing up their day on the ring. Again, tight curvy roads through the park made trying to pass the buses a very difficult drive. Back at the apartment, we all went to the different stores. Rob and Camille bought books at the Kenmare Book Shop. Chloe and I bought pizza at the Daybreak.
