This is the "keep" or inner fortification of Cardiff Castle. Our group was allowed in before it was open to the public, so we had great access with no crowds. As we found with many castles in Britain, it had been begun by the Normans around 1200, taken over and improved by the Romans (that's a Roman-era wall remnant to Gord's left), purchased by a private citizen and heavily renovated in the 1800s, and finally acquired by the state in the 1900s.

 After climbing up all the steps in the keep, we were rewarded with views like this out of the narrow windows, designed to shoot arrows out of without letting arrows in.

 Here's a typical staircase found in many castles! The spiral was an efficient use of space in narrow quarters, but there was another advantage too. Note how an invader coming up would have only his left arm free for swordplay, which is not as efficient as the defender coming down, who has more space for his right arm.

 One example of many beautiful carvings in Cardiff Castle...part of the renovations during the 1800s. This is not in the keep, but in the large palace or residence where the family lived.

 And then we left Wales and took a ferry across to Ireland, so here's Gord on the top deck. The crossing was supposed to take about 3 1/2 hours, but one engine wasn't working, so it took about 4 1/2 hours. But the ferry was large and very comfortable, and not very full at all. And we had new friends to get to know!

 This little island appeared out of the fog while we were on the ferry, and Gord took this amazing picture of it.

 Another castle! This is the famous Blarney Castle, where visitors stand in long lines to kiss the Blarney stone (upside down), which is supposed to impart the Irish gift of gab. We decided to explore the large grounds instead of standing in line for 45 minutes.

 Blarney Castle had what they called a "poison garden", full of plants that may have been used for medicinal purposes for the residents, but that can be toxic in large doses. This is foxglove, source of the heart drug digitalis. The pic also shows a heavy cage enclosing another (unseen) plant. There were several of these surrounding the most dangerous plants so tourists were kept safe.

 In Killarney we had a journey on a "jaunting cart", a horse-drawn carriage that took us through beautiful Killarney Park. Gord and I are on the left, a couple from California are on the right, and the man in orange and woman in blue on the front seat were a lovely couple from Osoyoos. At ages 76 and 72, they had only been married 9 months!

And finally, a typical Irish countryside. We saw lots of views like this from the bus. Although we had gorgeous sunny weather with not a drop of rain while we were there (extremely unusual!), the fields were still green.