May 24 Glendalough

Day 16 - Friday, May 24, 2002

We got up and had a great breakfast at the B&B. The owner, Patricia, was hilarious. There were two other families there, both from the US. The conversation wandered from customs in each country, television, driving etc. My favorite moment was when a gentleman from the US asked which side of the sidewalk it was customary to walk on. Is it the same as driving? He had noticed that it seemed people run into each other while walking fairly frequently. I had noticed the same. Our hostess looked bewildered. Her reply (in so many words) was that it would never occur to the Irish population to be that orderly. You simply walk where you walk. She left fearing she would insult our culture, but was soon back. We had a great time here.

Off to visit Cahir Castle. We got there right after they opened and we were the only people in the place. The weather was pretty blustery and they advised staying off the high walls. I went up to some mid-height walls. This is a much ignored castle and I think, unjustifiably. It is in excellent condition and is not something that was gutted and rebuilt 30 - 50 years ago. The view out to the rivers that pass it is beautiful.

After Cahir castle, we made our attempt to leave. As a result of Irish parking habits, we found ourselves parked in by a freezer truck unloading in the the local HB grocer. I found the guy just to find out if it was going to be a while, and he said no so I decided to take a bit of time to review my map. He left and no sooner than he did, another large truck appeared and parked right behind me. He was out of his truck before I could stop him. So I got a little extra time to review the map. We decided to take what we thought was going to be a short diversion to the place where cars roll up hill. As it turns out, the directions that we had were wrong as they suggested that we take R678 towards Rathgormuck. That was wrong by about ten miles.

As it turns out, for anyone who cares, the road to take is just North of the junction of N25 and R676 on R676. Here you turn left at the first sign for Comeraugh Dr (& Kilrossanty). You will follow that a short distance and turn right at the T Junction (You are basically in Kilrossanty at this point). There is a school on the corner. Keep following the signs that point you towards Mahon Falls. Eventually you will see one telling you to turn left. Follow that sign. You will cross a cattle guard and see two a couple of trees on the left. The second one is the "bottom of the hill". Stop there and put your car in neutral and it will roll "back up the hill". No it isn't fairies, it isn't a magnetic pull, it's a simple optical illusion. Felicity was able to actually see where they bottom of the hill really was and low and behold, she was right. The car did not roll uphill from that point. If you're there after a rain, you'll see that part of the "uphill" section has a stream running "uphill" also. I must say, it certainly appears that you are rolling uphill, but after some investigation, it seems pretty clear that you are not. Conclusion: If you happen to be driving up 676, between Dungarvan and Carrick-on-Suir, this is a cute quick diversion. Don't go out of your way as we did and unfortunately got lost (because of the directions) and didn't get to stop in Kilkenny on our way to Glendalough. The neat thing that came out of this was when we finally stopped and asked where the place was, a woman at the gas station drove us right to it. She went out of her way to take us right to the spot and then told us where to stop the car and everything. Irish hospitality is unbelievable!!! As it turned out, the place we went to was about a mile passed where I had turned around and given up on my third guess as to where it was.

From here, we decided that it would be quicker to take the major roads and go through Waterford to get to Glendalough. NOTE TO SELF: Never drive through Waterford to get anywhere. The traffic in Waterford was terrible. We spent about an hour there and arrived before 3:00 PM, so it wasn't technically "rush hour". Additionally, subsequent towns had equally terrible traffic. It took over four hours to get from Lemybrien to Glendalough, a distance of just over 100 miles....mainly on N roads.

The ride into Glendalough from Avoca was beautiful. The road was adorned with trees arching gracefully over the road most of the way. It was as if the path was cut just for us. We found out B&B, the Glendalough River House which is actually part of a woolen mill store. Not nearly as impressive as it looked in the book. This was our only true failure.

We ate dinner in Laragh (can't think of the name of the place) and the food was quite good. The Glendalough Hotel has a beautiful restaurant overlooking and over the Glendalough River, but we were not dressed at all well that day so we ate in Laragh. After dinner, back to the B&B and uncomfortable beds. We wanted to wander around Glendalough, but the rain and wind were terrible so eating and sleeping seemed like a better idea.

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