HOLIDAYS in IRELAND

Carolyn and Bill at Muckross House in Killarney.

This is a most stately home in Killarney, and well worth a visit. There are guided tours throughout the season and the house and its history are special. This is where Queen Victoria was supposed to have spent a couple of weeks during her visit to Kilarney but, due to her husband's sudden illnes, had to leave only a short few hours after arriving. Its location on the shores of Lough Leane in Killarney is magniificent. Make sure that you take in the farmyard tour when you visit here.
The tour of the farms is one of my own special retreats. It is refreshing to spend time walking around enjoying these old homes and the farm animals. There are a number of old cottages of varying sizes, the one above being the large farmers cottage.

These pigs are just some of the animals you can see here. There are also the magnificent cart and plough horses, geese, and chickens and ducks, donkeys and Irish Wolfhounds.

This is the inside of the medium farmers cottage. Here you see the fresh bread being baked on the griddle over a peat and log fire by real Irish country women. Better still....you can sample it....and i always do have my fill ....with real homemade Irish country butter, made here on the farm also. There is nothing to compare with hot break and the butter melting into it. Now i'm getting hungry just thinking about it.
This picture shows the labourer's humble cottage. This one now has slates but it would have been thatched in its day. The interior was very modest with a small kitchen come living room, a central fireplace with one chimney, and a couple of tiny bedrooms.

This picture shows the outside view of the medium farmers cottage. This was a fine home really and would have been considered to be such. Here you had a large open kitchen when you walked in the front door, and bedrooms at either end. There was also a loft area, which was known as the shelf, where members of the family could sleep. This would have been a warm area as the rising heat would heat the place. It was normally the younger family members who slept on the shelf and if a girl failed to find a husband she was said the have been "left on the shelf". Now there is one for you.

Where would they have been without their turf (peat). This is what we all burned here in Ireland years ago, and what a nice fire it made. The blacker the turf, the better it was, as the back turf was older and more condensed, and far better quality than the lighter brown turf. There are still many homes here in Ireland where turf is regualarly burned. When you grow accustomed to the smell of a turf fire it is very pleasant, and for me that smell stirs up many happy memories.