Skibbereen via Clonakilty and Kinsale.

Saturday May 25th 2024.

We had planned to spend this morning visiting Blarney Castle and gardens so that Michelle could kiss the Blarney Stone and we could enjoy the acres of gardens. However the weather forecast was for strong winds and heavy rain, Michelle didn’t like the idea of hanging upside down in the pouring rain and I didn’t fancy getting soaked looking at wet plants especially as we would have to pay 20 euros each. So we plotted a coastal route to our planned stopover for tonight and tomorrow with the intention of stopping wherever we fancied. Again we took a ferry across an estuary only getting charged 8 euros this time as we were classed as a saloon car?

Not long after crossing the estuary it began to rain not too bad at first and all seemed well until the satnav we were using decided to take us on a mystery tour to somewhere that wasn’t even on the map, I can’t even say that most of the time we could enjoy the scenery as there were high hedges on both sides of the lanes. Eventually we arrived at our first chosen stop Kinsale. By now the wind was gusting and the rain was lashing down, but never mind we donned our wet weather gear and off we went to explore the town. Sadly it’s difficult to appreciate places like the harbour with horizontal rain lashing down so we headed for the narrow side streets which held most of the shops, we didn’t go in many as were dripping everywhere, I only managed a few photos all day.

After lunch in Homer we drove onto Clonakilty where we parked up at a Super Valu supermarket (spelling is correct) it certainly was super the goods on sale were of high quality with a huge range of spices, cheeses meat etc, I’m not sure what the Valu is as it wasn’t particularly cheap, I had a disastrous moment when reaching for a bottle of Bushmills Whisky at 23 € I knocked one off the shelf which smashed on the floor. The manager was very pleasant about it all telling me not to worry accidents happen😵‍💫

A lot of the south and west of Ireland where we are travelling was hugely affected by the Great Famine which was a period of starvation and accompanied disease lasting from 1845 to 1852. The famine was caused by a mold that attacked the potato crop, potatoes being a staple diet for much of the population at its height 75% of the crop was affected.

Between 1845 and 1852 more than 1 million people died and at least 1 million people left Ireland to escape the famine.