Today is the last full day of our tour. It’s a day in Dublin, with four major stops.

The first was a museum called EPIC, which is all about Irish migration across the world. To be honest, I wasn’t really looking forward to this because it sounded a bit dry. But this museum is really good.

It was all technology driven. There’s lots of films and stuff to watch and interactive screens you can use it you want further information.
The first section is heartbreaking. It’s all about Ireland’s past and why millions of people have up stakes and moved elsewhere..

I tell you, it all made me very glad I don’t have a drop of Irish blood – these people have had it ROUGH.

The second part was all a celebration of Irish achievements around the world

It was so much better than I thought it would be. If you’re ever in Dublin and have a couple of hours to spare, it’s worth a visit.

Ben enlivened the bus trip towards the next attraction by turning the wrong way up a one-way bridge. A yell from the whole bus alerted him.

“Christ,” he said as he frantically backed up as the traffic advanced towards us. “I’d better get out of here before the Garuda come!”

On our way to Christ Church Cathedral, we passed this clock.

“Clery’s clock,” said Ben. “The tradition is to meet under there for a second date.”

We began talking about the nicknames all the statues have. There was one, whose real names escapes me now, that was a woman rising from water. Ben said that it had to be removed because people kept adding dishwasher detergent to it. She got the name of “the floozy in the jacuzzi.”

Look at where the bullet hole is. It’s not an accident.

Ben gave us a potted version of the 1916 rebellion and urged us all to go home and research it further. Basically, what happened was that in 1916 there were many young men off fighting for the allies in France. Back home in Ireland there were some freedom fighters in Dublin who decided that now would be a good time to fight for their cause upon the world’s stage.

They organised a shipload of weaponry which was then cancelled. Half of them pulled out, while the other half wanted to go ahead. So they did.

They barricaded themselves in a block or two in Dublin. I’m a bit hazy on the details. The town of Dublin didn’t know about it until it happened and there was very little support for it.

The English were not impressed. They diverted a ship full of 17 year old soldiers who thought they were going to France over to Dublin. The ship sailed as far as it could up the river and then opened fire.

The regular people in Dublin were NOT impressed and after 3 days convinced them to surrender. As they left the GPO people spat at them.

Then, here’s where it gets interesting. A guy called Maxwell was the leader of the English. He started executing the freedom fighters

By the time Asquith, the English PM at the time, heard about it and told him to stop, 16 of them had been killed.

Of course, public opinion immediately swung around and the English had 16 dead martyrs on their hands.

The paperwork for the Irish republic was signed in 1922 by Michael Collins.I’m going to track down that movie when I get home.

When we got to Christ Church Cathedral, I was in a Messenger conversation with my sister Kate.
“They’ve just told us that the toilets are located down in the crypt!” I typed.

The answer came back immediately. “We’ll you have to go now!!!”

As soon as I heard about the cat and the rat I headed straight down to the crypt to see them for myself. Here’s the info board:

But wait!

There’s more…

Here’s what the brochure said about this artifact:

“Here you will find the heart traditionally associated with St Laurence O’Toole, patron saint of Dublin.Laurence was buried in France in 1180 and his heart was reputedly brought back to Christ Church soon after. It was stolen in 2012 but recovered in 2018 and restored to its home in the cathedral.”

First of all… how’s the symmetry???

At the beginning of my trip to Ireland I see a head in a box. Now, at the end, I see a heart in a box. Both in cathedrals. Amazing.

Beautiful floor.

Here’s the Magna Carta. It’s one of the oldest copies of it in Ireland.

We were taken up lots of spiral steps to ring the actual cathedral bells. I had a go and they actually lifted me right off my feet. Single Carol is a bit claustrophobic, so she went up first and down first, so all she had was the guide in front of her instead of being hemmed in by a lot of people.
For some reason, the bells and the ancient stone stairs had the reeling with excitement. This was the highlight of her tour. I heard her say to the church guide, “ This has been the best thing on the trip.”

He replied, “Oh dear!”

After ringing the bells so that all Dublin could hear us, it was off to the Guinness Storehouse.

