September 1, 2016. From Cork to Killorglin and 1,000 Shades of Green

Greetings from somewhere in western Ireland…

Had breakfast this morning at Tara’s Tea House which was a few doors down from our hotel. Quintessential British/Irish with lots of chintz and patterns on top of patterns – all with little floral elements. But great breakfast.. Then tackled leaving Cork and headed to Kenmare (or at least that’s where we thought we needed to go)… Decided to head first to Kinsale which is a delightful seaside town about 18 miles south of Cork. Navigated (or I should say that Mike navigated) the car on some small roads and narrow paths with horseshoe turns… and even parallel parked in Kinsale… Very sweet fishing and historic seaport town with a population of about 5,000. Strolled the town, climbed several flights of outdoor stairs to get some views, meandered the main street – stumbled on a wonderful shop selling great Irish wool sweaters (that don’t look like those fisherman sweaters – not that I don’t like those, but I was surprised to see some interesting fashionable heavy sweaters).

Went inside to look (and eventually to help the Irish economy), and somehow began talking with the saleswoman (maybe the owner, not sure)… and like the owner of the hat store yesterday, she made some reference to our upcoming presidential elections. I think everyone starts the conversation rather tentatively – not certain where we might be on the issue.. and then once they know they engage fully and deeply. The hat guy started by saying “Well, you have an interesting election coming up in the states.” And once we responded, he began to say how scared they all were about a potential Trump presidency. And it went on from there. The woman in the wool store began by saying “I see one of your presidential candidates was in Mexico yesterday…” And we took it from there. She turned out to be extremely interesting and totally devoted to streaming Rachel Maddow (she gets it one day late) and Dianne Rheams (also a day late)… She said she stays up really really late to do this, but it’s worth it. Turns out, she lived in the states briefly – initially in Seattle (imagine that) and then in Port Townsend (of all places). Her then-husband was a ship builder and he went to the Pacific Northwest to take ship-building courses in Port Townsend. She’s got three kids, two of whom showed up while we were talking; one is studying interior architecture and is thinking of doing her advanced degree in architecture. The potential architect, daughter, had just come back from a few summer weeks in NY and California so we chatted about where she was and where she wasn’t. The mother was very quick to ask for Mike’s contact information with the hope that the daughter might come to CA for an internship!

After finalizing my purchase (great sweater), we headed to Kenmare since that was what I had written in my calendar. We were to stay at the Carring Country House. I had a little trouble with the GPS (since I wrote in Carring House, Kenmare)… so we just punched in Kenmare.. and later punched in Carring House which got translated to Ard Carring (although I didn’t really notice).

The drive was incredible… two hours seeing every possible shade of green.. layers and layers of greens. It was misty and rainy the whole way, but sort of fitting. As we approached Kenmare, the town seemed to be a lively and adorable quintessential Irish village. We started to seek out dinner places and places for breakfast the next morning. Mike was saying “Let’s eat at the hotel… too much trouble to drive again in the dark”… I said “The GPS shows the place as one mile from the town.. so we can walk – so much better to go to town than to eat at the hotel…” The argument didn’t have much time to fester.. as we found ourselves at the supposed destination “Ard Carring.”

We knew right away that this was wrong… The place was pretty much deserted. So we drove on for another mile and then realized we were somehow not in the right place. We called the Carring Country House and learned that it’s not in Kenmare at all… It’s in Killmorglin… a tiny place about an hour or so west of Kenmare. So, on we went… driving on the Ring of Kerry – through amazing landscapes.. maybe 500 more shades of green, lakes, mist, waterfalls – the whole bit.

The drive was tense… and obviously unexpected. Heavy mist and light rain; very narrow roads (and we have the biggest car we’ve ever driven – this BMW); windy roads, sort of like the drive to Mendocino on Highway 1; very narrow lanes when there are lanes – often really just one lane but cars in both directions, no shoulders, lanes are about 7’ wide compared to about 10’ in the states. Anyway, we made it to the delightful Carring Country House – the 16-room restored Victorian where it seems time has stood still.

The house is on Caragh Lake and has gardens, woodlands and, great views of the lake. They also boast a first class restaurant, so we booked reservations (actually not much choice; not sure where you’d even find a restaurant within about 15 miles!)… Seemed a bit “formal” so we actually changed our clothes.. not too dressy (don’t even have those kinds of things).. but put on a skirt and threw on a scarf – and lo and behold – fancy!

Restaurant lived up to the reviews, and had impeccable service…. They started us off with an amuse bouche… some kind of goat cheese ball with red peppers inside and a little sweet chili drizzle… We had drinks and this dish in the ante room… Mike is really getting into these Irish whiskeys. I’m not there… Then we were escorted into the dining room… Started with a nice squash soup that had a little hot chili to five it a kick (Mike) and I had scrumptious crab wrapped in paper thin pineapple and drizzled with a wasabi cream!  Mike had the vegetarian dish (stuffed eggplant) and I had the rack of lamb. Desert was some kind of sorbet concoction (which we determined was the least fattening?) including yuzu.

Now we are exhausted… More tomorrow, as we head to Dingle.

By the way, the press has not let up on the Apple fiasco. In the car we heard a great panel discussion that included a labor leader, an Anti-Apple organizer, and a government official. The best part of the conversation was when the anti-Apple/pro tax guy said “It’s not usual for a business to be able to phone the Prime Minister on a Sunday night at home on his private cell phone… That’s what Tim Cook did this past Sunday.” And the government guy said “Our prime minister is very approachable!” I think it’s a pretty sticky situation, and both Apple and Ireland will have to “pay.” I’m sure it will take years, decades… and Apple has already deployed teams of attorneys to build their defense.. and are talking about how many jobs they’ve created.  My little math tells me that even if Apple paid an average of $100,000 per employee (probably less in Ireland) for 10 years and there were 6,000 employees.. I think that is $6 Billion.. But the taxes they saved were more than $14 billion.. so??? I also figure this is the tip of the iceberg and that Apple could not possibly be the only company doing this scam… ??

Hope all is well..

Onward to Dingle.

Fern