A Week in Kerry - Part 1

 I don't even know how to begin my series of blog posts on my time in County Kerry. For one thing, there are literally over 500 photos to wade through. I guess I'll just work my way through chronologically, and stop whenever the post seems to be getting too long!

Where our story really begins and ends is with Liz, the owner of The Anvil Bar - the BnB and restaurant/pub I stayed at for the week. When the staff worked out that I was alone and without a car, she basically adopted me for the week and personally took me all around the county. I learned so much about the history of Kerry and Irish culture, and had such a fun time with her. If you ever find yourself in southwest Ireland, head outside of Castlemaine to find The Anvil and say hi to Liz for me! 

I know I said I'd go in order, and this is already out of order, but here's the lovely Liz herself!

Now onto a more linear narrative:

I knew I wanted to travel by train as much as possible during my brief stint in Europe, so rather than take a quick puddle jumper from Dublin to Kerry, I opted for a leisurely train ride instead. It was such a low key and simple way to travel - no worrying about security lines and weight limits and minuscule seats, just plenty of space to move around and lots of scenery to watch. I was feeling a little edgy when I started, as I find I generally am on travel days, but I pulled up Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone on my Kindle and the accompanying movie soundtrack on my phone, and boy if that didn't just whip me right into a good frame of mind. Going between reading and staring at the rolling green fields while Hedwig's Theme played, even if I was technically in the wrong country, just felt so fitting and like I was on an adventure and maybe even on the right path. 

Scenes from the train

The windows were evidently tinted blue!

Everything was surprisingly ambiguously signed, but I made my transfer correctly and upon alighting in Tralee I found the taxi stand - though it took about half an hour for a taxi to show up (there was one leaving right when I arrived, so I wasn't just standing around optimistically, I promise). My taxi driver gave me my favorite weather forecast I think I've ever heard: 

"If you can see the mountains, it's going to rain. If you can't see them, it's raining."

The Anvil is on a quiet road out in the countryside - the only stretch with sidewalks has the Anvil, another bar called Murphy's Bar, a sewing shop, a church, and a tax advisor. There is also a hiking loop that starts right behind the bar, but it was apparently closed for renovations, so I never tried it out. The pub itself was exactly what it should be - dark wood and amber lighting and a good crowd of regulars. And SPECTACULAR food. If you ever stop by (and you should!), try the grilled goat cheese. My taste buds swooned. 

Working dinner in the pub

Monday morning I took it nice and slow - but was actually awake during the morning! Jet lag is finally over! I enjoyed my lovely room and the views of the rolling hills I could see from my many windows, and rescued a butterfly that somehow got inside my skylight:

And I went for a little walk around the stretch of neighborhood that I could reach. It was very peaceful, and since I was in the countryside and did not need to block out city weirdos, I did not have headphones in, which is how I discovered that I was walking past a burbling brook:

Returning to the Anvil, I came across the owner's son who works the bar, and he figured out pretty quickly that I didn't have a car, and told me about the shuttle buses. During the summer they are available for the guests in the high season, but during the winter they actually function as school buses. But that means that they make runs into Tralee and Killarney each day for a few hours (and for the full day if I wanted to go with them for the morning run at 7:30am, which I decidedly did not). "Just let them know at the bar, and they'll let the drivers know." 

And then later that night, I met Liz. She popped by my table as I sat enjoying another fine meal in the pub to give me a handwritten schedule of the bus for the rest of the week, and we got to chatting. Soon enough, she had brought me a brochure of County Kerry and all of the places the school bus could drop me off for a few hours. When we were done talking and she left me to the rest of my meal, I experienced one of those odd moments that happen only when I'm traveling, where I have an actual physical feeling of overwhelming joy and like the whole universe aligned to create this singular moment. Running off to the Irish countryside was such a random, spontaneous decision on my part. Choosing this particular BnB was a complete whim, and the whole thing came together in a matter of minutes. I didn't do enough research to realize that I couldn't walk anywhere from the BnB, I had no idea what even was in the area to see, and it just generally could have been such a dud of a week. And instead, I was sitting in a picture-perfect pub with music playing and rugby on the TV in the background and that warm glowing lighting, eating a warm meal and getting ready to adventure around the Dingle Peninsula for the week, making friends, and it just felt amazing. All of those days and stretched where traveling is so much harder than just living at home, where I don't feel adventurous just overwhelmed, where I wonder what on earth I am thinking doing this with my life - this was one of those moments where it all pays off. 

I'll take you through the adventures and wanderings that ensued in the next post. For now, I leave you with one more out-of-order photo, just because I like it:

Having a WONDERFUL time on my impromptu Kerry trip

Road Trip 2012: Grand Canyon

Several years ago, I read a passage in a book about the Grand Canyon. I can't remember the exact phrasing, or even where I read it, but it said something to the effect of "Everyone needs to go to the Grand Canyon. It is the one thing in life that will meet or exceed your expectations, no matter how high they are."

From that point on, I became obsessed with getting there as soon as possible. I managed it sophomore year of college, when I convinced my parents to make the 5+ hour drive from Mariners Spring Training twice in one day. And the book really was right. 

This time around, I knew what to expect, but that doesn't mean it wasn't still absolutely gorgeous! And Katie had never been, so I got to vicariously experience it again for the first time through her reactions. 

We took the Desert View Drive along the South Rim, stopping pretty much every time there was a scenic view with parking, and singing along to Josh Groban and Bon Jovi in between.

Almost as intense as the views was the wind that day.  Our hair at this particular location should give you a vague idea.