Now, as you might remember, I hate Guinness with a passion. However, one of the American couples, Doug and Cindy, have been absolutely lovely on this trip. I gave Doug my free pint of Guinness voucher.

He was a little bit happy.

Yeast. Not just used for sourdough.

This tour was self guided, ending up in the Skybar where people could redeem their vouchers. I dutifully wandered along. I had 2 hours to kill in here.

Bright lights.
I saw an interesting video from the 1950s about how the oak barrels were made. It was eye-opening just how skilled the coopers were. Unlike the whiskey distillers, Guinness now uses stainless steel for their barrels.

Here’s the movie theatre that they showed ads for Guinness on repeat. I had a little snooze in here…

Then I popped up to the Skybar. Dublin was laid out before us. There were a lot of happy Guinness drinkers here.

Then it was off toThe Merry Ploughboys’ pub for our last dinner.

The men in the band own the pub. They have an excellent business model. Play good Irish traditional music. Pay some Irish dancers. Serve good food. Get the coach companies in.

The evening was excellent. Here’s some dancing for you:

In the second half of the night, the band started playing nationalist songs of reunification of the whole of Ireland. When the singer started his introduction of one of the songs by saying how Ireland had been ruled for 800 years by England, I couldn’t help myself. I glanced over at the other end of the table where Cornelia was sitting.

I laughed out loud at the sour expression on her face. She didn’t see me but I think her meek husband did.

Anyway, who cares what Cornelia thinks? Tomorrow I’m flying back to England to spend a week with Scott!

When we’re riding from place to place in the coach, Ben sometimes sings songs or tells stories to pass the time. Today he told a sad story about what happened to his grandmother’s brother just over 100 years ago.

Michael O’Sullivan was 22 years old. He was in the hills with a friend during the civil war, (which was in 1920 – 1921), when they saw some Unionist troops. The friend shot at them, and ran. Michael was shot in the shoulder and managed to find shelter in a friend’s house. But the troops knew where he was. They called out to him that he could go free. All they wanted was his gun.

He bent the barrel of the shotgun in the bannisters so it would be useless to them, so he was dragged out of the house and shot in the chest. One of the family rode to tell the O’Sullivans and they loaded up a wagon with straw, because they knew they’d be bringing him back. He rode home in the wagon lying in his mother’s arms and died 12 hours later.

A few years after, the man who had shot him was recognised in America and a letter arrived, asking if the O’Sullivans wanted him dead. They wrote back that no, leave him be. By now it was over and done with.

“That was 2 generations ago. Every Irish family has stories like this one,” said Ben.

I put this photo in because I was so pleased to get a shot with the ravens in the photo. You know how it is… you see heaps of ravens flying around being all atmospheric so you raise your phone and wait… and wait…

Anyway, Blarney Castle was built in the 1500’s by the McCarthy family. I couldn’t make head or tail of how or why the Blarney Stone was brought to the castle and mortared into the very top of the damned thing, but I guess it doesn’t matter.)

The point is: if you kiss the Blarney Stone, you have the gift of the gab for life.

Now, my previous students might say that I’ve already swallowed it whole, but in all honesty, I have to say that on this tour I’ve been fairly introverted. People who’ve read my previous travel blogs would know that I’ve travelled with some interesting characters *coughSamFrankcough* but this group of people just haven’t brought out the glorious delight that is Frogdancer Jones.

Ok, maybe that’s a good thing, I hear some of you say…

Don’t get me wrong. They’re perfectly fine people.

(Except for the overtly Christian farming couple who, when I mentioned in a general conversation that I was atheist, never looked me in the eye or spoke to me unless I spoke to them first, and then with the wife, she answered only in monosyllables. Very Christian of them… Christ would probably slap them.)

(Or the elderly English woman, let’s call her Cornelia, who after telling us all how ‘leftie’ she is and how awful she feels about what the English have done in Ireland- to the point where she was apologising to the guide in Belfast – evidently realised that the feeling against the English ran far deeper than she realised. She got uncomfortable.
Less than a week later, she’s railing against our driver and the men at a bar she’d been to, saying that “the Irish should just let it go”, and “it’s about time they did.”

