Kissing the Blarney stone
Monday night we got into Kilarny and found a hostel to stay in. We were quite exhausted from all the driving we did especially since the weather was so horrible it made us even more tired. We slept well and got up bright and early the next day to start another day of driving through the ring of Kerry. The ring of Kerry is the Ish-something pennsula is the county Kerry. There are a lot of towns there that still speak the traditional Gaelic language which is cool to listen to. Unfortunately the weather wasn't copperating with us again and to try and drive the ring with bad weather wasn't appealing to us since we had done that the day before.We opted instead to drive into Cork and go to the Blarney castle. We got to Blarney castle and headed up to kiss the Blarney stone. Who ever came up with this tradition is raking in the euro!! Basically this is it: You scale the castle climbing up a very narrow and round staircase that gets only more narrow as you get to the top. Climbing the stairs could be an experience just in itself. Once at the top of the castle you head to one side where there is a gentleman sitting on a ledge and lowering people backwards, head first down to kiss the stone. Legend has it that if you kiss the Blarney stone you are given the gift of gab. And then to make more money off you they have a photographer there to take your picture. Well being a tourist that we are we had to do this. It was a bit of fun because while waiting in line you can chat up the crowd. When it came to be my turn I told the gent to go easy with me becuase it was my first time. He thought it was pretty funny and had a good laugh. What I was really trying to do was bide my time so that Dave could get some good pictures, which he did!! I out tricked the Blarney. Whether or not I got the gift of gab is still to be seen.
From Blarney we headed out of town and made our way towards Waterford. Our sole purpose in going there was to go to the Waterford Crystal factory. We got to the factory and made it on the final tour for the day with literally only seconds to spare. NOt even enough time to use the toilet so I had to hold on. Waterford is extremely nice crystal and it's a bit amazing how they make it. To produce their usual pieces they have cast iron molds that they use. For their rarer and more expensive (think $50,000 to $100,000 worth) items like trophies they used wood molds that only last for about 7 uses before they are no good. They make trophies for a lot of the major sporting events like the super bowl, tennis and golf events and they did they ball that's dropped in Times Square each year. For trophies they make two of them, the one the winner gets and they the spare. If they don't need the spare they bring it back to the factory to display. Once the glass is molded they let it cool before they send it to be cut. The cutters have to have so many years experience before they can start cutting and they have to memorize all of the cuts the factory uses. They also have master cutters who have to have over 20 years experience and they have over 100 different cuts memorized. It was all amazing. During this whole process if any piece doesn't pass any inspection they it gets sent back to be melted down and started over again and the people don't get paid for that piece. The tour ends up in their showroom with everything they have to offer to buy. I got me a nice vase and some toasting flutes for when I want to celebrate a special occasion. Luckily they'll ship my stuff home so I don't have to worry about packing it in my luggage.
After leaving the factory we hit the road again and made our way over to Dublin. We found our hostel where we wanted to stay but it was full, so I hit the street where there were some hotels on and was going to start checking them out when a gentleman stopped my and asked if I was looking for something. I told him I was looking for a room and asked him if he knew any good hotels to recommend. He said that he owned and then pointed to three different hotels on our street and said maybe he could help me. He asked how much we wanted to spend and I told him we were on a budget and were trying to stay at the hostel but it was full. Long story short he told the front desk guy at one of his hotels to give us room and he knocked off $20 euro. I shook his hand and thanked him for being so generous. Again that's the beauty of traveling, that you get to meet really nice people who do nice things for you. Already I was beginning to like Dublin loads. We got to our room and found that we had a double bed for me and Dave to share. That's not even the funny part!! Our room also came with a shower but it was right in the room not in a seperate bathroom like we're used to. So this morning when I took my shower Dave got to stare at the wall till I was done. Then when he jumped in I dried my hair as I looked at traffic out the window the whole time. It was pretty funny to say the least. I guess my mom's nightmare is coming true: she was scared that I would have to share a bed with one of the guys, but the good thing is that these guys are just friends and there's nothing romantic so it end up being like you're sharing a bed with you brother.
posted by Camille @ 11:31 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home