day 10: Castlegregory to Tralee

location: Castlegregory to Tralee
distance: 9.55 miles
entertainment: A Wise Man's Fear, watching parishioners leave Sunday Mass in Camp while waiting for the bus
sights: a monastery, lots of caravan parks, dogs and beach goers enjoying the weather and water
lodging: Greenview House B&B
dining: blood orange and blue sports drinks from the petrol station while waiting for the bus; underwhelming dinner in the front dining room of a once noble inn located in the high street of Tralee

route: after another day of less-scenic hiking past caravan parks, along busy roads and well-traveled side roads (as well as more beach), we opted to take advantage of the fortuitously-timed bus traveling through Camp back to Tralee, rather than spending an extra several hours covering track we'd already hiked, but in reverse. we spent our time waiting along side another backpacking couple (one of whom had an identical backpack to one of us) and watching Mass conclude at the Camp church and parishioners file out and head off to Sunday lunch.

the bus was nearly full when we boarded, with us taking the last two seats available -- one a few rows behind the diver and the other a few rows from the back of the bus. this day's adventure began as we arrived in Tralee. locals asked the driver to stop near the center of town so they wouldn't have to retrace the route back from the station. Andy, near the front of the bus, figured it would be a great opportunity to avoid extra hiking with packs, as the bus stopped about two blocks up from our B&B. sitting at the back of the bus, I didn't realize he'd gotten off the bus until I saw him standing on the side of the road with our packs as we pulled away -- waaaaay to late to rush to the front of the bus and have the driver stop for me to get off. instead, I went on my merry way to the station, hoping that Andy would either stay put or go someplace that he would know that I would know to look for him. and hoping that he'd grabbed both our bags out from under the bus after I got off and my bag wasn't waiting for me.

to be safe, I retraced the bus' route which skirted the (unnavigably) narrow streets of the center of town and took the longer walk back to where Andy got off. initially I thought he might try to follow the bus, but as we got farther and farther away, it seemed a preposterous idea. but all the same, I made my way past Debenhams, narrow townhouses and local businesses, the police station, the backside of a pub that also faced the narrow streets of the center of town and advertised live music every evening, and finally past where Andy got off to the B&B where we'd stayed at the start of our hike.


a much relieved Andy & I booked into our room, thanks to the proprietor's husband who was on duty at the time. got to enjoy the room on the first floor (one up from the ground floor), cleaned up and rested a bit before heading out in search of food. the food was fine enough, eaten in the front parlor/cafe of a high street hotel with impressive history, but not much to recommend itself today. would have been better off farther from the heart of town. even a block or two. but there were scoops of ice cream from a corner shop on the walk back to make up for any other failings. particularly in light of the bustle of Dublin the following day, Tralee was a pleasant reentry point from 10 days all but off the map.

day 9: Cloghane to Castlegregory

location: Cloghane to Castlegregory
distance: 11.79 miles
entertainment: A Wise Man's Fear
sights: gobs and gobs of beach with a smattering of holiday-makers, jellyfish stranded on the beach
lodging: Castle House B&B
dining: fried chicken, cheese sandwich, Lucozade and sweets from Spar; pizza from a family restaurant in the high street

route: not unlike day nine of our Camino, the road from Cloghane to Castlegregory was hot and unremarkable. except for the miles of sand we traversed along Cloghane Bay -- nothing like that in Spain. it started along narrow and disused country roads; disused because they only lead to Cloghane and out to the end of the peninsula beyond. most holidaymakers took the N over the pass into Dingle ... some of whom we encountered later in the day when we had to walk along a busier highway towards Castlegregory.

the beach was pleasant, though less novel after already spending so much time hiking along beaches on the southern portion of the hike. lots more jellyfish on this stretch, likely because of when we were walking in relation to the tide (around low tide, but coming in, based on the class of surfers attempting to catch the baby waves coming in). poked one of the beached ones -- very dense and wholly un-jelly-like as I recorded it.

we passed a churchyard wherein stood a memorial to a ship lost in Brandon Bay after traveling from "lower California." only a few bodies were recovered from the sea, most of which were interred in a tiny church cemetery we happened across on the way to Castlegregory.

rather than hike the "extra" several miles out to the end of the peninsula, we opted to cut straight across and got to Castlegregory quite early in the day, comparatively. our bags, however, had not yet arrived, so after eating our picnic lunch from Spar on the patio of our B&B (which was really just the parking area forecourt) we spent a good while recovering on the quite comfortable double bed upstairs waiting for them to arrive so we could change out of our slimy clothes.

almost as soon as we set foot in Castlegregory, we could tell we'd reentered holiday-making civilization. the Tralee-Dingle road runs close enough to the town to make it worth stopping off and its proximity to one of the largest beaches in Ireland means that the town was fairly crawling with weekend merrymakers. the parking lot of the Spar was jammed at lunchtime, but empty when we walked past later looking for dinner. lots of people in swim gear and sandals; caravans; a pharmacy and corner shop dedicated primarily to beach-related concerns.

