Concentrated Maneur?

[This is me at the end of this day... heehee!]







HAPPY BIRTHDAY JENNIFER! (my sis!) ☺

WOOT!

So today was our ADVENTUROUS day!!!

We rented a car and Ky drove on the left side of the road! ☺ Today was designated to finding Castlefreke…

I am so proud of her – even though I am not sure who has more stress: the person driving or the person giving up control/possibly her life to the driver!!!

There are NO shoulders on this Island. And for those of you willing to take the risk: GOOD LUCK! Signs are seldom and you always get “you can’t miss it” when you ask for directions! Haha!!

The navigator wasn’t doing her job appropriately, so many detours were made – including one that led us to beautiful sandy beach with surfers and smooth stones and great shells. We did find Castlefreke, only to learn that the castle itself had been bought in 2005 by a descendent of the Frekes, Stephen and Valerie Evans-Freke of NYC. We were told that we couldn’t see the castle, but we stopped in the nearby school and took photos of newspaper articles re the recent sale and the lineage of the Barons?Dukes?Earls? of Carbery. Then we went on a mission.

I was determined to find this castle! Even if we couldn’t get into it, I wanted to see IT. So I navigated us around and around – I think Ky may have been a little worried about my judgment after she climbed onto a gatepost to see if there was a view of the castle from the main road – but we actually FOUND IT! Don’t ask me how. I just knew the general direction it was in, based on a postcard I bought of a map of the area. I have some really neat photos!!! (considering we were probably over a kilometer from the actual building…)

We found another great beach and took more pics and then hopped in the car. We were on a roll by now and Ky had gotten the hang of left-side driving, so we decided to follow the coast a little further and made it into Skibbereen (sp?). Once we’d seen it driving through, we thought – what about trying to see if we can make it to Cobh on our own??? HAH! We did take a nice detour into a great little seaside town and had a snack before returning the car.

The day was filled with reminders of NC. The trees are so much like home, it smelled and looked so much like the Appalachians every time we went through tree groves... Ky says West Cork reminds her of a cross between PEI and BC.

I think I will remember this day my entire life. It didn’t go exactly as planned, but that’s what made it special, you know?

You have officially been caught up in my travels! I will try to be more consistent with my blogging, but it wasn’t my fault this time! The Kilkenny hostel didn’t even offer internet! (what?)

One more day in Cork and then it’s off to Killarney ~

PS
The title is a result of one of Ky's remarks about the smell as we passed the cattle fields. If you're from/have been to NC, you will recognize the smell as "home," but we're pretty sure the cow-scent in SK isn't nearly as strong!