Day 9...winding down!

We woke up in Cashel this morning and drove to the Rock of Cashel. It is called the Cashel of the Kings. We kind of thought that they were saying "castle" even though they were pronouncing it "cashel". So we went to the Rock of Cashel thinking it was the castle of the Kings. You know...cashel = castle.








We spent nearly the entire tour of the Rock thinking it was a castle..a little confused until we sat in the video tour and realized it was not where the Kings actually lived..but where they displayed their power. Its magnificent..it really is. But what it was..was when the Irish kings put the Catholic church as the authority in the land (barring themselves of course). This "rock" was built as a cathedral. There was quite a bit of history there and I managed to get some, what I believe will be, breathtaking images. The cemetery is inside the walls and the courtyard is filled with celtic crosses. Such a beautiful contrast to the magnificent stone walls and arches of the cathedral. As you stand on the top of the hill, inside the walls..the wind just blows you around. Its incredible, really. The sound of the wind and the feel of it..while you are looking at a beautiful cathedral from the 12th century..and standing in the cemetery filled with celtic crosses. Its actually very hard to rightfully describe. You can stand there and look across the hill, down into the valley of green patchwork. You can see the cattle and sheep grazing and see the mountains in the distance. It was hazy today and a little misty. At the bottom of the valley was a beautiful abbey ruin. It is where the monks came and stayed during the time of the reign of the church. We were struck by the contrasts. The beautiful, powerful cathedral, controlled by kings and archbishops. Their wealth and power displayed in extravagance towering above the surrounding areas. At the foot of the Rock were the monks. The extreme opposite, poor, quiet, yielding no power. The people were drawn to their quiet ways..both places are just outer walls now. Just places we visit and imagine what it might have been like. Standing in places kings and men of power as well as quiet men of faith have stood.





After the Rock, we headed to Dublin. Our time in the farmlands has ended. We will finish our time here in the city. We dropped off Sybil..I was kind of sad to see her go. I'd forgiven her for nearly killing us on day 1. We'll never be able to think of the town of Ennis without thinking of the FIVE traffic lights we sat through because she would not go, or stalling on a roundabout, or the downtown experience with a car that hit everything in site and blew smoke out of her engine.

Although we were nearly killed by a train today I dont think i can quite blame Sybil. See, we've been driving in the back country for most of our time here. Venturing out to towns, villages and port cities. Nothing quite like Dublin. It felt a little surreal to be driving on a real highway and then entering a big city. We were trying to navigate our way and realized we needed to turn right pretty soon. Shannon told me I should probably get in the turn lane as the road would approach soon. I, being very agreeable, said, "Yes, of course!" and moved into the lane. Mind you..there were three lanes going one way, and three lanes going another and two center lanes. It was a bit bumpier than normal..and took me a bit to look at the actual road. I noticed two rails built into the road. Confused me a bit until I said to Shannon, "Do you suppose this is some kind of track??" It was then we noticed the wire system above our heads. Turns out we were driving down the lane of what was the train trolley. Imagine our surprise when we looked into the rear view mirror and saw the train coming along??!!
Thankfully, the people around us let us back in the correct lane and we were able to stop driving down the train lane! We were quiet for quite a ways that time. Really, really quiet.

We are staying at Buswells in Dublin. We are right next to the famous Grafton Street. We walked around for a bit..did a little more shopping and had dinner at an Italian restaurant. Tomorrow we will get on a Hop on Hop off bus tour. Shannon has plotted all of our stops, where to catch the buses and where we need to go. This is probably good if you know anything about the time I meant to get on a trolley in Austin, Texas and ended up on a bus instead. So I will just go where she has planned.
Interesting to note, as we were walking back to our hotel from around the city this evening, we noticed alot of garda around. Alot. We began to see them in groups collecting everywhere. On horses, on ground..in helicopters circling. The closer we got to our hotel, the more there were. Turns out...the country is gearing up for elections and the working class folk are not happy. Not happy at all. In fact they had decided to plan a protest. Flags, signs, hundreds of people..all part of the Socialist party. As they were walking through the streets, flanked by garda,you could see the people following getting bigger and bigger.
Imagine how we felt when we saw that the place of destination..was outside of our hotel!! Of course it would! I stuck around to see if something would happen and Shannon went up to the room. It was kind of cool to be in the middle of hundreds of people chanting and yelling as the speaker was getting them all riled up! I wanted to yell "CAPITALISM RULES!!!!", but figured that would not be cool.

Tomorrow is our last day..and we plan to milk it as much as we can. We've fallen in love with this place, as we knew we would. We miss our loved ones terribly. We cannot begin to think that we will never step foot on this old ground again. We have traveled the mountains, down to the patchwork valleys, stopped for sheep to cross the road, walked through the forests and along the rivers, stood where kings have stood and near graves of loved ones buried on tops of hills overlooking valleys centuries ago. We've ridden in boats across the rivers, walked the streets of port cities, sipped tea in the tea houses, have laughed and been awed every day.

"Over it all - the white houses, the green fields with their stone walls, the long road winding, the slow herds coming along in the knee-deep dust, the sweet smell of turf burning, the little carts with coloured shafts, the soft Irish voices the quick Irish smiles- over it all, and in it as if imprisoned in the stone and brick of this country, as if buried beneath the grass and hidden in the trees, is something that is half magic and half music."

Give us one more day..and we will let go and come home. xoxoxoxoxxo