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This will be my last post in this blog. Tomorrow, I'm leaving Belfast and Ireland for good. Direction : Greece and Athens ! :-)

Here are my last pictures of Belfast, not very cheerful ones : last week was the Twelfth of July, and it's the bonfire season, when Loyalists remind everybody the day of the Battle of the Boyne, by burning huge stack of woods and crap, and as you can see they add insult to injury by burning the Republic of Ireland flag on it (sometimes, even the picture of the pope). Of course, sometimes, it depends the year, the situation is quite tense between the communities : bomb alerts, riots, etc. On the second picture, you can see the police, near where I work, closing the Albert Bridge due to a bomb scare in the central station. Due to this, we finished 1h30 earlier this day !

I will keep writing a blog, a new one, and this time i will experiment a new provider, probably Blogger.

It looks like a wild wasteland, but this is not littering. This is the preparation for the Twelfth of July.

After a visit to the Dingle peninsula which is not worth mentioning due to the weather conditions, the last trip of the week consisted in bringing me back to the Cork airport, which led us through the south-west coast of Ireland.

 
Agrandir le plan

First, down to the little village of Baltimore (point B), famous for two things. First, the beacon which stands at the entrance of its harbour (his nickname is Lot’s wife, due to the Bible’s woman changed into a salt statue) :

And also because some detail about its history : Baltimore was one of the rare Irish port to be attacked and ransacked by pirates. It happened in 1691. A hundred villagers were captured and sold as slaves in North-Africa afterwards. That’s why you’ll find a pub called the Algiers Inn :

After that, we headed West in direction of Cork. On our way we went through a village called Timoleague where stands the remains of an abbey burned down by Cromwell :

And eventually, reached Kinsale (point C), a little port, now a popular holiday resort, endowed also with a tumultuous history.

In 1601, the town was held by Spanish troops, besieged by English forces. A battle between Irish and English followed, and the Spanish eventually left the town and the island. The James Fort and the Charles Fort, each one of a side of the harbour are quite impressive and well cared :

At last, it was time to go to the Airport. Half an hour later, i was at Cork’s Airport, and from there, four hours later due to a delay, i was back in Belfast.

Our destination today : the Beara Peninsula.

Agrandir le plan

Beara is the peninsula on the south of Iveragh. We first stopped at Bonane, where an Heritage Park was supposed to give us quasi-prehistoric monuments of the stone age. However, if the view was great, the place in itself left a lot to the imagination.

In the middle picture, you can see where was supposed to stand a fort, just like the one in Staigue Fort. However, nothing really remains except the ditch. The crannog, on the right side, is not genuine, but a reconstitution. In short, if you happen to cross Bonane, don’t stop at this Heritage Park, it’s a waste of time and money (4 euros by person).

Then, we crossed the Caha Pass, the limit between the Kerry County and the Cork County (because Beara peninsula is shared between both).

And we drove down to Glengariff :

Glengariff is a very little town, but with its almost tropical climate, its most distinctive feature is its flora, and a mediterranean-looking shore :

After a meal in a pub, we drove on the south shore of the peninsula, which is rocky, barren, sun-burnt almost ! Here is the Bantry peninsula view :

And then, we climbed again another pass, the Healy Pass, to go on the northern part of the peninsula, enjoying the view en route :

Again, once more, this was (above) the Cork County side and… this is the Kerry County side:

Finally, we finished the trip on the north shore of the Beara peninsula, facing Iveragh, and, somewhere on the other side of the Kenmare river, Sneem is hiding :

After the Ring of Kerry, we headed West, in direction of Killarney and its National Park.

Agrandir le plan

In order to reach Killarney, we had first to cross through the mountains, and there is there unbelievable landscapes, especially the Ladies View, where the Queen Victoria could admire, in the XIXth century the perspective of the lakes just like us :

Note that the roads are no less narrow than in the rest of the peninsula, and with the caravans of autobus bringing hundreds of tourists, it is better to start the visit in the morning.

Killarney is the home of the first National Park of Ireland. It encompasses the lakes and forests surrounding the lakes and the city as well as the highest mountains of Ireland (more or less 1000 meters high). It is truly the biggest forest zone of the whole island since all the woods and forests were cut down in the XVIIIth century.

