Day 2: Waterford/ Blarney Castle!

 May 7, 2025

Good morning and goodbye Waterford! We packed up and ready to go to our next hotel, but not before checking our Waterford one last time. 

Our tour guide brought us to House of Waterford which is their local crystal factory. They gave us an in depth behind the scenes look as to how they create their beautifully crafted crystal pieces, such as: wine glasses, flower vases, trophies, whiskey glasses and so much more!  We saw how they carve the wooden mold, glassblowers blowing glass into those molds, go through inspection, carving and etching details by hand on every piece. Now I’ve seen glassblowing before but THIS was actually pretty impressive. I learned if there’s any kind of flaw with a piece they’re working on, it gets immediately destroyed because it no longer holds up to the Waterfords standard. Those destroyed pieces end up getting melted and reused again for the next project.

After this we had a 2 hour bus ride up to Killarney for lunch and the Blarney Castle. For lunch I wanted to try another Irish specialty - seafood chowder. I wasn’t expecting soooo much fish! Like I was expecting clams, shrimp, the usual stuff. But I was delighted at all the big chunks of salmon and mackerel throughout the soup. And naturally served with brown irish soda bread and butter.

We then made our way to Blarney Castle where everybody was determined to kiss the Blarney Stone. Little did we know until the day of that this task is not for the faint of heart. It all starts at the bottom of the castle where we waited in a long line. This allowed us to mingle with folks and ask others how their experience was when they were leaving the castle. Some took the warning and left but I was determined to go for it! After 30 minutes and many, many, MANY flights of steps, we made it to the top! We could finally see the stone and got ourselves ready for our moment. “All this work for a rock” a man behind me said. And he’s right we were stuck in tight narrow spaces and climbed endless steps just for this stone. But we knew this was THE thing to do in  Ireland and we already made it so far. 

A lot of folks came up with their own way to kiss the stone (flying kiss, selfies, etc) but I was determined to get down there. Between the safety bars and the (rather handsome) guide holding and guiding you as you extend your neck to kiss the stone. Legend has ir whoever kisses the stone will receive the gift of speech. Lowkey wish it was something more but sure, speech is good too. I gave that stone a big fat kiss and yelled MWAH as I did it and before I knew it it was done. Legend also said in olden days they’d hold people by their ankles and “gently lower” them down to kiss the stone. Thank goodness for modern safety protocols! The journey going downstairs was, surprisingly, a lot more difficult than going up. The slippery steep rocks did not make it any easier amd my legs were absolutely killing me because of how tense my muscles were thr whole walk down. 

Once we left Blarneys Castle it was time for dinner at the hotel. This time I chose: vegetable spring rolls with cold noodles, loin of bacon with cabbage and potatoes, and tiramisu for dessert. The bacon loin was a hair on the salty side but overall delicious! My roomie let me try her baked rice pudding with peaches which had 0 added sugar which really made it hit the spot.

Then after walking around the hotel and having coffee and tea with some of the other folks in our group, it was time to head off to bed.

Thanks for Miroaming with me!

Check out today’s photos here!Day 2 Photos