disaster on the dingle peninsula / becca kisses an unsanitized rock

Our final day in Ireland started out really well. I could actually see a patch of blue sky when I looked out the window of the hotel that morning, so we hurried and drove back up to the Ladies View so that we could get some better photos. All the clouds made the lighting challenging, but we got a few decent shots.





When we were done, we drove back down the mountain to Torc Waterfall, which is inside Killarney National Park. We also stopped by one of the lakes that we had seen from above for some photos.



The waterfall was pretty cool, but I must say that my favorite part of this stop was seeing the forest and getting photos of it. It was essentially a rainforest, but not like you would see in South America or whatever.











When we were done at the waterfall, we drove back toward Killarney and then headed out to the Dingle Peninsula, which is the westernmost point of both Ireland and of Europe. Unfortunately, this is where we ran into the worst weather of our trip. The weather had been decent going in:



However, by the team we were near Dingle, it became a rainy mess, culminating in a disaster attempt at visiting Dunbeg Fort, an old stone fort on a fairly remote piece of coast outside of Dingle. We paid the entrance fee, but got pretty soaked within minutes. I was pretty upset about this, so I canceled the rest of our drive down the peninsula and decided that we should cut our losses and head towards Cork, where we would fly out later that day. It's really unfortunate, because the Dingle Peninsula looked beautiful (when we could see it), and the scenery that we couldn't see as we drove through steep mountain passes was supposed to be some of the best in the country.

We stopped for food at a gas station in a small town called Tralee, and then drove to Blarney Castle, home of the famous Blarney Stone. It was still raining lightly, but not so bad that it ruined our visit. We climbed to the top of the castle so that Becca could kiss the stone and get the gift of gab (I have no trouble running my mouth, so I passed).

The castle:


The line to kiss the stone:


Becca kissing the stone:




Since we had a flight to catch, and since it was rainy, we didn't stay at the castle long. It would be decent to go back and walk the grounds and gardens more on a non-rainy day (if there ever is one in Ireland).

Our final stop was the airport in Cork. Our first order of business was returning our beater of a rental car, and since the rental joint claimed we chipped the windshield ("windscreen"), I'm engaged with them in an ongoing dispute. Not fun.

After we checked in for our flight, we met up with a friend of mine at the Starbucks in the airport. Her name is Labhaoise (I'll buy you a burger if you can guess the correct pronunciation of her name), and she was one of our entry-level analysts in our London office. She's Irish by birth and had been wanting to move back to Ireland, so she quit the business earlier this year and got a job with Apple's Ireland office. She had helped put together our itinerary, and I talked to her quite a bit when she was in the business, so it was good to catch up.

After a short flight, we were in Edinburgh, Scotland. More on that later.