Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Day 5 - County Tipperary & County Cork

Friday was our castle day in Ireland. Our first stop was at the Rock of Cashel. The Rock of Cashel is an archeological site that's been in use since the 4th century.





From their we drove to Caher Castle - one of Ireland's largest castles, it was built in the 12th century. This seems to be a slightly less well-known tourist attraction, because much more of the castle seemed to be open - you could climb stairs, walk on ledges, and just explore everything.





At this point we were ready for lunch, so we stopped off in Cork for lunch in a pub. There was some kind of horse race going on, and there were lots of people in the pub watching it.


Just outside Cork is the Blarney Castle (and the Blarney Stone)! It was raining a bit, so it wasn't crowded at all, which was nice, since I've heard there can be long lines to kiss the stone. Kissing the stone does seem a little silly, but the castle was really cool - it was about four stories tall, which was pretty amazing to see, and all of the surrounding gardens were really beautiful.




The Blarney stone is at the very top of the castle (and the castle is really tall!) and you have to bend over backwards and stretch to reach it.





Back at home Emily cooked up an amazing meal of sausages and potato stew, and we all watched "The Informant!"

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