Disclaimer: This document is for entertainment only and is not intended to instruct or educate anyone about anything. If you choose to emulate the stupid things I do you are on your own, and I take no responsibility for the consequences of your actions.

Trip Report:

With breakfast and coffee on board it was time to continue driving madly about the Irish Countryside. I needed to get to the Cliffs of Moher, so I took a route along the southern coast of Connemara toward Galway.

There was a rare pullout along the highway at a particularly pretty spot East of Roundstone so I decided to stop for a monster photo op.

I decided to have a walk up the road and get a closer look at some of sheep that wander free in this part of Ireland.

In the bottom of this picture we can see part of the reason that there aren't that many sheer cliffs in this part of Ireland despite the abundance of rock in the landscape. The striations on the rock were left by massive glaciers that raked their way across this landscape in ice ages past. As a result most surface rocks have been scraped down to rounded nubs.

After wandering about for a bit it was time to keep driving back toward Galway.

I decided to shortcut toward Galway by way of a back road. I ended up on the wrong road, and it eventually dead ended at a house guarded by this cute little dogie.

Most of the country dogs I came across displayed a fairly surly disposition, probably from chasing sheep all day in the cold North Atlantic wind. This guy, however, was downright pissed to see me. He started barking up a storm and then decided to display his herding prowess by biting my front tires as I backed out. What a cutie!

Most of the Irish countryside has been devoid of trees for about as long as anyone can remember, so using wood as fuel isn't really an option. It turns out that in the bog the ground beneath one's feet is loaded with biomass that eventually becomes a biofuel: peat. The Irish equivalent of what we Americans call redneck head into the bog with some heavy machinery and dig out these long trenches in the peat.

Then they cut the peat into briquettes to dry.

And finally stack the briquettes into huge piles before transporting them to market.

A little while later I came across a group of scrappy looking men with unusually long eyebrows extracting peat from the bog. I didn't stop to photograph them because if they were anything like rednecks in the states they probably wouldn't enjoy some Yank tourists stopping to objectify them photographically while they toiled in the bog.

A few miles later the surface rocks changed from metamorphic to igneous and I came across this picturesque little lake.

I parked the rental car next to a group of Germans on a cycling tour of Connemara.

We chatted for a bit about our shared German heritage, but in the end they probably still thought I was just another war-mongering Yank. Still, one of them was kind enough to snap this picture of my skinny ass.

After this stop I picked my way through Galway City and on to the road to the Cliffs of Moher. A few minutes South of Galway I drove past Dun Guaire Castle.

I decided to stop and wander about in this 16th Century castle for a bit.

Next stop, The Burren!