Today we docked in Cobh. pronounced “Cove.” Once known as Queenstown, it is where the Titanic stopped to pick up immigrants before heading out across the Northern Atlantic. There is a statue of Annie Moore with brothers here and one on Ellis Island to commemorate her being the first emigrant to land at Ellis Island after leaving Ireland for New York in 1891.
Cattle thrive in the lush clover fields of the South, enabling the young city of Cork to do a brisk trade in hides and butter, as well as high-quality cloth. The settlement of Cork was attacked and burned several times by Vikings from Denmark. Anglo-Norman knights from England seized control from the Danes in 1172. Cork became a distribution center for wine from Bordeaux, France, and sugar from the West Indies. French Protestant refugees called Huguenots settled in Cork at the end of the century, bringing skills that stimulated the manufacturing of glassware, linen, cotton, and silverware.
Gaelic is the official language here, but almost everyone speaks English. “Failte” means welcome and thank you is “go raibh maith agat”.
Our shore excursion today is to Killarney Lakes and Muckross House. Our guide was Rosheen and she was wonderful, telling us funny stories someone the naughty side such as limericks. She greeted us with “Cead Mile Failte,” pronounced “kead meelay faul-chuh” and “Top o’ the mornin’ to yuh.” The accepted response is “And the rest of the day to you.” She told us about the history of the region also. How the Celts arrived about 700 BC and the melding of the pagan symbols such as the moon and sun into the Christian cross, which created the Celtic cross.
Many of the words we use today in America come from Ireland: smithereens, banshee, keeners (criers at funerals), galore AND celebrating Halloween, which was a Celtic festival. Expressions such as “put that in your pipe and smoke it” come from here as does one I hadn’t heard—“on a pig’s back,” which means doing well. A funny one was “craic.” You’ll see signs on pubs that say Good Craic. It’s not what you think—it means good fun.
We saw dark barked trees with white flowers that are black thorns, also called fairy trees. Shelaighlees (sp.?) (they look like gnome walking sticks) are made of these trees. Many movies were made in Ireland: The Quiet Man, Circle of Friends, Ryan’s Daughter (Dingle), & Michael Collins (Cork) to mention just a few. In the Cork area, we saw flags that said Up the Rebels. These are flown by those against British Rule even for Northern Ireland.
Some clues to the Gaelic language: “bally” means townland and “kil” means church. Another interesting fact--fisherman’s sweaters made famous here are sewn with different patterns. When a bride is married, she learns the pattern of the family and makes her husband’s sweaters with that distinctive pattern. For a sad reason—for identification if they are killed at sea.
Supposedly nearby is St. Gobner’s Well, the waters of which are good for the eyes. We didn’t see it though. In Irish families n the old times, the first son is usually given the farmland to take over. Then the family was supposed to “give” one child to either the priesthood or the nunhood. And then there’s the tradition of giving nursing mothers a bottle Guinness every day. Hmmmm…..
On the way to Killarney National Park and Lakes we went through the River Lea tunnel and past small farms and ruined castles on our way to County Kerry. We climbed through the Derrynasaggart Mountains and entered the park, which boasts stunning views of tree-lined lakes against the backdrop of mountain peaks.
Next came a coffee stop at the Abbey Hotel in Ballyvourney. I have cream tea and Ray had coffee. They said we were having scones, but what they served were shortbread cookies—that was fine by me.
Aghadoe Heights (place of 2 yew trees) was our next stop to take pictures of the lovely lake. There are three lakes here: Lough Leane (Lower Lake or Lake of Learning), Muckross Lake, & Upper Lake. Jagged misty mountains hover over the shining lakes and rolling green meadows.
Our next stop was Muckross House, a 19th c. Tudor Style manor and sunken garden. Built in 1839-43 by the Herbert family, it was lovely with its stepped gables, mullion windows, Victorian furnishings, 15-18 ft. ceilings, 62 chimneys, Waterford Crystal chandeliers, a rock garden and a walled rhododendron garden. Mr. Herbert invited Queen Victoria to stay here on a visit to Ireland and he spent 6 years preparing for her 2 day visit. The cost of this bankrupted him, and the house was bought by the owners of the Guinness fortune. They later sold it and its 11,000 acres to an American couple to give to their daughter, Maude, as a wedding gift when she married a Scotsman, Archibald Vincent. They had met on a sailing ship. Sadly, Maude died of pneumonia in her forties and the family gave the house and acreage to the government in 1932.
