The Most Beautiful Place on Earth

Wow.

That's pretty much all I can say about my weekend. Six of us decided to plan our first weekend away from Cork, and we decided to go about four hours away to the Dingle Peninsula. Around 2005, National Geographic proclaimed that Dingle (An Daingean or Daingean Uí Chúis) and the peninsula were the most beautiful place on earth, and I wanted to see if I would agree.

My friend Megan had class on Friday, so while the rest of the group hopped on the bus pretty early, we took an afternoon bus, meaning that by the time we were an hour away from Dingle, it was already dark, so we didn't see any of the scenery as we were driving in. It was wet and rainy, so once we found the hostel, we just made dinner and hung around there for the night.

On Saturday, we got up really early and went on a driving tour of the peninsula that lasted for about two and a half hours. It's safe to say that it was AMAZING. The tour way exceeded my expectations! Our tour guide, Kevin, didn't say too much other than telling us the names of the places and a few random facts, but the scenery spoke for itself. The peninsula has these steep rocky cliffs that crash into the Atlantic, small beaches that are tucked away (but look awesome if it's warm!), and these amazing old ruins. There were beehives and churches that are over 2000 years old. What's so cool is that they're all made of dry stone, with absolutely no mortar used in making them--and they've never been renovated or remodeled and look like they were built yesterday. Kevin also pointed out the ruins of houses that people just up and left when they moved to America. Dingle is surrounded by these huge rolling hills and mountains, and you can see for what seems like forever. And the fields are all divided the way they've always been divided, with these small stone walls. There were sheep all over the place, too! We drove through a lot of Gaeltachts, or Irish-speaking areas. It was really cool because we were at the most western point of Europe! Our guide pointed out the spot that is the farthest edge of Europe--next stop is Boston! There was also a sweet rock formation called the Sleeping Giant that I was a big fan of. We also saw the Blasket Islands (Na Blascaoidí), which were inhabited up until 1953 or 1954, when the residents were moved to the mainland.

On Sunday, we decided to go for a horseback ride for beginner's. It was the best mixture of ridiculous and breathtaking. Let me just say that we looked RIDICULOUS. When we got there, the horse lady had us put on these huge rubber boots, helmets, and told us that we could take their coats for the ride if we wanted to. Since it was raining at the moment, we decided it would be a good idea. Everyone looked semi-normal except for the three that got stuck with these long khaki trenchcoats (with corduroy!) that went down to their ankles, had pockets big enough to stick a baby in, and were big enough for two people to fit comfortably inside. And they had these wings on their shoulders. We were a good looking group, let me tell you. Being the tallest people on the trip, Kate and I got stuck on the most enormous horses (mine was named Meg!) you could imagine...while the guide rode a pony. The ride was amazing, though. We start off on a little mountain road, but the next thing I know we're forging our own path up the side of a mountain! The view was gorgeous--you could see the land all divided up below us, and there were mountains stretching out all around us, and we were riding through this amazing open field with little streams running beside us. When we got to the top of the hill/mountain and could look down the other side, all you could see was the actual town of Dingle sort of spread out down a rolling hill in the valley, stretching into the Dingle Harbour, which at that moment was perfectly still. And the rain has stopped as soon as we started the actual ride, so the sky was blue, and I've never seen anything so pretty in my life!

The only thing we missed on our trip was a trip out into the harbour to see Fungi the dolphin. Dingle has this (one) dolphin that they will take you out on trips to search for. They tell you he is a wild dolphin, but word is that he is actually an escaped show dolphin, which I happen to think is hilarious.

The weekend, overall, was so much fun! Even the hostel was great--we got to meet people from all over...other counties in Ireland, Germany, and France. I'd also have to say we made some pretty good meals, too! And everyone in town was so nice to us, especially since it was the off-season...they would pretty much make exceptions for us and give us sweet deals. AND Ireland won their first game of the 6 Nations rugby tournament (against Italy, in case you're wondering)--we saw part of the replay of the game at the pub. If you ever have a chance to visit the Dingle Peninsula, DO IT. I can already tell it will be one of my favorite places to have visited!