Our third port of call on the Princess Cruise of England, Ireland, and Scotland took us to Cork and I had arranged for a very full day of sightseeing. As usual, I had booked a private tour to take us around the countryside. Here we used the tour company, Munsterbus Tours https://munsterbus.ie/ and we could not have been happier.
We knew we had done the right thing when, as we entered the car our driver said - Let's head to Blarney Castle in advance of the tour buses. And, that we did. To our chagrin, we beat the buses and had a very short wait in line to make our way up the town and kiss the Blarney Stone. m
We toured the gardens and headed to the very large shopping mecca known as the Blarney Woolen Mill Shop, were we purchased all things woolen and Irish.
Having done our bit to help the Irish economy, we headed towards Kinsale, a very pretty port. The Lusitania was torpedoed by a U boat here during WWI. We stopped off at Charles Fort - a star shaped fortress and took some pretty amazing pictures. Kinsale is also know as a gourmet capital. So, lunch it was.
Our first taste of Ireland was a resounding success. Now off to Dublin...