In Ireland it is difficult to get early morning starts. The usual breakfast time is 8.30 to 10.00am and sometimes they don’t want to start until 9.00am. It is also slow because they individually cook each breakfast and often there is just one person on duty. This means we often don’t get away until about 9.15am or later. You could forego breakfast but the villages are few and far between and pubs that serve food for lunch or dinner are almost never open for breakfast.

In Spain it was important to have early starts in order to beat the heat and walk as far as possible in the cool of the morning. There were villages almost every 5 km and they were set up for pilgrims who had started at the crack of dawn and wanted breakfast on the go. Heat is not an issue here in Ireland so far but sometimes you do want to start while it is not raining and get as far as possible dry. Or while the air is still as the wind gets up later in the morning.

We imagined it would always be “Full Irish Breakfast” which is a fry up of bacon, egg, sausage, tomato. baked beans, black and white pudding. But there is usually a choice: eggs anyway you like, omelettes, potato waffles, pancakes with fruit, French toast, fresh salmon, etc. Always there are cereals, yoghurt, fruit juice, toast, tea or coffee. Often fruit and small cakes. So no need to go hungry at breakfast.

Today we woke to brilliant sunshine and only a gentle breeze and it quickly warmed up to a beautiful day. It was a short day, we only walked about 10 km from Castlegregory to Camp from where we caught the bus the remaining 18 km to Tralee. We had heard the track from Camp to Tralee was the wettest and muddiest on the whole Dingle Way and there were three unbridged rivers to wade through. It also wasn’t very interesting, just crossing the lower slopes of the Slieve Mish hills parallel to the road. We had completed the Camp to Camp circuit of the Dingle Peninsular so decided to keep our energy and relatively clean clothes for another day.

From Castlegregory it was about half an hour walk out of the village to the beach again. We passed a couple of camping grounds and a five metre high standing stone at Anghacasia. Unfortunately it was far off in a field and we couldn’t get very close. Standing stones date from at least the Bronze Age (from 2000 BC) and are thought to have been erected for ritual purposes. Isolated tall stones may also have signified burial sites.

Our bus wasn’t until 2.10pm so had a very leisurely stroll along the beach just soaking up the sun. It was a Saturday so there were more families enjoying a day at the seaside, setting up deck chairs and all the paraphernalia that kids bring to the beach. Barbara had a paddle but although the water looked very inviting it was very cold. All too soon we had to leave the beach and passed by a nice little Church of Ireland chapel at Kilgobbin. We went to have a look inside and met three ladies doing a ‘spring clean’ They were pleased to take a break and have a chat with us.

We had a couple of hours to wait for the bus but were entertained for a while by a large group of walkers assembling at a petrol station/cafe/shop/community centre over the road. They were doing a 10 mile fund raiser hike in the hills for the Irish Kidney Association. We are now back at the Willows B & B in Tralee  – but in a different room. Our luggage wasn’t delivered until nearly 5pm so we were starting to get a bit agitated by that. Sometimes it does go missing. Tomorrow we get the bus to Killarney and then have a day off waliking before starting the Kerry Way.