Ireland: Day 6

Day 6 was Limerick and Co. Clare. Limerick isn't the most glamorous city, it just happened to be right where I needed to spend a night. I saw the castle, then left town for Bunratty. In Bunratty there is a castle (the usual one tower irish kind) and an open-air museum with lots of reconstructed houses and buildings showing life in Ireland in earlier times.


From there I went into Co. Clare to drive around the Burren. This is a very weird area that spreads over much of Co. Clare and to some extent surrounding areas like the Aran islands. The ground is limestone as far as you can see, with deep, parallel grooves that have been eroded into it by the water over time. Very rocky and very alien.


As I left the tomb, I followed the directions my TomTom gave. When it told me to turn left onto a tiny little road, I thought nothing of it, because so many of the roads in Ireland are tiny. Well, this one turned out to be different. First, there was a farmer leading a huge (honestly, 8ft tall) bull down the middle of the road without a lead. I pulled over and stopped to let the bull by. I figured the bull goes where the bull wants to go. Then, the road became to paved strips with gravel down the middle. Then it became gravel, and then it became deep muddy potholes cover the entire road. At one point I thought about turning back, but by the time I found a place I could turn around, the GPS said it was just as far to go back as it was to keep going. So, I kept going, and tried to keep my speed up, because if I stopped in one of the muddy bits I probably would have gotten stuck and no one would have found me for weeks. Eventually, I made it out to a bigger road and all was better.

Next stop was the Cliffs of Moher, aka the Cliffs of Insanity. The cliffs are really huge, but in this new era of health & safety, they keep you well back from the edge.

But, like everyone, I walked past the big sign that said danger and no trespassing to take an obligatory dangling over the edge picture.


The pics are here.