Aglish

Our little thatched cottage near the village of Aglish, located about halfway between Waterford and Cork.

Our flight to Ireland was pretty uneventful, and we picked up the rental car at Dublin airport for the short drive to our first stopover point near the village of Aglish. While planning the trip I tried to find self-catering places well off the beaten tourist path and this little place certainly fit the bill. The cottage itself is located down a long, unpaved farm track, and the directions to it included lines such as "turn right at the monkey puzzle tree outside the village". The last 3/4 of a mile down to the cottage was so narrow that our little rental car was scraping against the overhanging foliage on both sides...the path was carved out in the days when horse and cart were the primary modes of transport, and modern vehicles just have to make do. Made for a nice base of operations for our first week here, not to mention trying to adjust to the 7 hours of jet lag.

Looking down the path behind the cottage. From here it's about 30 yards to the banks of the Blackwater River - a seagoing thoroughfare since before the time of the Vikings who raided along this coast in the 8th century, and who founded the towns of Lismore just above us and Youghal down at the mouth of the river.

And looking out the front door of the cottage - nothing around us but pasture, forest, and wetlands.

Been exploring the local area and visiting places we missed on our last trip to Ireland in 2007. Spent one day in Waterford doing all of the usual tourist stuff, which included stopping by the Waterford Crystal Showroom for lunch and a browse. We've previously enjoyed guided walking tours of the city wherever we've been and so when the local tourist office mentioned that that had one about to depart we joined in. Our guide was an entertaining local gent who provided a running commentary on the history of the city while stopping by most of the significant buildings in the Viking Triangle. Pretty fun afternoon actually.

Next day we stayed a little closer to home and visited Ardmore - a pretty little seaside village with a lot of history of its own.

The ancient abbey, round tower and graveyard just above the town. These round towers exist all over Ireland and date from the era of Viking raids between about the 8th and 11th centuries. There were no real towns back then and centers of population tended to be grouped around monastic settlements like this one. When a Viking ship was spotted  off-shore the monks would collect the manuscripts, gold, silver and anything else of value and high-tail it into the tower. The "door" is located about 30 ft above ground level and is accessed via a ladder which the monks would pull up behind them when they bolted the door. Pretty safe and secure unless the raiders wanted to settle in for a protracted siege...and most of them didn't. The towers were so well constructed of the local stone that they still look new after nearly 1,000 years.

St. Declan's oratory down near the sea front in Ardmore. Declan was a Christian missionary who preceded St Patrick to Ireland by about 30 years, and who was responsible for converting most of the southern Irish coast to Christianity. Didn't have the PR team that Patrick had, however, and so his contributions have largely faded from the wider world. Not here though, where's he's still revered as the one who started it all.  

And St Declan's well - one of many "Holy Wells" in this area, reputed to have healing properties for a variety of ailments. There's still a trickle coming up out of the ground where I'm standing.

There was a nice coastal walk around the point from the oratory, which passed by the Martello Tower you can see on the cliff behind me. Martello towers were built along the Irish coast in the early 1700's to help guard against a feared invasion by the French.


Spent another pleasant day up at the Glen of Aherlow south of Tipperary. Really a pretty little valley tucked away in the hills with lots of old ruins and some interesting hikes.

A view of the Glen on a particularly moody afternoon. The weather has been pretty changeable so far, and we're re-learning that the reason why Ireland is famous for its "40 shades of green" is because it has about 80 different types of rain.

One of our hikes was up to a megalithic tomb called "Darby's Bed" near the village of Galbally. You occasionally come across these old passage tombs as you ramble around the country. This one wasn't quite as remote as some.

One particularly efficient business in Galbally - a combination of an undertaker and a pub. Guess it's sort of a one-stop-shop for the dearly departed and their families...can book both the wake and the funeral in the same establishment.

The Irish people are just as friendly and welcoming as we remember. Really makes it a pleasure to travel about the country.

We'll be here for another couple of nights, then head about an hour down the road to the village of Kinsale - just south of Cork - where we'll be staying for 3 nights before shoving off for the Beara peninsula in the west of Ireland for some hard-core hiking.