after dinner we stopped into a pub near our B&B (where we'd unsuccessfully solicited some dinner) and had a pleasant pint on a pine bar before Saving Private Ryan started up on the television set behind the bar. an consequence of airing whatever was on RTE or TG4 totally at odds with the increasingly boisterous Saturday night revelers. we headed out before the dance party got going, glad for a nice quiet room with the promise of tasty, generous breakfast to set us off in the morning.

day 8: Feohanagh to Cloghane

location: Feohanagh to Cloghane
distance: 12.2 miles?
entertainment: a terrier pup following us through its farm, watching the Three Sisters recede and disappear behind the saddle of Mount Brandon, A Wise Man's Fear
sights: Smerwick Bay behind, Cloghane Bay ahead; turf cutting; art gallery offering the most welcome cold refreshment of our lives
lodging: Mount Brandon Hostel
dining: sack lunches packed for us by An Riasc (tasty), and dinner at the pub next door

route: our morning started out with a fabulous breakfast, negotiations to have both our packs transported, and two sack lunches to be enjoyed at some point on our hike. we were off a bit later than normal and the day promised to be a toasty and challenging one, packs or no.

we wended our way through a few more farms, encountering a herd of sheep moving along a track from one pasture to another, and later an extremely friendly spaniel puppy followed us from one edge of its territory to the other before getting a bit concerned about its distance from mom and turned around. shortly thereafter, we passed through a farm gate and began our ascent along an old, green track up the side of Mount Brandon.

it was a challenging uphill climb, even without our packs, and more than a bit toasty in the bright sunlight. lots of breaks and convincing ourselves to get to a particular spot just a bit farther up the hill, with a water break at that sign post, or a sit just the other side of that gate. saw a fair number of sheep off to either side getting the tastiest bits of grass and generally steering clear of us humans. we rested for a bit at the top of the pass, enjoying the spectacular views towards Cloghane Bay. our guide referenced a standing stone with ogham cross carved into it, which was easy to spot, standing right in the way.

the downhill climb proved a whole new measure of challenge -- the loss of all the elevation we gained going up in about a quarter of the distance and soggy patches determined to catch and turn an ankle. we'd met a German woman in the hostel in Dunquin who climbed Mount Brandon in that direction -- straight up the steep face first and then nice and easy down the other side. can't imagine doing it that way, but I wouldn't be surprised if she had the same reaction when hiking the opposite direction we went from Dunquin to Dingle.

heading down put paid to the notion that everything would be easier on the descent. we walked past a clump of apprehensive cattle, an old guy cutting turf, and finally an art gallery advertising cold drinks. without our packs, we were carrying less water than normal and had run out about half way down the back of Mount Brandon -- with kilometers and kilometers left to go. sitting in the shade of the gallery wall, drinking cold Coke with a straw, it was some of the tastiest beverage you've ever enjoyed.

reinvigorated with sugar and caffeine, we opted to cut off an optional 8 extra kilometers and head straight for Cloghane, rather than the end of the Brandon peninsula. though our bags had preceded us to the hostel, the room wasn't prepped, so we headed to the pub next door for some much needed hydration and lunch of our tasty B&B sack lunch. we returned later, after showering and washing clothes, to one of the tastier meals for dinner and another fantastic evening of off-the-beaten-path-holiday atmosphere.

day 7: Dunquin to Feohanagh

location: Dunquin to Feohanagh
distance: 15.9 miles
entertainment: A Wise Man's Fear, a cow peering over the pasture fence onto the beach, children running in and out of the pub for snacks on a break from the beach
sights: Smerwick Bay, the Three Sisters, Mount Brandon
lodging: An Riasc
dining: a pub in Ballydavid and The Old Pier Restaurant

route: today's walk was relatively flat compared to the leg from Dingle to Dunquin. we climbed down the hill, past the restaurant we'd eaten at the night before, along narrow country roads for quite some time. past a golf course and clumps of houses. we stopped into one of the ubiquitous, touristy pottery shops along the road to investigate their wares. it was still early enough that no buses had pulled in on the loop around the peninsula and we picked out a pair of mismatched mugs to have shipped home.

much of the day had us following the edge of Smerwick Bay, mostly along beaches dotted with families on some type of holiday. craggy sections of the beach had us climbing up into dis-used and ill-marked pastures and eventually through a clearly beach-holiday-oriented village called Ballydavid. after asking at the local shop about a place to get lunch, we settled down at one of the two pups in town -- the one that offered something approaching lunch. it only did so because they'd worked out an agreement with the restaurant next door. they seemed rather ... perplexed? perturbed? that I asked for something that didn't include any meat. a grandfatherly-looking guy came in with about five kids, ranging in age from about 10 down to two, taking a break from the heat of the beach and enjoying a snack.

