Mer seemed to glory in her returned luggage, with the enclosed makeup, going through her normal morning routine before we went down for breakfast a little after 8:30. We had another fine breakfast of (Irish) bacon and eggs and toast, and then we were on our touring way.

We started the day out by going to a Methodist church in town for Sunday services. As an aside, we were both amused when we told our Catholic hostess we were going to the Methodist church in town and she told us how to get to the Irish-Anglican church. I guess we Protestants are all the same.

We were welcomed warmly by a man named Billy and the pastor of the church, who comes down from Cork (eleven miles) every Sunday before going back to Cork for services there. We came to understand the congregation was small, but today it was tiny — there were Mer and I, another American, a woman from the Dublin area, the pastor, the organist (Valerie), and Billy. That was it. Still, it was a moving and meaningful service. The pastor spoke on the importance of thanksgiving and living a life of thanksgiving – of finding ways to thank God in all circumstances. After reading from Luke and Numbers (about the ten lepers whom Jesus healed, but only one of whom came back to thank Jesus, and about the Israelites complaining about the lack of meat when wandering in the wilderness), the pastor quoted libreally from a variety of texts from acorss the ages, and even from some of his original poetry. He never strayed far from the Biblical texts, though, and that helped keep the sermon focused.

The music of the church was interesting. We sang three hymns and one worpship song. We thought we knew all the songs, and we did, but two of the hymns (“For the Beauty of the Earth” and “When I Survey the Wondrous Cross”) were both set to music we didn’t know.

We hung around after church chatting with Billy and Valerie, and they were kind enough to invite us out for coffee. We went to a nearby restaurant, and Bill bought us a scone and a hot chocolate, and we chatted for about forty-five minutes. Valerie is a cattle farmer with her husband, and Billy is a retired carpenter. They were lively and interesting people. When Billy found out Meredith was an English teacher, he quoted a Wordsworth poem from memory, a poem about a singing Scottish woman. It was lovely to start with, and was made even better by his accent.

Speaking of accents, we found out from Billy and Valerie that there is a variety of accents in Ireland. Billy commented he had to listen hard to the pastor because the pastor had a thick Dublin accent. When they found out we were going west later this week, Billy and Valerie both agreed that we would encounter stronger accents.

After coffee, we went back to the room to change clothes and head out. Mer wanted to go to the local castle, Desmond Castle, which is a small castle built in the 1500s. The castle has been a home, a jail, a workhouse, and a training building for troops. It is now restored, and the main floor is about the history of the castle. The second floor is dedicated to the prison area and to a wine museum, which also spreads to the third floor. Our guide in the main room explained that while Ireland makes almost no wine, after various defeats and after the famine, Irish who emigrated often went to France or Spain, where some of them became very successful vineyard owners. Later Irish did the same in America and Australia. The wine section was interesting to me when it was talking about history, but my mind glazed over when the information guides started to mention various types of wine.

After the castle, we went down the hill to Sundays, a local ice cream place with a fifties American Diner theme. The ice cream was a little small in portion compared to what we are used to, but it was good quality.

Since Kinsale is on an excellent harbor, it seemed good to tour it, so Mer got us on a one-hour boat tour of the harbor. We did not learn too much that was new (that we had not heard at Charles Fort or at the history museum), but it was a perfect day to be sitting on a boat. We were all the way in front, even in front of the helmsman. Our seat held four people, and we sat next to a charming couple on vacation from Dublin. They were kind enough to recommend several places to see in western Cork.

Back on land, Mer had us walk along the now very familiar low road, out toward Charles
Fort. We ended up in a pub called Bulman’s around 4:30, where Mer’s guidebook said there would be traditional Irish music. For once, the guidebook was wrong, and there was no traditional music today. We grabbed an order of fries (chips) and did take some time to sit across the street in the parking area, looking out over the bay and enjoying the early evening air.

We walked back to town, and after a brief stop in the room, we found a pizza place, where we got takeout (“take away”) pizza. We took it back to the B and B, where we ate it outside on a bench.

After supper, we popped down to the Tap Tavern, where our hostess said I could use the wifi internet to check on mail from home and to update the blog. That worked fine, and since it was early on a Sunday evening, the pub was quite quiet. We wrapped up our internet needs, made a trip to the bank to get some cash, and were back in our room before 9:00. The early evening and mellow pace of the day certainly qualifies as a day of rest on a Riordan tour of Europe.