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&fullscreeGreetings to all from me, Amanda! I am leading the way with the synopsis from the day (giving Milie's fingers a little rest).
Ah yes, Dingle. So many things come to mind (including a few giggles) when I think about this cozy little city by the sea. After leaving our luxurious Bed and Breakfast that overlooked the entire town, we headed on an adventure around the Dingle Peninsula. The tour usually takes the average person about a good hour and a half (by car) to get around the stretch of land. We are not the average and it actually took us three hours to complete the 47 km trek, and worth every minute of the experience.
The Peninsula Tour is guided by winding roads with rolling lands on either sides of you. The homes of the Gaelic community are nestled deep within the hillsides of the mountainous range. The sights are glorious and leave you wondering how anyone could doubt God and his creative touch. I have only begun to experience the things in this world that God has created and I cant wait to see more!
One of the first places we stopped while on the tour was the Dunbeg Promontory Fort, which was said to have been created around 800 B.C. While heading down to the fort, we were greeted by two donkeys who were grazing on the grasses. Also grazing were a few sheep. Dingle actually happens to have 500,000 sheep that inhabit the lands of the countryside. Crazy enough, there are only 10,000 people that reside in Dingle. To put that into perspective, each person could have 50 of their own sheep (holy sheep)! While at the Dunbeg Fort, we ran into another donkey who had a lot to express. It was absolutely hilarious and I don't think I have laughed so hard.
Continuing around the peninsula, we stopped at some ahhhmazing points where the lands dropped off into cliffs that kissed the blue waters of the Atlantic. I can truly say that I have never seen such beauty in all my life. Seeing the currents move and the waves crash into the slate grey walls was of the cliffs was spiritual. I almost started to cry!
We also made our way to a little church called Kilmalkedar which was densely populated with graves from many different time periods. The old crosses that were attached to some of the graves were beautifully constructed and unique. We all made are way into the the church (which no longer had roof, due to erosion and time). There was a special stone that has often been used as sight for couples to renew their vows to one another. In the stone is a hole, where the couple each place their thumbs and confess their love. Brent and I wasted no time and decided to make another declaration of our love to one another.
After the peninsula tour, we all headed back to the town of Dingle for a little shopping and tastes of the town. The shops were filled with all sorts of things including charms, wool items (made from the very sheep surrounding the town), quilts, blankets, and so much more. We decided to stop in at The Blue Zone, a pizza place that had a great jazz vibe and lounge feel to it. The pizza was wonderful and a great way to finish the evening in Dingle. We chatted with the owner of the Blue Zone for a little while and told him about our travels thus far and are future plans. He was really funny and offered us some suggestions on places we may want to venture to next. Alas, we said our goodbyes to our newfound friend and the charming little town of Dingle and headed to Doolin. Another post for another town, for another day!
Millie lucked out and walked by just as this guy was delivering meat at the market... crazy!
It has been a busy but very enjoyable time in Ireland, and Brent and I wanted to take a moment to share the different things that we saw, specifically day two. Here are just a few images that we captured throughout the day. No better way than to start with a group shot!
Millie mentioned the distillery in her post for day two. Here I grabbed a shot of the inner workings of the old water mill that helped bring power to the plant. The gears were enormous and still going strong. You can actually see the slight movement in the gears.
This is a shot of the aging process of the whiskey starting with the earliest age of whiskey on the left (aged for three years) all the way to the oldest age on the far right (aged to 18 years). By law, the distillery is required to let their whiskey age for at least three years before selling it. The Jameson Distillery ages their whiskey for at least four years before selling it.
The longer you allow the whiskey to age, the darker the whiskey color becomes. You also lose more of a percentage of your whiskey the longer it ages, because it soaks into the woods of the barrels or evaporates. That is another reason it is more expensive!
While driving, we passed a little town along the water called Monks Town. It was so quaint we just had to stop!
Just one of my faves from the town of Cobh. As the Irish would say, "just lovely."
Love this shot! The water is like glass!
Grabbed a shot of us as we head into a restaurant for dinner. The decor and design was beautiful, but let's just say I ordered some "take away" later that evening. (Oh and "take away" is what the Irish say for what we in the States call "take out.")
Another great panoramic from Brent that features the town of Cobh. I love the colors and architecture of the buildings. What is so great about this shot it that the the road curved and the buildings followed the curve of the road as well!
A couple of weeks before leaving for Ireland I photographed Jillian & Chris' engagement session. I know Jillian because she is in my small group but I hadn't met Chris before so it was great finally getting to meet him. When I was chatting with Jillian about the session and reading their Get To Know You Sheet I learned that they LOVE eating at Indochine and Chris even proposed there so this is where we started out the session. We later headed over to the beach where I asked Jillian to bring their travel scrabble game because I heard they really love to play it often. They both went all out for the session and were willing to get soaked under the pier... by the end of our shoot we were sandy and soaked but it was worth it because we had a really great time!
I loved this copper gate!
Jillian specifically requested this shot because she loves the lights that trail down the side, I love them too!
Jillian & Chris - I am so looking forward to your wedding a few short weeks away!
Tonight we made the journey from Cobh to Dingle, we found the trip to be long, dark and windy.
