Visiting Kilkenny - 19 April 2023

19 April 2023 - Kilkenny City - sleeping at Jenkinstown 2nd night

After a good nights sleep we were up and out walking by 07.30. It was beautiful and sunny first thing. 30 minute walk around one of the designated path walks. The deer were up! Saw a squirrel, but not fast enough to photograph it! From about 05.30 it was just a cacophony of bird song - what a great way to start the day.

Had breakfast, showered and then rode into Kilkenny - about 7 miles - only 1 mile on main roads. Was still chilly 🥶

We bought Rick Steves Ireland book, as we enjoyed his audio tours so much in Italy. It’s not a pretty book, in fact hardly any colour photos - but packed full of information.

So, he says this is the loveliest inland city. Its nickname is Marble City because of the stone from the local quarry (actually black limestone, not marble!).  It has about 25,000 residents. It was even the capital of Ireland for a short spell in the turbulent 1640s.

It has been a delight to be out and about today - almost without exception the people are just so friendly and chatty. In fact, this travel lark could take a very long time!

We locked our bikes up close to the Kilkenny Castle, and walked to the tourist information.

Kilkenny is a hurling mecca and the statue is of three players in leaping action.

John was brilliant! It’s normal to be handed a map, the assistant draws a circle saying you’re here - visit this, this and this etc whilst drawing circles on said map - hands it to you, and you’re away. John went through all 15 points of interest on the map, and told us all about them - then gave us about a dozen maps of other towns, and generally chatted - what a nice man!

So far, it feels like the towns are like what Guernsey used to be - clean, friendly and full of little interesting shops - no huge franchise shops today. Loved that you could get sweets from a jar like we used to - mine treat was ‘borrowing’ 10p from Mum’s purse to walk along to get a quarter of wine gums - only about 5 decades ago!

We visited Kilkenny Castle first. Very good that you can go inside and listen to a 12 minute audio about the castle without paying, and have access to all the gardens for free. As I’ve mentioned before, we don’t mind paying - but having read Rick’s book, it seems to be you have to pay for most things, so we’ll pick and choose what interests us.

The Anglo-Norman Butler family controlled Kilkenny for 500 years. The castle once had four sides, but Oliver Cromwell’s army knocked down one wall when it took the castle, leaving it as the rough ‘U’ shape we saw today.

There was a group of youngsters with their hurling sticks, so I asked if I could photograph a stick. They were all delighted, lay them down and were happy to pose for a photo. They have a match this evening - good luck to them!

From there we visited the castle yard which houses the National Design and Craft Gallery.

It’s fair to say that the price of various handmade pots, objects etc were more than I’d want to pay!

John had mentioned the ‘knife man’, so in we went. A lady was on a zoom call, but came to chat. It was the kind of place we would have just poked our heads in, then disappeared. Well, quite a while later and we knew all about Tammy and her husband Patrick. In summary, he had a serious road accident with life changing injuries, which lead him to craft during rehabilitation. He started off with leather work, followed by knife making, as well as jewellery making.

The knife in the picture is €40,000 - Tammy took it out, explained all about it. The philosophy is that the quality knives are handed down from generation to generation. He’s won lots of awards, and glad to say he recovered from his injuries. Please see www.patrickjoseph.ie if interested! Jamie, maybe you need to come to Ireland to do a photo story about Patrick - Tammy sounded very interested!

From there quick look around the Butler House gardens. The blackbird caught his worm! We did joke about the early bird catching the worms this morning, as we saw lots of thrushes with worms!

Next up, Talbot’s Tower - information in the photos!

There seem to be lots of shops selling homemade cakes. One was called ‘Tess’s’ - seemed like a good omen, as Mum’s name is Tessa. Bought a whole apple crumble cake for €7 - didn’t think that one through - had to carry it around all day - well bar two slices!

The tall tower is the Medieval Mile Museum. By then it was lunchtime, and Tintin was chomping at the bit for his first taste of real Irish Guinness, so asked a random woman on the street where to eat. She recommended the Paris Texas nearby. What a fantastic looking bar! I can imagine drinking being serious business over here!

Well, he enjoyed his pint 😊. I tried a glass of Outhouse cider - very good too. Food was ok, not brilliant - €40 for the drinks and two burger and chips.

Tintin can be seen loitering on The Tholsel - which was the Town Hall. It’s great hearing John say these names - nothing like our version!

The picture with the blue bin in front is Rothe House - a well preserved merchant’s house that expanded as the prosperous Rothe family grew in the early 1600s.

The Black Abbey has one of the largest stained glass windows, so had to have a look.

From there it was St Canice’s Cathedral and Round Tower - photos of outside only - another you had to pay to see inside or go up the tower.

St Mary’s Cathedral was last on the list. The dome reminded me of some in Italy - and you can tell from Tintin’s expression that we’d done enough sightseeing!

We went into a few shops - the typical ‘tourist tat’ shops were really quite nice, with quality stuff. We did buy caps, as this was what Tintin forgot to pack. It’s quite hard packing for summer when it hasn’t happened at home yet! And yes Brian - I did remember to pack the ice cube tray this time!

Quick stop off at the Butler Gallery on our cycle home. Maybe we’re heathens - but we weren’t inspired, think our grandson could do similar!

The two murals were by the same artist according to another random man we spoke to. He also said that the weather will be 40° in a couple of weeks - said he wasn’t joking - was on the news this morning - time will tell - but I prefer his forecast to the one we’ve looked at! Update on the weather - the Irish Met are denying all rumours that we're in for a heatwave, oh well.

So, over 12,500 steps, 14.5 miles riding - and now sitting typing this with a glass of wine. All in all, a very pleasant day. Ireland seems to have a lot to offer - and we’re excited to discover more.

As John said, if you’re enjoying somewhere, why not linger instead of rushing on, so with that in mind, we’re staying here another night…