we'd opted to have one of our two bags transported, but even with the lightened load the heat was draining and we powered through our water without difficulty. switching the weight between us helped the day from getting too long and gave us a great idea for preferred transport methods for the future.

after a nice long rest, it was off the beach and onto clifftops to round out Smerwick Bay and head towards our B&B which wasn't quite in a town, proper, more in a valley dotted by a collection of houses, a pub, and a school. the B&B was very welcoming, very comfortable, and our room had impressive views of the bay, the Three Sisters, and of Mount Brandon.

evening: our B&B offered evening meals, but we figured we could find something nearby for dinner. we did, but if we'd known how far back up the road it was, we might have reconsidered. but given how pleasant and delectable our dining experience was, perhaps not.

from the pub on the main road to Dingle, we were directed back up the hill by one of the bar patrons -- the proprietor couldn't think of anyplace with food within walking distance, and for a moment we feared a dull dinner of nuts and whatever remaining morsels we could find in our packs.

The Old Pier Restaurant, however, turned out to provide us with one of the best meals of the trip and one of the more entertaining proprietors. he greeted and seated us in ratty jeans and a t-shirt, all the while asking not to mention is presence to his "boss." he returned about fifteen minutes later in black slacks, black shirt, and apron, and continued to wait on several tables for the course of dinner, including a table of two older couples, an American couple returned to the restaurant after a previous vacation, and a family of six or eight celebrating a birthday of one of the daughters. (she was mortified when they brought out a cake and sang to her at the end of dinner.) the food was fantastic; we'd tried fried brie with cranberries in Dingle but it was a weak, dismal cousin to the scrumptious version we ate the other side of the peninsula. I don't even remember what I ate, but one course involved melon with a mint garnish. and some kind of spectacular, shared dessert. we nearly rolled back to the B&B and had a wonderful night's sleep as a result. good fuel for climbing over Mount Brandon the following day!

day 6: rest day off the edge of Ireland

location: the Great Blasket Islands
distance: 8.1 miles
entertainment: 3 mile boat trip, an unexpected proposal and a wonderful Irish couple to help capture it
sights: views of the Blasket Islands,

Slea Head, and the end of the Dingle Peninsula -- off the end of Ireland
lodging: Dun Chaoin Hostel (two nights!? what a luxury!)
dining: Blasket Island Centre for a late lunch and a fabulous restaurant and gallery the name of which I cannot find.

route: we slept in a bit late and headed down to the Blasket interpretive center to learn a bit about the island, what life was like living on the island, the consciousness-raising efforts of some of its final inhabitants, and the diaspora of former residents. from there we walked down to the ferry launch and crossed the three miles of open water to land below the abandoned village. from there, we climbed up the hill and behind the village for spectacular views, some photos taken by a friendly older Irishman ... and an unanticipated marriage proposal. the Irish gent did a fantastic job taking photos, and Andy had the foresight to start the GoPro recording just before popping the question, so we have great record of what happened.

after the big event, we sat down on a tuft of grass (vainly attempting to avoid the sheep droppings) a rested. Andy returned to a normal shade and his heart slowed down while I couldn't stop smiling. before climbing up the hill, I'd had a mind to find the departure point of the next free informational tour after we got back down to the village, but that was completely blown out of the water. instead, we just wandered around, through the tumbled-down houses and old tracks, between fields and around (surprisingly) skittish sheep. even though the islands were evacuated in the 1950s, a herd of sheep remain and obviously hadn't been sheered in quite some time.

as we headed back to the Blasket center from the ferry landing, the guy who'd sold us our tickets out to the island caught us up. he was out walking his friend's grand-daughter's toy-sized dog before heading to Limerick to pick up a pair of tickets to a Springsteen concert in Dublin the following weekend. we hadn't spoken more than a few words to him before heading out on the boat, but walked and chatted with him for a good fifteen, twenty minutes afterwards. as Andy said, he definitely looked like the kind of guy who'd been to more than a dozen performances of the Boss and the E Street Band.

lunch was good, made calls to my parents with the good news, and headed back to the hostel to rest for a bit before climbing over the hill for dinner.

evening: after returning from our adventure and once growing a bit hungry after our late lunch, we determined to try climbing over the hill in search of the restaurant the hostel's proprietor mentioned -- supposedly about a 20 minutes walk along the Dingle Way. it turned out to be closer to thirty, but it was certainly worth it. the food was good and there was a huge family group with a tiny baby nearby (and somewhat overwhelming the wait staff and kitchen, as it transpired). once the dining room cleared out a bit a young guy began performing perhaps the most traditional music we heard in a restaurant setting. an excellent way to end another spectacular day.