Our Trip: The Dingle

Ever since I thought about going to Ireland, many, many years ago, I have heard about "The Dingle." I was informed that it is a very popular spot to visit. So for this trip, I decided I would finally see "The Dingle." I was so glad when Roger mentioned that he would like to see it also!!
The Dingle is a peninsula in the Southwest corner of Ireland. It is north of another very popular drive called the "Ring of Kerry." Both of these drives have quite spectacular views.

Our first turn off of the main road was to this beach, the Maharees.

Then we travelled on to what is known as Connor Pass. It was equally beautiful!

Oliver Cromwell, descendant of Thomas Cromwell's family (King Henry VIII's minister), became Lord Protector of England in 1653. He is an extremely controversial figure in British History. For the Republic of Ireland, mainly the Catholics, he was a hated figure. Cromwell informed all the Catholics that they had to leave their fertile, productive farmlands of the east side of Ireland, and reside on the West, west of the Shannon River. This land was rocky and not very fertile. In order for the farmers to utilize the land for farming, they had to basically create fertile land by bringing up seaweed from the ocean and mixing it in the soil.
The people were dependent on their crops to live. Potatoes became their chief export, selling to those who had money. When a blight hit the potatoes, it caused a great famine throughout the country. This was between 1845-1852. This is referred to as the Irish Potato Famine, mainly to those outside of Ireland. The Irish tend to regard it as the Great Hunger, a period of mass starvation, disease, and eventually emigration. About two-fifths of the population was solely reliant on this cheap crop. Even though many were near the coast, the people did not have access to the fish. They had to retain permission from the Lords in order to be able to fish. (Wikipedia and Rick Steves)

We stopped at an example of a famine hit village.

This is an article to a paper about how hard hit the people were from the Famine.

Ireland is also known for the monks keeping history records. Charlemagne recruited many of the monks to record his history. There is a great book about how Ireland saved history, because of their keeping records.

The monks were known to reside in huts such as the ones below.

These "Beehives" were built so well, with the ceilings were incredible.

When we got to the town of Dingle, we were greeted by this rainbow.

We are lunch, per suggestion of a nice young lady, at Murphy's Pub.

One is not wanting for pubs in Dingle. There are something like 34 pubs in this one town.

At the end of our day, we rented a wonderful place on Lough Caragh. This is a 400 year old thatch cottage we were fortunate enough to be able to reside for two nights.