That’s all fine… it must happen a lot here I guess, but then I heard how she was starting to badmouth Ben, our driver, and trying to manipulate people into lowering the tip they were going to pay him at the end. Well, there’s some modern-day English landlords taking the money from their Irish workers behaviour right there. What a hypocritical way to act. I’m trying to avoid sitting anywhere near her.)

But apart from that, everyone is nice and very agreeable.

We set off hotfoot from Kilarney this morning, hoping to get to Castle Blarney before coaches full of cruise ship tourists descended upon it. Ben heard that a huge ship had docked at a port nearby.

Sadly, no such luck. When we got there, the place was seething with tourists, like as like someone stuck a stick in an anthill. But all of that was forgotten as I walked towards the castle.

I walked over a bridge with a stream flowing merrily underneath. I could hear the sound of a piper coming down from the castle. With the river, the blue sky, the green of the garden and the medieval building in front of me, it was perfect.

As I walked, the piper finished his song, there was a scattering of applause, then he began another song. I knew the tune… it was very familiar… hang on, it’s’Scotland the Brave.’

When I reached the castle, the piper was just finishing up his song. I told him how wonderful it sounded, and asked if I was correct in thinking that it was’Scotland the Brave’ he was playing.

“ I wondered if I was still in Ireland!” I said.

“Aye, we’re like two brothers, but with one common enemy,” he said with a wink.

The queue to kiss the Blarney Stone was extremely long. Like, over an hour long, winding down from the Blarney Stone, all down through the castle with its winding spiral stairs, then down the slopes.
It took over an hour to get to the stone.

There was a very irritating woman behind me from Minnesota. She had a few friends with her and honestly… she didn’t shut up. All the way up to the Stone, she kept braying her vacuous stuff.

And then, of course, at the Blarney Stone, she was the one who asked me if I wanted her to take a photo of me kissing the stone.

So now I owe her… I feel bad for all the impatient things I was muttering underneath my mask.

As my sister said when I posted this picture on Facebook, “Oh! You get a kiss AND a cuddle!”

There’s quite a gap, as you can see from the left of me, and some people get a bit scared. But as one of the lads said, “Don’t worry. We haven’t lost anyone so far this morning!”

On an aside, we had dinner with some Canadians who arrived at Blarney Castle at 4:30. No queue, they just walked straight up and were done in about 10 minutes…

No words.

As I left my intimate encounter with the Blarney Stone, I stopped at the top of the spiral stairs to show you what they’re like.
The medieval builders made them steep and narrow, so that if the castle was under attack only one soldier could come up the stairs at any one time. They also made the spiral turn to the right, as most people are right handed. A soldier can’t wave his sword wildly if the wall is in his way, but it gives a person standing facing him on the stairs the best chance of getting him first.
They were violent times back then.

I saw this good boy in the cafe garden. Isn’t he great?
I bumped into Single Carol from the tour in the upper cafe and we had lunch together. She’s booked to do a tour of some American National Parks and the Americans on the tour were really excited for her when they saw the tour. She and I are the only singles on this tour and we often have dinners together, because the couples absolutely want to sit together at all times.

The gardens around the castle are stunning. After such a long queue for the Blarney Stone, I didn’t have time to see it all, but I had a good walk around as ai gradually headed back to the bus.

I was keen to see’The Seven Sisters’ because I liked the story, but first I went through the Poison Garden, which is exactly as you’d expect, then through the fairy grotto.

Here are some shots of the grotto. There’s a witch who lives in there, but she only comes out at night but they close the park at dusk, so she can’t do any harm

Here is the legend of the Seven Sisters stones.

Many, many years ago, there was a proud king who lived in these parts. He had two fine sons and seven daughters. Everything was going fine until the day the king rode out to battle and both his sons were killed.

On the way home, the grief-stricken king passed by a circle of 9 standing stones that had been in place for far longer than anyone could remember. As he rode by, the king commanded his men to push over two of the stones in memory of his sons. To this day, two stones lie flat… well, flattish… while the Sisters stand tall.

The gardens also had an exhibition of sculptures.

I bought a hat!

