Today Jana, Sudurika, and I rented bikes to ride around the Dingle Penninsula (29-mile loop). The countryside here is absolutely spectacular - rolling green hills and old stone walls - just like the Ireland you see in the movies. It was quite windy out today, and it rained off and on, but that just added to the ambience. The penninsula is also covered with all kinds of old ruins. One of the places we stopped at was a cluster of clochans, beehive-shaped huts constructed before the 5th century. Clochans were made only with stones (no mortar), placed together like blocks of an igloo and angled properly to keep out the rain.
I've begun to notice that there are many road signs written only in Gaelic (some places don't believe in writing in English). The most common one is "Taisteaal go Mall" (go slowly), followed closely by "Tog Bog E" (take it easy). After fording a small stream (apparently they don't belive in bridges either), we reached the village of Dunquin.
About 11 miles from Dingle Town, Dunquin is located on the Dunmore Head, the westernmost point in Europe. This is where the movie Ryan's Daughter was filmed in 1969 and is the first piece of land that Charles Lindberg saw when he flew across the Atlantic in 1927. It's also the place where Jana and Sudurika decided to turn around (rather than riding 18 miles to finish the loop).
I believe this is primarily because Sudurika didn't pack a raincoat. And I don't mean she forgot to bring it with her today - I mean she didn't travel with one. What is it that people have against raincoats? Incidentally, Sudurika (who had been living/traveling in Ireland for almost a year) also carries a huge frame pack on her back and a second smaller pack on her front.
I was actually pleased to continue alone because now I could travel at my own pace. The second half of the journey was even more dramatic than the first. This is a bleak, weather-beaten part of the country, and although it's strikingly beautiful, it's hard to imagine that people survived out here. One of the keys to their survival was sheep. While only 10,000 people live on the Dingle Penninsula, the area is home to over 500,000 sheep! Along the back-half of the loop, I stopped to watch a sheep farmer herding his flock. Here in Dingle they still herd sheep as their ancestors did - with two obedient sheep dogs, a lot of yelling in Gaelic, and a 2003 Mitsubishi Land Runner.
My next stop was the ruins of the Reasc Monastery, built in the 6th century. By "built", of course, I mean placed on top of a much older Celtic site. The oldest structure at the monastery is actually an Ogham (rhymes with poem) stone - a pillar with Celtic runes from around 500 BC. When the Christians arrived (and by "arrived", of course I mean converted or slaughtered the locals) in the 5th century, they carved a Maltese-type cross over the original Celtic scrollwork. This seems to be a common theme here in Ireland. I saw a similar thing a short while later when I visited the ruins of the Kilmalkedar Church, "built" by the Normans in the 12th century. In front of the church is another Ogham stone, this one from the 3rd century. Rather than etching a cross over it, however, the conquerers simply drilled a hole in the top of the pillar. This Ogham stone is now used by people renewing their wedding vows (you simply touch fingers through the hole). Since I was alone at the church, I simply touched my own fingers through the hole and renewed my vows to myself. Before returning to Dingle Town, I also visited the Gallarus Oratory, a fully intact beehive-hut from 1300 years ago, and ate an orange in a fairy fort.
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