The core of that national park is the Muckross Estate, which belonged to a rich american family who gave it to the Irish state in the 1930s in order to create the national park. And this is where we stopped. It shelters huge gardens :

And at last we reached Killarney, whose main attraction is its Cathedral of course :

and also the Ross Castle which is just at the entrance of the city, on the shore of the Lough Leane :

After the first night in our new house, it was time to explore the Kerry, starting with the Iveragh peninsula for what is known as the Kerry Ring :

So we left Sneem (H point) on the morning and headed West. The first stop was for the Staigue Stone Fort (point B), ruins of a stone fort quite well conserved.

Then, we kept going along the coast of the Kenmare River, which provides stunning landscapes :

Then, we arrived in Waterville (point C), a little town endowed with a lot of hotels of course and resort places and an enormous beach. And also, Charlie Chaplin seems to have enjoyed the place long ago, that’s why you’ll find a statue of him there :

We then drived on, to do the Skellig Ring, the peninsula of the peninsula itself, remote, barren, with little communities here and there. However, it also has the greatest cliffs ever (don’t forget to bring 4 euros to visit the site as we learned it there) :

We then stopped in Portmagee (point E) for a lunch in a sailors bar/restaurant quite friendly, with even a singing Irishman, perfect to add up to the atmosphere. And after the traditionnal fish-and-chips, we drove up the north coast of the Iveragh Peninsula, until Rossbeigh, a long sand bank cutting into the sea towards north and which is a leisure place for a lot of people during weekends :

Then at last it was time to come home, and, instead to pass through the Lakes and Killarney, i suggested to take the little road cutting straight through the mountainous part of the peninsula. On the map, there is a road indicated, however, the more we kept driving, the narrower the road was getting, and the less cars we could see around us… Fortunately, in a sense, because we wouldn’t have been able in some places to pass another car coming in the opposite direction. At last we reached the Ballaghbeama Pass (point G), which is one of the highest point of the whole peninsula :

And after more than 45 mins on the other slope, we eventually got back to Sneem (H) safe and sound.

After one night in Cork, in Sheila’s Hostel, I headed to Ringaskiddy, the little at the mouth of the Lee River, where the ferries from France arrive. That’s where arrived the Pont-Aven, the Brittany Ferry that my parents took.

A short embrace later, we headed in car to Sneem, less than two hours of a ride, first through the good roads between Cork and Killarney, until we reached the peninsula of Iveragh, the biggest peninsula of Kerry country, where the width and the quality of the roads decreases suddenly, but not the speeding limit !

   
Agrandir le plan

We arrived then a the end of the afternoon at Sneem (in Gaelic : An tSnaidhm), a village, filled with leisure resorts made of cottages for people in holidays.

Not much to say about the village except, quite surprisingly, a monument dedicated to Charles de Gaulle, who used to visit the village in the sixties, and (not surprisingly!) the beauty of the landscapes around.

This village would be the head quarter of our exploration of the region.

Cork is the second biggest town of the Irish Republic, and the third of the whole island behind… Belfast ! That’s where I was supposed to meet my parents who were coming by ferry from France.

Arriving 24 hours before them, I had plenty of time to visit and discover the city by myself and especially the city center which is surrounded by the two channels of the River Lee (first pic), where one can find the Holy Trinity Church (second pic), or the City Hall (third pic).

Not much more to say about this town, except it is mainly like Dublin, in reduced size : quite cosmopolitan, not particularly attractive but easy going, grey weather, but colorful little houses…. I found a bed in the dorm of the Sheila’s Hostel, a nice hostel very well situated :

From which i had a nice view on Cork, especially by night :

Saturday 23rd, i I left Cork for Ringaskiddy, 40 minutes away on the coast, where the ferries from France (Roscoff) arrive.

Last Saturday, I was invited at the Grand Opera House of Belfast to watch a play. This is one of the fanciest place of Belfast, created in 1895 and refurbished totally some years ago. As the bizarre architecture of the place says it, it is not a place devoted to only one kind of art, but it is more a place where opera, magic, circus, theatre and musicals collides to create something monstruous and opened to everyone...  It has even been used as a cinema during 20 years. Of the play I watched at this occasion ("The Happy Medium") I won't say any word : a cheap comedy, set in Belfast, with cheap jokes, and such a strong accent that I couldn't understand most of the jokes with where not... physical. But according the roaring irish audience, it was really funny ! :)