Keeping it relatively controlled for the picture

 

Going head on

Challenging the wind

 It didn't help with the near-vertigo of being so close to such sharp drops to have huge gusts of wind that felt like they could easily take you over the edge. But I like to think it added to the drama of Katie's first visit. Dramatic vista, dramatic weather.

 Once our visit concluded, it was off to California! Katie did some poking around and discovered a little desert oddity: Lake Havasu City, home of the original London Bridge. We have no idea how this little town got the bridge (I suspect some eccentric billionaire), but it was intriguing enough that we made it our home for the night, just miles from the California border. We did our drive over the London Bridge at dusk, so there aren't any decent pictures to speak of, but if you are ever out that way, it's worth a look. They have it going over water, with old fashioned street lights and everything.Very cute.

Road Trip 2012: Entering Red Rock Country

 When we first arrived in Flagstaff, AZ, the plan was to spend a day frolicking around the Arches National Park in Utah before commencing with our Arizona-based activities. Unfortunately, that turned out to be significantly further away that we expected, so we had to nix Utah from the travel plans.

Instead, we spent our full day in Flagstaff exploring the Red Rock country over in Sedona. The Oak Creek highway is a 15-mile stretch of scenic highway that winds up (to? through? Not entirely certain where it ends) Sedona, with some truly stunning red rock formations. Conveniently, Montezuma's Castle, another site we wanted to see, was just beyond it.

First up was Montezuma's Well, a natural spring of some sort. We'd actually intended to skip it, but took a wrong turning on our way to the Castle, and figured Why Not?

I was particularly enamored with this tree, and Katie humored me

Our first cliff dwelling!

 We knew that Montezuma's Castle would be a cliff dwelling, but had no idea that we would get a preview at the Well! I took an archaeology class last fall that featured several cliff dwellings, so I geeked out a bit and pretended I knew what I was talking about.

The Well itself

We didn't linger overlong, as the heat was a bit overpowering. The altitude kept us very dehydrated, despite our best efforts, for our entire stay in Arizona. Moving on to the Castle. It is one of the largest and best preserved cliff dwellings in the area, over 1000 years old and last occupied something like 700 years ago. It is not a castle, nor does it have any connection to the fabled Montezuma. The settlers who discovered it assumed that something so impressive was built as a castle for the great leader, and thus it got its name.

Despite another rattlesnake sign warning us to stay on the trail, the only wildlife we encountered were some funny little lizards that did pushups and turned in circles on their beds like dogs. We weren't able to get a good picture, but they were quite the animated little fellows. 

For our return trip through Oak Creek, we stopped at several pull-outs for less reflection-y pictures. Despite rising and falling some 3000 feet while severely overloaded, Candy pulled through and got us home in one piece.

Once back in Flagstaff, with its normal rocks, we wandered around the Historic Train District for dinner and some light shopping, and stole more free wifi from the surrounding hotels (when we checked in and tried to buy internet, we were informed that the Motel 6 internet was down, but prompted to scrounge some wifi off of a neighboring hotel. Worked like a charm). Up next: the Grand Canyon!!

Road Trip 2012: Land of Enchantment

Oh my goodness, I have gotten so behind. In terms of days, we are still less than halfway through, but it feels like we are already on the home stretch! But for now, let's journey back a few days, when we explored New Mexico....

Our time in New Mexico was centered around Santa Fe. It brought us a healthy introduction to the geological splendor that is the Southwest, which we have been thoroughly enjoying at its fullest in Arizona. After making camp, we basically had a night in, with a brief stop at Olive Garden. Something about being on a road trip has us both mentally geared towards all of the Americana chain restaurants. Thus far, we have made stops at Sonic, Dennys, Olive Garden, Dairy Queen, and I think Katie got something from a Burger King at one point. A stop at Chili's is also likely. Hopefully we will return to our senses soon, but in the meantime, Sonic makes darn good mozzarella sticks.

Our full day in New Mexico started with a journey to Taos, an artistic community about an hour outside of Santa Fe.

Some cool freeway decorations

Camel Rock

The Road to Taos

Just your average freeway overpass

Preliminary research suggests this might be Frijoles Canyon

Once we got there, we realized that we knew little of what to actually do in Taos. We just knew we were supposed to go. So we wandered around Old Town, in and out of shops (met some excellent shop cats at the bookstore, Mable and Little Trouble), and had organic smoothies in the sun.

A little corner off of Old Town Taos

On our way back, we stopped at a pretty little pull-off, and attempted to get some bubble pictures a la the Grand Bubble Tour of Scotland, but our bubbles were not cooperating. You get a single picture of me show-boating instead.

The middle of the afternoon was occupied with a matinee of Snow White and the Huntsman (highly recommended, btw), and in the evening we wandered around downtown Santa Fe. An energetic and aggressive search landed us free street parking, and again we sauntered in and out of shops. Sadly, no jewelry even close to our price range, but we did meet this lovely donkey statue:

Donkey in Downtown Santa Fe

And we hung around the tiny cathedral. A building across the street had some sort of rooftop club, so it is possible that I may have busted out a little bit of the Cupid Shuffle on the cathedral steps. I don't admit to anything, but I also regret nothing.

Up the next morning to make the drive to Flagstaff. We are already pros at handling 400-mile drives in a single sitting, though we vaguely have intentions to make more frequent stops to walk around and stretch out. After the first two days, our bodies have settled quite nicely into the routine of things and no longer yell at us for keeping them in Candy (my car) for hours at a time, but we know we shouldn't take advantage....

Coming soon: the geological marvel that is Arizona!