Road tripping turns ugly... and a trip to Blarney Castle!!

After our night in Cork we had to get up to move the car, as paid parking started early. This is when me and Violeta had another little 'disagreement'. I had said that I would pay for parking for the whole day in an all day car park so we could have a look around. But when I told her you had to leave the keys with the car park man she refused, even though I had already bought a ticket! I said to her that if she wasnt going to leave the car there, then I wasnt paying as it was more than double to park in the street. Also that she can go and fix up the ticket I had just bought. I was starting to get mad... Not off to a good start.

Things just got worse, there are loads of one way streets in Cork, and even though I tried to tell her every time she was going the wrong way, she refused to believe me as the GPS was telling her to go that way. It wasnt until cars would come the other way that she would get confused and panic. I knew where we were but she refused to listen to my directions, so she stopped to ask people. Only problem was she asked for directions to the wrong place. I thought I would mention this 5 minutes later when I realised we were heading in the opposite direction to where we should have been going. This was around the second time me and Laura thought we should do a runner before we ended up in a big pile up. We thought we would give it a little bit longer and see how it went once we were out of the city.

Once we got out of the city it got slightly better. We managed to find the Blarney Castle and straight away we went off on our own. I needed some time out. It was a great place to relax a little. The grounds were enormous! I was most excited though that Hamish and Andy had been there on their tour of Ireland and that Hamish had kissed the Blarney stone too. (In my theory I figured that meant that basically I was kissing Hamish if I kissed the stone... im not crazy at all.)

The castle was about a 10 minute walk into the grounds. It looked just like a castle from a real fairy tale. It sits on top of an 8 metre rock wall. From the north side of the castle it looks so much bigger, as a lot of the ground iin front was excavated. The rocks from the ground were used to build the castle itself. On the north side were the dungeon entrances and where the dog lived. (Guard dog). There were also cave entrances which apparently had little tunnels that led to all of the surrounding towns. Back in the day if the castle was ever in trouble, the occupants could use those tunnels to escape. Although being about 1 metre thick walls, it never really stood any danger.

We entered the castle and started up the 100 stairs to the top. You enter through a basement which used to be used to keep cattle and make butter. Then you go up to the earls bedroom which was one of the bigger rooms, but still quite small. There were also rooms for the 'young ladies'. No one is sure which ladies lived there, but it is thought that 2 of the earls daughters were raised at the castle, and it was those two who lived in that room. There was also a priests room, which is believed to be so as there are no gun holes in the walls and also a section which may have been used as an altar.

There was a huge banquet hall and kitchen, then you reach the top. Stairs normally arent a problem, but these stairwells were so small and cramped. You had to duck down and really watch your feet. You could only fit one person up at a time. But once you reach the top it opens up with amazing views of the whole property including the farms and gardens. The Blarney stone is also at the top of the tower. It looked a bit scary at first, as theirs a big drop, but I realised it must be fairly secure, as even old people were doing it!! So I laid on the ground and slowly leaned back. Theres someone there to hold your waist and lower you down. You actually have to lean back quite a lot to reach the stone itself!! I kissed the stone, then quickly got back up on my feet!! Apparently now I am bestowed with the gift of eloquence!! Laura had her turn then we made our way down the tower.

Once we got down we walked a bit more around the grounds and looked around. It was really relaxing and peaceful. But I was still stressing at the thought of having to get back in the car!! We decided that we wanted to drive to waterford, then maybe further up the coast back towards Dublin. I was happy, as that meant closer to safety!! We got to waterford around 6pm and Violeta went for a walk around town while me and Laura went to the pub. It wasnt until about 7.30 that Violeta got back and then she said we would just go to Kilkenny as it was a bit closer and find somewhere to stay. I was starting to worry again as we had no accomodation booked and things were generally expensive when you book late! If anything is available at all!

We got to Kilkenny around 9.30pm. We went for a walk to find some hostels and it was freezing!!! The first place I asked had rooms, but they were 20 euro a night and you shared with 13 other people!! I would rather sleep in the car than pay that much to have a crap sleep in such a big share room. We kept walking and then realised Violeta had walked off on us. It was about this stage when my 'crazy person' switch went off... I was freezing, it was late, we had nowhere to stay and I was so stressed out and on edge that I was about to flip out!! We went back to the car thinking she may have gone back there. We waited about 45 minutes in the cold deciding how to break into the car and get our things so we could RUN AWAY!!! We decided that we would leave her now and find our own way back so we could go to Scotland.

When she got back to the car we told her we were gonna go our own way, and sadly she was sad that we were going. But I put my foot down and said enough was enough and that we had to go. So there we were, me and Laura and all of our bags standing on a footpath at 10pm wondering what to do and where to go. At this point we knew we had to get a bus back to Dublin, and thought there may be a remote chance that night buses ran. We walked for 10 minutes to get to the 'bus station' which turned out to be just a sign on the side of the road in a backstreet. Then we thought perhaps we could just go to a pub until closing, then go to the train station when it opened. But realised we were too tired to stay up all night. Then we considered sleeping in a park...

In the end we decided to walk to the train station at the other end of town and hope that it was open and we could sleep on the floor in there. About 15 minutes later, we found a pub with accommodation signs out. We asked and they had a private room for 20 euro each. We thought it would be better than a park or station so agreed. Thank god it was a warm, private room with super comfy beds!! We were finally back on our own and able to get some good rest!! It was such a relief.