Wednesday, July 3, 2013 @ 7:28 PM in 2013 Europe
Day 7
Last night I got lucky and stumbled across some local musicians practicing songs in a local pub. It was fairly empty since they were doing an impromptu jam session so I was able to get front row seats. I watched them play for a couple hours over a couple pints.
This morning I started my tour of Kilkenny by walking down to the Kilkenny Castle and walking around the gardens and park area. The castle looked really neat and had the River Nore along one side. After the castle I walked along the river for a bit then came back and zig zagged through the city seeing the various old buildings. Some of the sights were The Black Abbey, St. Canice's Cathedral, St. Mary's Cathedral, Tholsel, County Hall and parts of the original wall surrounding the city.
Kilkenny is known as the "Marble City" due to its polished limestone that looks like marble. All of the limestone was quarried locally and I plan on walking by the old quarry tomorrow on a 12 mile round trip hike that will take me by the river and by some old mills and church ruins to another city southwest of Kilkenny called Bennettsbridge.
I originally had tonight as my last night in Kilkenny but decided to stay another night so I could do this river hike. I'd been thinking about heading to Killarney next to see some of the Ring of Kerry (a 179 km loop in southwest Ireland with beautiful views along the way). Unfortunately I forgot what day of the week it is and I tried booking a hostel for Friday and Saturday nights but every one of them was booked. I had to adjust my destination a bit and instead I'm going to Dingle in the Dingle Peninsula on Friday and I'll be staying there Friday and Saturday nights.
Dingle is a small fishing town but it's surrounded by some really nice mountains and islands. There's a "Mount Brandon" there so I want to see if I can hike it or at least part of it! After Dingle I'll start my journey northward and work to hit the Cliffs of Moher and then Galway.
It's still pretty early (almost 7:30pm) so I might try to hunt down some more live music in a bit. Everything was really dead when I was walking around the town a little while ago.
Teaser photos:
Tags: daily journal, ireland, kilkenny
Posted from: Ireland