Ireland Day 2 - Kilkenny to Tralee

We woke up at Hotel Kilkenny and went downstairs to grab coffee which was served in China and came with all the stuff you wanted like cream and sugar. One of the things that you will hear before you come to Ireland is how nice everyone is, what I can say at this point is they certainly always want you to feel comfortable – like visiting family.   Dress and ready for the first full day we got in the car and drove downtown town for breakfast at the Cave at Playwrights which was very Irish. We had walked by it the day before and it had a fun patio/outdoor area and was busy with people that didn’t look like tourists which was something I was looking for.

When traveling I try very hard to get into the heads of the locals to connect with not only the beautiful humans there but get a taste of what the city is like when you live there. At the Cave they had a bacon sandwich which was something we had to learn in Ireland – typically unless you ask the bacon tends to be boiled instead of crispy especially the further west you are in the country. The sandwich was fantastic, it had this Ballymaloe relish which is a condiment created in Cork and has “secret recipe” vibes to it and the best way to describe it is a tomato-based tapenade. With the family fueled up it was time to explore a bit more before heading back on the road to our next stop.

My wife had two stops she wanted to hit up while here. The first in Kilkenny was the medieval mile museum which was stunning. It is the most intact church in the country and is still a live dig site which means they are still permitted to dig around the church because it had been essentially a meeting place for weddings and dances til 2013. In 2016 they found 3 skeletons that are on display. The museum uses the audio tour tech you see everywhere and while we were doing that the kids were on a hunt for LEGOs hidden throughout the church. Once on the second floor, we saw our first sword and the oldest ledger/book in the country outside of Dublin. There is something about old books I cannot get enough of and this country has lots of old books to enjoy.

On the way to Tralee, I wanted to make one of the out of the way stops as we hit up the Rock of Cashel which sits on this rocky cliff over the highway and is a stunning reminder of where the ancient world meets modern conveniences. There is a tour but we had other stops on tap for the day so we walked the ground looking at the ruins along the countryside, talking to the sheep, and in general taking in the breathtaking view of this defender of the countryside.

When my wife was in middle school she had a teacher who took his family to the Blarney Stone and that story had a huge impact on her growing up, so there really was no way to visit Ireland and not take this detour. Blarney Castle is more of an event than the Rock of Cashel, the car park is bigger, the grounds sweep across the countryside, and it has more of a Disney feel to it. Meaning it is a destination rather than a stop on a trip. On the day we are here the castle is empty, there are signs all over telling us how long the wait can be to “kiss” the stone, and apparently, you can wait in a queue for over 2 hours on some days, just not today. Once at the castle, two things leap out at you if you’ve never been to a real castle before. First is how cramped (and cold) the living quarters are compared to what you watch on Game of Thrones and the second, and depending on what you fear, perhaps more important is how tall the castle is and how small the stairways are. You climb and climb and climb until you are high atop Blarney Castle and you walk around the wall the inner ward below and there it is, an unassuming stone on the side of the high walls of the castle. The legend of the stone is hard to nail down but the version I like it is the version you read right before you kiss the stone. It tells the story of Cormac McTaidhg Láidir MacCarthy who rescued a woman from the river who turned out to be a witch and explained to Cormac there was a stone in the castle that already had magical properties. But you pick whichever story moves you.

The thing about the kissing is how far back you have to lean, it is quite unflattering but we both did it. My son wanted to but saw how high we were, how far it was down, and how small he was and decided it couldn’t. He was pretty bummed he didn’t try but he cheered up with the Irish treat ice cream with a chocolate stick. Imagine soft-serve ice cream with a stick of chocolate stuck into the ice cream and you get the appeal.

As we were walking from the castle my son turned to me and said “Dad, are dragons real?” Without missing a beat I turned and said, “If you had asked me a week ago I would have had a much different answer but right now, I have no idea” Honestly, if a dragon had landed on the castle wall while we were exploring the poison gardens I would have thought, that seems on brand right now.

After Blarney we were driving to what was sure to be my favorite part…we are spending two nights in an actual castle. The Ballyseede Castle is just outside of Tralee and as we turned down the drive and the castle came into view, it was everything I wanted it to be. We arrived shortly after 5, freshened up, and got into some muscles, chowder, incredible Irish bread (eat all the bread and butter you can get here) and I had my first Guinness of the trip, while my wife wanted to order a Sex on the Beach but because there were kids around she just pointed at the menu. Not picking up on what happened I asked to keep the drink menu because I thought the other side was full of drinks in Gaelic which is why she had to point. Sadly, that wasn’t the case.

 Every trip we take my daughter and I find ourselves walking around at night check one or two places out before heading to bed. Since it was our first time at a castle we had lots to explore and the way the ground is lit up at night makes you feel like you have been thrust into Cinderella moments before the pumpkin carriage arrives.