Thursday, January 30, 2014

Europe Day 30 - Part Two



The drive from Kerry to Kilkenny was fairly lengthy, in the afternoon we stopped at The Rock of Cashel! Which is another really cool ruinous castle, so called because it sits on a hill which is a large rock.


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St. Patrick’s Rock of Cashel!



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Fun statues in the parking lot.


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So the really interesting thing about this one was how many… layers it had, from being built on over the centuries. Most of the places we went to like this were the same, but here you could see it more.


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The original building was a roundtower, which makes sense because, big hill, a watch tower is logical.


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Then it was incorporated into a cathedral. Then other rooms and buildings were added over the centuries.


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This is St. Patrick’s cross, but actually, it’s a replica. The real one is kept in the museum portion, preserved. I don’t remember how old the replica is though.

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Inside the cathedral.


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We happened to be right in time for a tour, so that was nice and we got a bit more information than we would have otherwise gleaned from signs.


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This I think is inside the cathedral portion as well. What I had a hard time capturing were those bumps, they’re actually faces! And really weird ones, all different.


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I had a hard time, because it’s quite high, and combined with the cold I couldn’t keep my hands steady.


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The site was incredibly cold and windy, and actually the guide said that was the very reason it was eventually abandoned, as no one wanted to climb the hill for services in the cold wind.


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This large, and I guess famous, cross is Scully's Cross, which was destroyed when lightning struck a metal rod that ran through it.


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Once again I took so many pics, this is getting so split up.


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Actually, I’ll end here 8D

Still more castle pics, some inside the museum, and our next location still to come!

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