We took a very interesting tour of the house. There were screens to protect the women’s faces from the heat of the fireplaces because they wore wax makeup—I had never heard of this. No ladies were allowed in the games room, which held the largest billiards table I have ever seen. It was actually built IN the room in 1848 and weighs 3 tons. The beds in the house we very short and I found out that they were custom made back then and people slept sitting up to avoid respiratory problems, so length wasn’t needed. There were 25 bedrooms when the house was first built. The children’s room was so pretty and had 2 1870 dolls displayed. The bell pulls were an interesting feature of the house. As was the fact that Queen Victoria brought 100 staff members with her when she visited—so many that some had to stay in hotels nearby.
Mr. Herbert did all this to try to gain a title for himself so that he could receive more land and pay less taxes. And he was on track to receive one until King Albert died soon after the visit and Queen Victoria was so distraught that the title-giving was lost in the shuffle.
After the house, we stopped in at The Laurels pub for an Irish lunch of salad, Irish stew, and a delicious cream pie. I was a bit leery of what we would be served as I had read of traditional Irish dishes--Colcannon is cooked potatoes diced and fried in butter with onions and either cabbage or Leeks then covered in thick cream. Crubeens is pigs trotters, which tells me nothing except that I don’t want to eat it or see it. Codde is a traditional pub dish of bacon, sausage, onion, carrot, and potatoes, all boiled together. Carrageen is a moss pudding cold dessert with a seaweed base and served with Irish cream. Irish stew is pieces of lamb braised with vegetables and potatoes—that one sounds safe & indeed it is the one we had. Yay!
For many, the pub is the center of life in Ireland where locals gather for relaxation, conversation, and entertainment and a drink or two. The Irish drink nearly 500 million pints of beer a year, mostly stout—a rich, creamy dark-brown version that derives its taste from roasted barley. Guinness, a dark beer, is also popular. That is what we chose to drink today with out meal which we had with 2 ladies from the ship—one named Hazel who was this amazing lady who was 90 years old and still going strong. I thoroughly enjoyed talking with her and her sister. The word “whiskey” is derived from the Gaelic “uisge beatha,” the water of life. Rosheen pronounced it “ish-kuh bah-hah.” Irish whiskey is drunk straight or with coffee and cream (Irish coffee), but I have heard that “Irish coffee” was really invented in San Francisco. Irish mint is honey and herbs in a whiskey base. Irish cream liqueur is whiskey with chocolate and cream. I will have to try more of these.
In charming Killarney town (Cill Airne), we browsed the shops and tried to visit St. Mary’s Cathedral, but the gates were locked. A sign for Jaunting Cars Ahead warned us of the horse-drawn carriages that tourists like to ride in around Killarney and at Muckross. A very interesting sign which I still don’t quite get is the one that said: Road Calming Ahead. This was to show when 2 lanes went down to one. Doesn’t sound calming to me. The shopkeepers in Killarney were so nice. One, a young man, engaged us in conversation about the Queen’s visit—neither he or we were pro-visit—and about the horse-racing in town. They were even calling the play-by-play of the races over the intercoms in some of the shops. The young man had a bet on two horses—hope we won.
On our way back to Cork, we ran into traffic and were late getting back to the ship, but they held it for us. We saw the Martello Towers all over place. They were round English defense towers to defend from Spain and France. The first Ford Motor Co. factory outside the US was in Cork. Henry Ford’s parents came from here. I saw signs for the town of Tralee, which was interesting since I love and listen to the Celtic song “Rose of Tralee” all the time.
Rosheen told us the story of how we have pictures of the Titanic even though it sank. Seems that a priest named Father Brown had an uncle who was the bishop of Cork. Father Brown received as a gift from the uncle a trip on the first leg of the Titanic voyage that stopped in Queenstown (now Cork). He also received a camera from him and went on the voyage, taking pictures of everything. He met an American couple on board who so liked him that they offered to pay his way to make the rest of the trip with them to New York. Father Brown wrote to his uncle, the bishop, for permission, but the uncle said no. And afterwards Father Brown was thankful for his uncle’s decision.
So we made it back to the ship just in time for dinner. I ordered the Smoked Salmon appetizer which said it came with a crayfish tail, which was fine because Ray said he would eat the crayfish tail for me. Well, when our waiter, Russell, pout my plate in front of me, there was A WHOLE CRAYFISH SITTING THERE--STARING AT ME!!! I told Ray that I was just going to continue looking away and would he please remove the unfriendly creature from my presence, which he did. I mean, it had eyes and feelers and everything!!! HOW is this called a crayfish TAIL?! It brought back memories of my horrible Skye experience with the langoustine all over again.
Anyway, Ireland was wonderful and we were sent off to Dublin with fond memories—just not the ones with the creature.
pictures from top: walkway at Muckross House; love these old oak trees at Muckross; Gaelic sign; beautiful flower in Killarney; MacRoom's Castle.
