Well I'm leaving Cork now. I really don't like it very much. There's really not much to see and the people don't seem to be very friendly. I will say that the people at my guest house were positively delightful. There was also a family from France staying there and they were also very nice.
Now I'm on the road towards Killarney. I was thinking as I started to drive a long how much improved the roads are until it narrowed back to a two lane road. I let that go right out of my mind.
So I'm driving along and actually I like the fact that this isn't a 4 lane road. I get to see the small towns and it really is quite lovely. It you drive by you see ruin of castles and forts but unfortunately I can't stop at them all. There is no place to pull over either.
The weather is really not very good today. It was raining on and off and it was cloudy the rest of the time. Occasionally a few rays of sunshine would break through the clouds and turn the countryside of beautiful green. I stopped at the Kerry Woolen Mills and bought a sweater as I like the ones that I bought there before very much.
After this I entered into the Ring of Kerry. How beautiful! I had the ocean on one side and the McGillicuddy reeks on the other side. I turn down one side road and began to drive on a very narrow road that went through the mountains. The driving was scary but the scenery was magnificent. As I drive along and look at these things I wonder why people left such a beautiful place.
I arrived and my guest house and was greeted by the owner. She never did tell me her name however she is going to help me find my grandmother's house. After getting settled, I went out and drove up some of the mountain roads looking for the O'Connor Farm. My GPS actually found inchiclogh and directed me right there. I knocked on the door and talk to mrs. Sheehan who said she was not familiar with the O'Connor Farm but she did point me in the right direction and gave me some people to talk to tomorrow. I think I may be successful this time.
I headed into town to have dinner. There's a Music and Arts Festival starting tomorrow. I hope this livens things up because this is a very dreary town. I drove down across the harbor and drove over to the beach and to the remnants of a castle near the beach. I walked around the castle but it was cold and windy with intermittent rain. It was still beautiful. I have chat with the Lifeguard at the beach. He said he hasn't had much business at all this year as the weather is really been lousy all summer. There was nobody at the beach. It reminded me of the beach in winter , desolate and cold.
As the music doesn't start til tomorrow, nobody had music tonight. I stopped at a pub called the Fertha. Besides the fact it was full of crying kids the place was really nice and the food was excellent.
I don't think I would want to live here. As I look at the town although many places of brightly painted it is still very dreary. Buildings haven't been modernized or even cleaned up in years. There is nothing to do and unless you want to go into a pub there's really nothing to do.
I'm in my room now and ready to go to bed after a day of driving. It was a good day. It was a day of beginning to really see the beauty of Ireland. But I also understand why people left. The remnants of those days are also here to see.
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