I haven’t laughed as hard as I have in the past two days in years. I for sure have the right people on board for the trip and they are keeping me fully entertained. To say it’s been a blast would be an epic understatement.
Today’s breakfast was included in our hotel and it was our first Irish experience where we witnessed other natives eating. We quickly discovered that they don’t only drive on the wrong side of the road, they also eat on the wrong side of their fork. We also discovered that bacon is simply grilled ham, the strawberry jelly is delish and they don’t salt or season their food as much as we do. However we were properly served on doilies, which added a nice proper touch to our first meal of the day.
This morning I noticed that EVERY sink in Ireland has two faucets. Hot on the left and cold on the right. The problem Is when you wash your hands you have to decided whether you prefer freezing cold water or scorching hot water. Otherwise you’ll need to fill the sink to mix it to the right temperature and then wash. Not worth it! Of course drawing a bath takes a little more work too since you have to calculate the exact volume of each temperature.
Shortly after leaving our hotel this morning we made a discovery. The roundabouts were made for us, we are certain of it. The advantage to them is you can drive around several times and explore all of your options before making a decision. We have made our fair share of u-turns today.
The Road Atlas I purchased prior to the trip was the best $20 spent on this entire experience. We refer to it often! The good news is our $100 tank of diesel is lasting us a while… we still have ½ a tank left. We have also noticed that it’s hard to distinguish between left and right and requires quite a bit of thought since we are driving on the wrong side of the car. Our brains seem to have a hard time rendering a proper sense of direction.
Our first pull off this morning was for a herd of sheep in a small pasture on the roadside… you would have thought we had never seen sheep before. We “bah-ed” at them for what seemed like an hour.
Today we planned to stop in the whiskey distillery between Waterford and Cobh. It was in Midelton and that was a fun little trip. April and Amanda volunteered to be the whiskey tasters in our group and Brent got video of their faces while trying it out. We learned a lot about whiskey and how it’s made, we also took a lot of photos. I think the tour guide thought we were more interested in images than whiskey and she would have been correct!
FUN FACTS:
We found another word for our people carrier. We now loving refer to the mini van as our “coach”. We realized this when we saw the sign labeled “coach parking” at the distillery.
Instead of a TJ Max, they have a TK Max.
The national plowing championships are held here! Seriously.
“Quay” is pronounced, “key” we said that wrong about 50 times before we realized what they were saying.
You have to actually turn each outlet on after plugging in a device. I often forget this and have found myself thinking all of the outlets are busted on several occasions. Genuis!
They use the word “indeed” a lot and I have come to love that word so I’ll be adding it to my vocabulary!
People here eat dinner early, most places close around 1800(6pm) and we haven’t even thought about dinner by that point so we’ve got to start planning a little earlier in the day if we intend to eat some real Irish food. Tonight we wandered around the town at about 2300 (11pm) to try to find some dinner and the only thing in the whole town still open was an indian restaurant serving fast food. Pray that goes over well because our stomachs are probably wondering the same thing we were, "what the hell is this"?
Tonight we are staying at a small bed and breakfast which is amazing. Probably one of the nicest places to stay in Ireland. Tomorrow we explore Dingle, then it’s off to The Burren and County Claire! Until then, cheers!
We would randomly find these amazing views on our drive to Midleton and sometimes there would be nowhere to pull over for a photo.... I literally saw one of the most amazing views of my life and was too awestruck to even grab my camera as we were wizzing past it! Here is one that we found complete with a little pull off area! Brent jumped out for some panoramic views!
Now for the Whiskey factory tour and photo op!
This water wheel powered the distillery!
45,000 gallons! Now that's a lot of whiskey!
An old poster I saw hanging in the distillery... I loved it!
The distillery we toured is no longer running... the new one is much more modern and updated. You can even spot the current plant right out back, smokestack and all!
Apparently April an Amanda are now "Qualified Irish Whiskey Tasters" and they have certificates to prove it!
My FAV of the day I think!
I LOVE doors! I'm going to start a door collection on this trip... I've already seen some cool ones in the town we are in now which I plan on shooting tomorrow.
At the very top of Cobh we spotted a little set of stairs which was super cute so we paused for a quick photo session!
More to come... Amanda has an amazing shot that shows the progression of whiskey aging in a cask and I am sure Brent has more pano's but they are all asleep and I need to join them!
Shortly before we left for Ireland, Brent and myself had a wedding to photograph (and I mean shortly before, as in the day before)! Louise and Charles were married on a very rainy day in September. You'll have to stay posted to the blog to see images from that wedding later on, and hear about the entire day!
Long before the big day, I had the chance to meet Louise (and Charles) when I photographed her bridals. Brent was supposed to go with me that day, but sadly and painfully enough, he had a terrible migraine that forced him to rest. I was on my own for this one. I was a little nervous, anxious and excited to meet Louise and handle the shoot myself.
I met Louise at her parents home were I took shots of her on the porches that overlooked the absolutely gorgeous and luscious sound. It was absolutely breathtaking and a great place to photograph such a beautiful bride!
One of my faves....
Louise's veil was actually her mother's veil that she wore at her wedding. It was long and beautiful and a great addition to the already outstanding dress.