As we were in the bus driving towards our next destination, one of the American guys told us all about another snippet about the Choctaw Indians that I was talking about a day or two ago. They were used in WWI as ‘code talkers’ because they’d communicate in their own language and the Germans couldn’t understand it. They thought it was a code and try as they might, they couldn’t break it.

I found that interesting.

We arrived at our second distillery, Midleton’s, where they make, among other things, Jamison’s Irish whiskeys. I wasn’t expecting to find this as interesting as the first because we’ve already heard how Irish whiskey is made. But our guide was great. We were also allowed to take photos here.

I tell you what, they were certainly pumping the tourists through here! There may be money to be made in liquor, but there’s certainly a quid or two to be made in whiskey tastings as well.

I thought I was coming good from the cold I’d been wearing a mask for for the last few days, but as we were standing outside the mill wheel waiting for the slow people to catch up, I suddenly thought, ‘ Frogdancer, you’re tired.’
Scampering up and down a castle and then walking around the gardens was enough for me for today. I sighed and resolved to have another early night.

Midletons have what they call the ‘Very Rare’ release every year. The first one was in 1882, but it was the result of massive forward planning by the management in the 1960s. Sales of Irish whiskey were plummeting in the US, so they decided to lay down a drop that would be matured for around 28 years and would be a drop to be treasured.
But of course, they had to wait twenty- plus years before they could release it…

Nowadays, it’s regarded as the most bought Irish whiskey in the world, and the least consumed. By coincidence , today is the release date of the Midleton’s Very Rare 2023.

I think the main difference between the two distilleries is that Bushmills stay close to the traditional ways of brewing, while Midleton’s is happier to try new things sometimes.

An example was their micro distillery, where they make a whiskey called ‘Method and Madness’ that our guide highly recommends.

For a whiskey to be legally labeled as Irish, it needs to be triple distilled and it needs to be matured in a wooden cask for a minimum of 3 years.

‘The Angels’ Share’’ is a real consideration. Every year 2 percent of the barrel’s contents is lost to evaporation. This doesn’t sound like much, but when you consider that some of these barrels are untouched for 20 years, that becomes a significant amount. They could cover the barrels, but then the whiskey wouldn’t mature. It needs the mix of oxygen the evaporation brings. The barrel needs to breathe.
I love that they call it the ‘angels’ share.’

Afterwards, we were given a taste test of 3 types of whiskey, then we were let loose in the gift shop. I bought a tiny bottle of Red Breast, because James said it was a good drop. I’m planning to drink both little bottles, one from Bushmills, one from Midleton’s, on my second-last night of the tour.
I wonder which one I’ll prefer?

Today we were driving along the coast towards the oldest licensed whiskey maker in Ireland. I sit up near the front of the bus, so I get to see things like this tunnel before the rest of the bus.

Ireland is pretty lucky in that it has very docile fauna. As Ben, our bus driver put it, “You can pitch a tent at night. Nothing will sting, bite, or try to kill you. The only thing that might happen is that a cow might get the tent flap open and lick your toes.”

We saw many beautiful little fishing villages.

We were given 20 minutes to gallop around Camlough village.
“Hang on, “ said Doug, an enormously tall American with a wife of exactly the correct height for a human. (In other words, Cindy is around my height.). “Aren’t we still in Northern Ireland? Why is an Irish flag flying?”

“Maybe there’s a rebel living here who sneaks out in the dead of night to make a point?” I said.

I know I’ve said this before, but this vivid green is not photoshopped. (Anyway, even if I wanted to, I don’t know how.)

There’s Doug and his lovely wife Cindy, balancing out this shot with a pop of blue.

Such a pretty place, which looks out over the Irish Sea with a smudge of Scotland over the water.

We had a brief stop at this pretty litter place.

Portaneevey. If you look closely, you can see a top bridge between the mainland and the island. Hang on, I’ll zoom in for you.

See it now?

I just liked this shot.

There are huge hedges of fuchsias along the roads. Normally they’re red and purple, but these pale pink ones were at the car park here.

Before I had kids, I owned a collection of different fuchsias, around 24 of them if memory serves . Maybe I should buy another one.

