Castletownbere to Eyeries

The walk today took us out the main loop of the Beara Way to the point where, heading northwest, it crosses the central mountains, heads down the north side, and starts turning back east. Kenmare, the end of the walk is three days away.

Just outside of Castletownbere are the remains of a stone circle, a mini-Stonehenge. Like Stonehenge, it had some religious significance centuries ago, and like Stonehenge, it's still being studied. As we were leaving the circle, a small tour was arriving. One of the folks on the tour walked past me and said “Go Green.” My Michigan State Spartan hat also has religious significance in some circles.

The trail wound up the mountain and down an old farm road on the other side. When we got to the bottom we began hearing shouts from high up on the ridge to the east. A couple of farmers were up there gathering their sheep by herding them down the mountain. They may have had dogs with them, but they were too high for us to see them. The effect of watching the herding was of little white specks (sheep) moving across and down the mountain faster than we've ever seen them move, clustering together when they got to ravines and paths, and pouring down the slope. If you've ever seen a Pachinko game, it was kind of like that.

A little further on we started looking for a place to stop for lunch. We were following around the north side of an open ridge and there were some great views of Kenmare Bay and the Iveragh peninsula.

One good spot had been taken by a Dutch couple also walking the Way. We stopped and talked to them for a couple of minutes, then moved on a few hundred yards to another spot. Dick was a few minutes behind the rest of us at this point.

Everyone knows how easy it is for Dick to make friends, and it turns out this was another example. When he got to where we stopped, Dick said that he'd come over the rise where the Dutch couple had stopped for lunch, and found the wife with her pants down. When hiking there are some things that you just have to do outdoors. Apparently the Dutch woman and Dick were both surprised and each scattered (like sheep down a mountain?) in different directions.

Dick told us that when he came over the rise he thought it was Marty. That raises a couple of questions. First, how does a Dutch woman with her pants down looks like Marty? Second, how would Dick know that anyway? 

Later on the couple walked by where we'd stopped for lunch and we all had good laugh. Poor woman. The husband said it was the fourth time today she had, uh....  Those Dutch are just full of information. 

The trail led on around the slope and down into Eyeries. Eyeries is a nice little village One store, one restaurant, two pubs, a nice B&B up on the hill. We were ultimately customers of each of these.