Day 363, 10 June '15, Dingle Peninsula including Slea Head Drive and the Blasket Islands Centre, Bee Hive Hut, Ruins hunting (Gallarus) & Bowser-Man.

We set out from the beginning of the Dingle Peninsula with a blue-sky day and brilliant sunshine. Forecast to go to 19 degrees - we must have brought the Marrakech weather with us. Any warmer and the Irish folks will be stripping down to the nude. Speaking of wild and crazy sights - check out this sheep photo - up at Connor Pass it was perched on the edge of a cliff bleating like no-one's business - Baaa! How did I get here? Baaa! How am I getting down? Baaa! Baaa! Baaa! On our way around the Slea Head Drive, we stopped in at the Blasket Islands Centre. We admit to knowing little about these islands off the end of the Dingle Peninsula, but basically they were the Irish equivalent of the untouched tribes of South America. Unadulterated Irish was spoken and various scholars visited during the early 1900s before the last residents left in the 1940s. We watched a movie about the island and enjoyed the views... did we mention it was a Heritage Card site - another €8 of value. We enjoyed the visit then visited the loos. Down a hall then a door with Male / Female pictograms, then behind the door two separate doors leading to the Ladies & Gents. Simple huh? Nothing too foreign or surprising huh? A massive (60+) person coach of tourists arrived for the facilities just as I was leaving. I unfortunately got stuck on the wrong side of the door and got to patiently wait as they streamed past me. Thus I got to listen (and now get to tell the story). "Oh my God! It's co-ed! Oh, I can't handle this. This is just too weird. Oh, Oh It's OK - they're separate. Wow - that is just strange..." Next worthwhile quote... "Oh my God! I can't believe how busy the bathrooms are! This is going to take forever!" This was a classic from the tail end of the group of 60 who had just all piled in to the toilet area. Yup. The joys of travelling on a coach tour. You bring your own crowd of daft tourists with you. We were pretty happy to finally get through the door and back to the Wee Red Beastie and on the road (again). The Dingle Peninsula is a lovely drive - not as stunning as the Connemara nor the Ring of Kerry, but still great fun. Lots of old stuff. One of its claims to fame are the Beehive Huts (see today's album). We are too stingy to pay to see them at the main collection... and eventually tripped over one in a small coastal area. All good. It seems to be a bit of a past-time on Dingle - comb your land and try and find any old bit of stone something and then charge tourists to see it. One prime example is the Gallarus Observatory - an early Christian site that is actually a public monument managed by the Office of Public Works. It's free to go to via a public path (as we found out later), but if you follow the signs and use the carpark and walk through a gift shop - then you pay a €3/person charge for the convenience. Brilliant business plan. We were about 3/4s of the way into the drive and it occurred to us that even the Wee Red Beastie can't run on fumes forever. Whooops! Probably should have slung a bit of petrol in last night. Hmmm. Couldn't imagine any of the little towns on the remainder of the drive having a gas station. As it turns out, in the little town of Castlegregory there was a mechanic's workshop that had a couple of ancient Esso bowsers out the front. And a geezer on a chair staring into space. And they worked! Woo hoo! He was pretty disappointed when we only wanted €10 of gas. But he got up and pumped it anyway. Doesn't sound like much but that's 210 kms of driving power in our great little set of wheels. Made it back to Milltown, felt like a long while since lunch and we hit up The Little Pavilion for another Chinese meal. Mentioned it was our second night running and how much we enjoyed last night's dinner... got a free drink and prawn crackers. Making friends and influencing people - that's us. Off to the Beara Peninsula tomorrow and on to Cork for the final night's stay of the trip.