Dear Kilkenny...

It's day seven. Gienna has become very adept at driving on the left and is now working on avoiding pot holes. I’m feeling more comfortable and I no longer go into a state of involuntary rigor mortis every time we get a little too close to a car, wall, cow, etc.

And this is all good because I may have typed in the wrong county into our GPS today, putting us a bit out of our way. Did you know there's a Cashel in just about every county here? Neither did I.

We stopped at a 13th c friary to take pictures.

 

 

Seriously? We need to have this conversation?

At one point, I came around a corner to find an older man, wearing cap, cane, and rain coat, just standing there. He spoke as soon as he saw me.

--Morning.
--Hello.
--Have you any family buried in there?
--No, we just stopped to take pictures because it’s so beautiful.
--Where are you from?
--Boston.
--[Looking me in the eye for the first time] We all have great symat'y for everyone in Boston.

We talked a while longer. His daughter runs a pub in town, and he plays in the band. “There are four people in the band. Last time we played, 11 showed up. Take it as it comes, I s’pose.” And then he walked away, just like that.

This picture, of a town near the friary, would have looked awesome on a sunny day, about a mile closer.

Our main objective of the day was to see the Rock of Cashel. Do you want to see what it looks like? So do we. It closed because the weather was so bad it was unsafe. (raises fist to sky) IRELAND!!

This is pretty much all we saw of the Rock of Cashel. But as the story goes, even the bishop moved out of the castle and into the town because the weather was ridonkulous up there.

So off to Kilkenny, a cute medieval town. Dinner at Matt the Miller's and some Irish music presented by these guys. They were fantastic singers.

Another pint done and dusted.

For those with less discerning taste, there's the blaa blaa blaa sandwich shop.

Derelict cottage on 2 acres for 50k euros. Anyone want in on this with me?

I thought, sweetly, that these places, all over Ireland, were some sort of modern convenience for printing books because there aren't any B&Ns around. Gienna set me straight. This is your local bookie.

At last, my Irish boyfriend.

One for Gienna too. Slainte!

I am nursing a cold at this point. And between the beer drinking each night and the cold, I figured I was probably starting to saw serious wood each night. But Gienna says my snoring is soft and sweet. She's kind that way. (Meanwhile, she's started tossing F bombs at me in her sleep. Girl is scary!)

I checked out St. Canice's Cathedral, built in the 13th century next to an 8th century round tower. I did not climb the tower. I'm carefully conserving my energy for beer drinking.

How cute is this n-scale model of 1642 Kilkenny from the view of St. Canice's?

At this point, I saw something that made me cranky.

This lucky bastard got to hold a little lamb.

I came here to this cold, rainy island, in part, to hang with sheep. And they're everywhere! But impossible to touch. So for days now, they've been so close, but so far away. I won't lie--I've been a little heartbroken. Don't furrow your brow--some girls like handbags; I like sheep. And I remain ever vigilant.