Killarney National Park, Ring of Kerry, and John Cleese's Fawlty Towers (Brilliant!)

April 16, 2013

Killarney National Park, Ring of Kerry, and John Cleese's Fawlty Towers (Brilliant!)

April 1/2, 2013

Well, we were told before we took off for Ireland by our friends Martha and Barry Arner who had been to Ireland a few Mays ago, that the Ring of Kerry was a bit overhyped and that we should skip it in favor of the Beara Peninsula. Mary from Towerview said much the same thing. But do I listen??? Oh no, we are here, and by gosh we are going to drive the Ring of Kerry. Well, we do that, at least the most scenic part, which is the east/south side of the Peninsula. We had also read and been told that the Skelligs Ring was a must do if you are on the Ring of Kerry. So in a long day of driving that is just what we did, and the verdict? Martha and Mary were right – it’s overhyped. The Dingle Peninsula is much more dramatic. But that is not to say that we didn’t like it, but after the Dingle Peninsula, it was a bit of a let down. The Skellig Ring was indeed the highlight of our Ring of Kerry drive, and I did manage a rather nice couple of shots of the Skellig Islands.

We ended up driving twice thru Killarney National Park on this odyssey, and that is where we are staying for the next two nights, at Friar’s Glen within the National Park. Friar’s Glen was built in 1994 by Mary and John Fuller, our hosts (Friar’s Glen looks old and fits right in with the landscape). It’s a really beautiful home in a beautiful setting. The home is set on land that was owned by John’s family, and they had to abide by some pretty stringent standards when they built Friar’s Glen. John and Mary are wonderful, and we discover that we share along with their waitress/assistant helper Bridgett (or Brigid, not sure of the spelling) a love of John Cleese’s hilarious BBC mid 1970’s comedy Fawlty Towers. Bridgett also loved “It’s a Mad Mad Mad World”, which is a favorite of ours as well, and particularly Jonathan Winters, who coincidentally died yesterday (April 12^th). We had so much fun trading Fawlty Towers quotes and scenes from favorite episodes with each other. Our first night we opt for walking down their lane to Molly Darcys Pub for dinner, and are not disappointed. After dinner, we walk to the abbey ruins at dusk for a first magical visit of this abbey ruin by a lake.

Morning brings a fabulous breakfast, including porridge with Bailey’s poured over it (oh it is a rough life!) and visits with Bridgett about Fawlty Towers and It’s a Mad Mad Mad World. And it brings one of those lovely and amazing coincidences. We visit with the couple next to us, who are from the Tacoma, Washington area, and it comes out in the conversation that we are from Littleton, Colorado. He graduated from Littleton High School in 1987! Then at the next table over, the man interjects that yes indeed, he was originally from Littleton too (he graduated from Cherry Creek High School, a neighboring school district)! Our long time friends are just moving to Gig Harbor, Washington right next to Tacoma, and the wife is from Snoqualmie, where these same friends are currently living. The only other table in their dining room had a German couple, so out of 4 tables, 3 had Littleton Colorado connections. Oh, it is a small world that we live in (yet vast too, a lot of places to see, and that’s what we aim to do).

Upon a recommendation by Mary, we decide to do a longer hike through the National Park today, following our long day of driving yesterday. We don’t even have to drive to get started. We end up hiking about 14 km (about 8.5 miles), and it is a lovely walk/hike. We start at the abbey ruins, which we visit for about 30 minutes then hike along one of the lakes to Muckross house, then all the way around Muckross Lake, back to the Abbey, and then to Friar’s Glen, our B&B. We stop at roughly the half-way point and have a great lunch at Dinis Cottage, and the “Meeting of the Waters” (Where two large lakes come together). Although we were tired when we got back from what turned out to be our longest hike of the trip, it was a beautiful day in a beautiful spot. That night we had dinner in Killarney at a cozy/elegant restaurant, named Bricin’s with 243 year old art work of the Killarney region on the walls – good food too – best sea food chowder of the trip as the starter. On the way back, I snagged a few pics of the sunset over the lake by the abbey.

It was another wonderful time in a wonderful place.