County Cork and a Load of Blarney

I got up early on Wednesday in order to get to the bus station and head out of Dublin.  Somehow, I managed to get lost on my way to the station but I still got there in plenty of time.  The trip took about four-and-a-half hours and there was a stop in the middle for about fifteen minutes for food and toilets.

I got into Cork and, once again, it was pretty easy to find the hotel from the bus station.  The station is in the middle of town, close to St. Patrick Street, which is the main retail part of the city, and there were signs directing me to the hotel.

The weather in Cork was similar to the weather in Dublin.  I’ve never seen the weather anywhere in the world change so often in a single day.  We would go from heavily overcast to sunny to rainy.  Sometimes it would rain while the sun was out.  It would change from the time I left my room to the time I walked out of the hotel doors.  The one thing that was constant was the wind.  In the hotel rooms, I could hear it howling and it would cool me through my clothes whenever I tried to walk through it.

I walked around and took some photos but the weather wasn’t particularly cooperative.  I grabbed a late lunch and then returned to the hotel.  Between the cold and the previous night’s insomnia, I decided that it was time to take a nap.  I got up around eight and went out for some beer and some dinner.   It was another relatively quiet night as I watched some television and wrote.

There were three things in particular that I was looking forward to seeing on this trip to Great Britain.  The first one was Blarney Castle so I would have a chance to kiss the Blarney Stone.  I’m not sure why.  It’s not that attractive.  I’d be kissing something that has been kissed by millions of other people, even though it’s probably not the first time I could make that claim.  Nevertheless, I was really looking forward to this part of my trip.

I got up and went to the bus station to get a ticket to Blarney.  From Cork, the buses run pretty much every hour and a round-trip ticket costs around $8.  After buying the ticket, I had some time to kill until the next bus so I grabbed a sausage and egg sandwich and waited for the bus.  The trip took about thirty minutes and dropped us off a short walk from the Blarney Castle complex.  It was strange because even though the castle is a huge structure on top of a hill, you still have to follow the signs to find the entrance to the complex because everything is hidden behind the trees leading up to the castle.

It costs ten euros to get into the complex and from there, it is maybe a quarter-mile walk to the castle.  As you come around one of the bends, the castle jumps out at you as large structures tend to do.  As far as castles go, I don’t suppose that it’s the most impressive structure, but since we don’t have castles in the United States, I found it quite interesting.  Still, the weather was constantly changing and as it started to sprinkle, I decided to head straight to the entrance to get inside.

Inside the castle, there was a long line, predictably, leading up the steps to the top, where the Blarney Stone is located.  It was dark and dank inside the castle with a few plaques explaining how the castle had changed over the years.  The trip to the top of the castle went up narrow, steep stone steps.  (Say that five times fast.)  It probably would have been a pain in the ass to go up quickly, but we were only going up a step or two at a time because of the line of people in front of us, so it was quite a leisurely trip.  Once at the top, the line winded around about a quarter of the way along the castle wall the to the Blarney Stone.  I had made it this far, so of course I had to kiss it.  While we waited, though, there were some great views from the top of the castle.  

Kissing the Blarney Stone isn’t as simple as it sounds.  It requires you to lie down on your back; lean half of your body over the edge of the castle roof; bend over backwards from the middle back; and kiss the bottom white stone of a broken wall.  It’s safe enough but it did cause all of the blood to rush to my head which made the next forty or so seconds fun as I felt like I had just finished off an ounce of jerk chicken.  Anyway, I don’t know if I’ve been granted the gift of gab as promised by all of the legends, but at least it was something else that I can now cross off my list of things to do.

That’s it for now.  I should be able to finish up Blarney and Cork in the next entry.