After having breakfast with 2 Chilean ladies, one who lives in Germany and her sister who lives in Argentina, and a French woman from Marseille, and thanking Jack for his hospitality we left Dublin.
Breakfast in a guest house has always been a highlight as you get to meet other travellers from all over the world and share stories with each other.
As for Jack you couldn’t hope to meet a nicer guy and his guesthouse is one of the nicest we have stayed in anywhere in Europe - it’s an 11 out of 10!
Luckily the vehicle has inbuilt GPS, so we could ditch our fallback option of following AA travel routes that I meticulously put together before leaving, however that didn’t stop us getting into a wrong lane and having to circle the block or get ourselves on some very narrow backroads but nevertheless after a 302km drive we have arrived at Blath Cottage near Fethard which we can call home for the next 4 nights.
En route we first stopped at Glendalough the site of a now derelict monastery dating from somewhere between the 9th & 12th century
However there is an intact “Round Tower” which rises above the area
Don’t recall it being on a lean so just the angle that I had the camera on
It is a very picturesque environment in the Wicklow mountains
Leaving there we moved onto the Avoca Handweaving mills at Avoca, a site Sherry had visited when she was in Ireland last year with Jodi. Another beautifully laid out site with the cafe and shop in one building and the actual mill in another
Moving further south west we stopped in the medieval town of Kilkenny which has an intact castle but other than a stop for coffee and also the purchase of some groceries we didn’t spend too much time there as we have planned a return trip in a few days.
With the time getting on to 4.30 we drove to Fethard and met our hostess, Selina, who gave us some advice of what is in the local area.
We are in a very rural and horsey part of Ireland with the headquarters of one of the world’s largest breeding operation of thoroughbred horses, Coolmore Stud just 500m down the road.
Having spent sometime talking with Selina we then drove about 30kms to Cashel, a rather nice village for dinner at one of the recommended pubs and a place we might visit again some time during our stay in this area. We were taken however but the gorgeous Cashel Palace Hotel a building erected in 1732 as the home of the Church of Ireland’s Archbishop and which was converted into a luxury hotel and spa in 1962 but was closed from 2014 to 2022 when it reopened following restoration
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