Castletownbere, Dursey Island, Garinish Point and Allihies

Plans for a longer walk failed to materialise this morning. I’ll out it down to the slightly overcast start to the day, that had us thinking we’d not appreciate being up top of a hill or three. So we decided to head on out along the peninsula towards Dursey Island, linked from the mainland by a cable car. More on that in a moment.

First we stopped off at Castletownbere for a mid-morning coffee. I even managed to get some work done whilst Mel went for a wander around the town.

Onwards to Garinish and the cable car. It has slightly peculiar hours, so it wasn’t due to run again till 2:30, so we had time for a spot of lunch. The plan was to cross to the island and do a circuit, or as much as time allowed before the last return. Once fed and togged up, we headed to the ticket office, only to be told that it was currently closed for maintenance, and had been all day. They didn’t know when it would be running again.

Which was probably a good thing, as a cable car is a loose description of the thing. Something more like a cross between a skip and a garden shed, dangling between two electricity pylons would be more accurate. It seemed to take a eternity to cross from one side to the other, but in fairness that might have been down to the maintenance.

So much for a plan. But there was a plan B, which was a circuit of Garinish Point, which for all intents and purposes was just the same as a lap of the island, so nothing really lost.

Now the problem is where to stay for th night, as there were prominent signs against camping where we were. So back along the peninsula, then turning north towards Kenmare and the start of the Ring of Kerry!

Once over the headland, a rather attractive bay opened up, ringed by mountains and the site of the village of Allihies. A lovely stretch of white sand too, so we had to go for a stroll and Mel had a paddle. We met another English couple in a camper, who were doing the trip in the opposite direction. A quick swap of stories about daring does and scenic spots.

We’ve headed on, passed on a couple of slightly wonky wildcamping spots before finding a nice level spot looking out back towards Garinish Point and Dursey Island.