Kissin' The Blarney Stone

Well the days are flying by but I'm still on Monday as far as my blog posts go. Internet access is a little iffy in some places. Tonight we are in Dingle, actually tonight and tomorrow night :) No Skywalker sightings yet!

So Monday afternoon, after visiting the Rock of Cashel, we went to Blarney Castle and kissed the Blarney Stone! Blarney is the gift of telling a good story, or the varnished truth, as the picture below explains. Our guide Larry said the Irish philosophy is "Never let the truth get in the way of a good story." He has been telling a lot of stories the past few days and every once in awhile he will say "now that's the truth!"

The stone is at the very top of the big structure. You have to climb a very steep, tightly enclosed spiral stone staircase to get to the top. If you're claustrophobic or afraid of heights it can be difficult. We saw some people struggling with both those issues. In our group, as I mentioned we have three in their eighties. I told Michelle that I hoped Bruce, who is 84, was not making the climb, but when we reached a place where we could look back at the line, there he was and his wife! They both climbed to the top but did not kiss the stone, but Stuart who is 81 climbed to the top and did kiss the stone!

Here is Michelle kissing the stone! There is a pretty wide gap under the upper half of the body that drops all the way to the ground, that's why someone is holding on to you and there are bars to hang onto to help pull yourself back toward the stone.

Here is me kissing the stone. We should both now have the gift of telling and embellishing a good story!

This picture below gives a better idea of how far down it is from the top. Luckily when you're doing the kissing, you're looking up, not down!

There are beautiful gardens surrounding the castle to stroll through.

Our guide had us learning some Gaelic on the van, as we were heading to Gougane Barra to spend the night which is a Gaelic speaking area.

View from top of the castle! (Above)

 The plan tomorrow is to golf in Dingle and go visit a sheep farm! Off to bed now, we walked over 15,000 steps today, over 17,000 yesterday! Oh, Michelle and I have been splitting all of our lunches and dinners which is working out great. We are still getting plenty of food, but not wasting any :)