we woke up early thursday morning and got on yet another bus. what a ride! it took us 8 hours to get to dingle which is on the west coast. most of the trip we had seen before on our journey to limerick. but the last leg from tralee to dingle through the mountains was spectacular. it was the one time in my life i wished for a camcorder. i didn't even try to get any pictures because you needed to spin in a complete circle to take it all in...

it was getting dark by the time we got there so we settled in to our hostel and prepared for the morning. here's carrie enjoying the view from our private room. it was wonderful to sleep on a real bed...

in the morning we headed toward the town of dingle along a cliff walk. with the sun shining we had some spectacular views awaiting us....

the top picture is of the sheep fields we passed on our way to the cliffs. carrie was a little diappointed by the lack of sheep.

this is the view across the opening of dingle harbor. there is a world war 2 lookout on the top.

here you can see some of the cliffs we hiked over. oddly enough it was a very peaceful way to start the day.

we all had our bit of meditation. here's carrie's....

...and here's mine. this is the view toward's bull's head.

of course on our way back into town from the cliffs we were treated to even more kodak moments. on the left is the view into dingle harbor. dingle is at the right of the photo.

and this is just a cool view.

it took us awhile but we finally left dingle and went looking for ogham stones. ogham is an ancient linear script and the first known written language in ireland. but we didn't find those. what we did find were lambs. lots and lots of lambs...

this is the one carrie chased halfway down the road. what a sight that was!

after our standard lunch of dubliner cheese and fresh bread (oh how i miss that bread), we decided to search for the gallarus oratory. and we were going to find it no matter what...

we made the mistake of following signs...i should have learned my lesson in glendalough.

the first sign lead us down the straightest road i had seen in all ireland and up over the mountains (or hills to the purists).

here is the view from the top of the mountain we climbed over. this alone was worth the hike.

at this point we ran into another sign...another 3.6 km to the oratory. i don't how everyone else was feeling but i had some serious blisters. but we were determined to find this oratory...so it was down the mountain...

...until we hit the next sign about 1 km away. the oratory was now within 1/4 km. what a surprise...but still we followed the sign. after walking in a really, really big circle from the mountain pass, we finally caught site of the oratory.

and here it is. it is one of the best preserved early christian church buildings in the country. the mountain we hiked is in the background.

built somewhere between the 9th and 11th centuries, it is made of unmortared stone and is still watertight. dad, you would have loved this.

we had a fellow tourist take our picture as proof that we made it.

somehow we made it back to the hostel before dark. my only thoughts were supper, shower and sleep. all three were the best i'd had in my whole life!

this was almost the end of my irish adventure. we headed back to dublin in the morning. but there was time for one more amazing sight. as we drove through the countryside, it started to drizzle through the sunshine. the brightest rainbow i've ever seen spread over the road so the bus was driving underneath it. in a field to the left of the bus i could actually see the end of the rainbow...maybe endings aren't so bad after all.

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