We arrived at Bushmills whiskey distillery bang on 12, and in we went. I wasn’t expecting much from this tour, ( but was looking forward to taste-testing the end product) but it was actually really interesting.

They asked us not to take photos during the tour, but the big bonus for us was that we had to miss one of the steps to make whiskey, because they were cleaning out the vats or something, so we got a tiny bottle of the good stuff to keep. I was happy with that.

This is from the gift shop.
For the first time, I was glad that I was in a tour with people who don’t drink. I had 3 different whiskeys to try… their common run of the mill one that they recommend that you buy if you’re going to add Coke to it; their bourbon oak barrel infused one which was nicer; and their 12 year old one which was as smooth as a baby’s bottom.

Then it was onwards towards The Giant’s Causeway, without lunch.

The weather had turned against us and it was raining. It wasn’t a harsh rain, but it was persistent. When the guide from the causeway said there was a bus to take people there and back and that it was FREE for National Trust members, I gave a cheer. That’s another £1.30 I can take off the cost of my National Trust membership. ( Believe me, I’m keeping track!)

Even though it was raining, of course I was going to walk down the track to the causeway. What’s the point if you don’t?
Walking back up the hill is obviously another issue entirely.

Here’s the legend of the Giant’s Causeway:

The Myth

As legend has it, Northern Ireland was once home to a giant named Finn McCool (also called Fionn Mac Cumhaill). When another giant – Benandonner, across the Irish Sea in Scotland – threatened Ireland, Finn retaliated by tearing up great chunks of the Antrim coastline and hurling them into the sea. The newly-created path – the Giant’s Causeway – paved a route over the sea for Finn to reach Benandonner.

However, this turns out to be a bad idea as Benandonner is a massive giant, much bigger than Finn! In order to save himself, Finn retreats to Ireland and is disguised as a baby by his quick-thinking wife. When Benandonner arrives, he sees Finn disguised as a baby and realises that if a mere baby is that big, the father must be far larger than Benandonner himself!

Following this realisation, Benandonner rushes back to Scotland, tearing away as much of the Causeway as he can in his haste to put as much distance between Ireland and himself as possible. And thus, the myth of the Giant’s Causeway was born.

Perhaps a less interesting explanation, the scientific approach dictates that the Giant’s Causeway was first formed over 60 million years ago. The science says that the Causeway was created following a period of volcanic activity, where the lava cooled and formed these incredible interlocking basalt columns. Each column is near-perfectly hexagonal in shape; a lasting reminder of the power of the world’s natural beauty.

No matter which explanation you choose to believe, it’s undeniable that the Giant’s Causeway is a truly awe-inspiring natural wonder of the world.

(I didn’t write that explanation. I googled it.)

It’s crazy, but the rocks are hexagonal.

Despite the rain and the slippery rocks, people were doing their best Finn McCool impressions.

You can see here how the rocks have been thrust up from the earth. Imagine the forces big enough to accomplish this?

As I walked near the queue for the bus for the way up, I passed by Carol, who comes from Brisbane. She told me to make sure I went “around the back”, so I dutifully followed where she pointed.
She wasn’t wrong.

This is a random person here to give perspective as to how high this particular bit is. I love the lines throughout the rock.

There were people climbing the rocks all over the place, but even though I’d consumed 3 whiskeys and therefore felt invincible, I had enough common sense to know that I should probably stick to unslippery level ground.

Another Carol, this one a kindred spirit from Northampton in England who is also travelling alone, said that she found herself clinging to the cliff face by her toes, thinking, “ Carol, you’re an idiot!”
She wasn’t hyped up on Irish whiskey. She was the kind soul who gave me the bourbon one.

I stayed on this side of the causeway for quite a while. We had oodles of time… this tour is very relaxed.
I stood looking out at the ocean. The people seemed to disappear and the rain was irrelevant. ( Though I knew that my one dress, the unflattering grey sack, was getting very wet from where my Antarctica raincoat finished.)

The cliffs encircled me, the sea was rolling in and the area seemed timeless. It was a special moment that was only interrupted when a group of people asked me to take their photo.

Just a selfie to prove I am really here!