Wednesday, September 3, 2003 (Doolin - Ireland)
Sharing the same spot. Slowly but steadily North.
The Cliffs of Moher versus the Cliffs of Dover. Will Doolin hold our traditional
music? A service wash was very welcome.
Day 175. When we awoke this morning, we noticed
that another van that was parked not too far from us the evening before was
still there. The four occupants of the van were now sitting outside eating
breakfast. Clearly we weren’t the only ones to have found this nice little
secluded spot to overnight.
We
finished our own breakfast and I sat down to look at the map and guidebook in
order to get a good feel for where we would be going over the next few days. We
are continuing our march slowly northwards along the western coast. Just up the
road from us is another largish town called Ennis. Originally, we were going to
stop there to look around for a short while but at the end of the day it’s
just another city. Once you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all so we
decided to keep on driving.
An
absolute must for this part of the country are the Cliffs of Moher. Almost like
the Cliffs of Dover but without the white colour. The fact that this is a must
see is kind of a mixed blessing in that the views are spectacular but it also
attracts every tourist around for hundreds of miles. Essentially, the whole
place has been ‘developed’ into one big tourist trap. The €4
just to park was a huge disappointment, but what can you do. Another dead give
away that this was a place for tourists was the dozen or so busking musicians
every fifty paces or so and a few stalls selling tacky Irish souvenirs. It took
me a while to block out the tourist feel of the place before I could truly
appreciate the awe-inspiring views of the cliffs. As we wandered around along
the rim of one of the ridges, we noticed a few people had wandered over the
guardrails and down onto some exceedingly precarious looking ledges below us.
They would certainly not have been able to see the huge cracks in the ledge from
their perspective and I doubt they would have went down there if they could
have.
Having seen the famous Cliffs
of Moher, we drove on a little farther into a town (well, more a collection of
houses really) called Doolin. The guidebook raves about this intimate little
place as a stronghold for traditional Irish music so we moored up in one of the
two campsites in the area. The campsite is actually one of the bets we’ve
been to and we immediately struck up a conversation with an older Welsh couple
in the campervan next to us. Being on the far west coast of Ireland, we wandered
along the rocky shore for a while. The views of the rocky west coast and the
Cliffs of Moher just up the shoreline make for one of the best that we’ve
seen anywhere in Ireland.
We took
advantage of the washing machines in the ablutions block and subsequently hung
everything out to dry on a line strung between the brick and a nearby lamppost.
Sandy broke out the sewing machine that she’d brought along to repair some
clothes and I wandered off down the shore to admire the
sunset.
This evening, we went down
into town. I call it a town somewhat euphemistically since there is only one
pub. We made it to the pub just in time to order a meal before the kitchen
closed and remained there for an hour or so listening to the three musicians
playing a variety of traditional Irish music on various instruments. The pub was
absolutely packed and it was a nice atmosphere but we returned back to the
campsite after half dozen or so melodies. Much like a lot of other travellers
that we’ve met whom are travelling around the country, we always seem to
find ourselves just too tired at the end of the evening to stay and enjoy the
music for very long.
Posted: Wed - September 3, 2003 at 01:18 PM