Ireland Trip Day 3: Road trip begins

The night before, we arraigned with the hotel to have a taxi take us to the car rental place. Once again the local taxi driver was very knowledgeable and gave us tips to check out Skellig Ring near Killarney, Ireland among a few others. We arrived at Europcar just outside of the airport and had an easy time checking in. The gentleman at the counter was friendly and very knowledgeable as well.

Ireland Car Rental – Europcar

We originally booked our car rental through Booking.com for a car through the company Europcar. When we go again, I’ll just book directly through Europcar’s website to cut out the messiness of the middleman. Nothing against Booking.com but it was confusing about fees and holds and what was actually needed to rent a car versus just looking directly at the information on Europcar’s website.

Due to accidents, insurance prices are crazy high in Ireland to the point that all car rental companies will have an “excess”. This is a held amount placed on a credit card (debit cards not allowed) to hold funds in the event of damage on the car. This excess typically ranges from $2,000 to $5,000 and is held against your credit card. Don’t worry, there is a way to avoid this hold amount. The way to get around having such a large hold on your credit card is to pay for the SCDW (Super Collision Damage Waiver) insurance directly through the car insurance company. Don’t get this mixed up with “premium coverage”. It shouldn’t cost an arm and a leg. This insurance for us cost roughly $250 for the entire 2 weeks we had the car. It should only be roughly 19 – 21 euros per day extra. It’s not a rip off and a total peace of mind coverage to have. Especially on the Ireland roads which are much smaller than the United States and traffic is a little crazier especially coming from a smaller town in the Midwest.

All in all, our car rental cost $637.47 (USD that was charged to our Credit Card). This was for a total of 11 days. We opted to not get a GPS because we both had an international plan on our cell phones so we were going to use Google Maps. However, during checkout, we ended up upgrading to the slightly bigger car for just a couple extra dollars a day. Our upgraded car was a Renault Captur and it came with a built in GPS.

It took a good minute to figure out the car since everything is opposite from the United States except for the pedals. I took a minute to make sure my seat was adjusted and my mirrors were good and started it up. I started pulling out of the parking spot but couldn’t quite turn all the way around like I needed to. I didn’t know how to reverse at first! Thankfully the car rolled back just far enough I could complete my turn. It took a good while down the road before Luke figured out how to put the car in reverse. I’m used to manuals that either have the last gear as reverse or you push down on the shifter to put it in reverse. On this Renault Captur, you don’t do either. You actually have to lift up on a section under the shifter knob and then put it in first gear to put it in reverse. I completely forgot to take a short video on how to do this before we dropped the car off.

It was crazy getting used to driving on the left side of the road on the right side of the car but I just had a mantra I said each time I got in the driver seat. I would just repeat “drive on the left” 3 times and I had no problems. The desk agent at the car rental place told us to get on M50 and head south and it will take us to Kilkenny. We made our way to motorway M50 and started heading south. There are a few toll roads in Ireland but for a car it’s never more than 2 euros and worth it to pay it to get to your destination. Initially, we got all sorts of lost because our GPS didn’t know what it was doing but after a few extra roundabouts and going a bit farther south than we needed to, we were able to get to Kilkenny. You don’t actually stay on M50 to get all the way to Kilkenny but we saw more coastline so it was worth it getting a little lost.

Town of Kilkenny and some history

We found a place to pay and park and walked around the town. Almost next door to where we parked was Talbots Tower. Around 1210, lord William Marshall built the first city walls made from oak timbers set on top of an earthen rampart. Sixty years later, William’s grandson Gilbert De Clare replaced the earth-and-timber with a stone wall. This stone wall was primarily used for protection from attacks but also used for taxes. People living outside the city walls who wished to sell their goods in the marketplace had to pay a toll as they went through any of the seven city gates.

We made our way to the City Wall Design Center and had lunch. This neat little restaurant and shop plaza was just across the street from the Kilkenny Castle. We decided to skip Kilkenny Castle today because we had Luke’s camera backpack with us and they don’t allow backpacks or have lockers to store them in.

Instead we explored the town saw St. Mary’s Parish Church, climbed a hill to St. Canice Cathedral and the Round Tower, walked the premise around the Black Abbey, and many more. Looking at a map, everything seemed farther than it actually was. It only took us a couple hours to walk round the town.

Lesson in Pay to Park

It was later afternoon so we made our way back to our car. In most places in the United States that we’ve paid to park; when you enter you get your ticket, keep it in the car, then when you leave, you pay at the terminal as you are exiting the parking area. That was not the case! We were at the barrier to leave when we realized that the station there accepted only “paid tickets”. A quick look around, we saw a walk up station where you can go to pay not too far from us. The downside was that there was a car behind us waiting to exit as well. Thankfully when I put the car in reverse, they also backed up so I was able to get out of the way and they could exit. Luke jumped out of the car and paid at the automated terminal. We were then able to exit the car park finally.

All except 2 car parks were like that. You enter and get your ticket, then before you leave, you pay at a walk up terminal, which gives you another ticket, then as you are exiting, you insert your paid ticket and exit.

There was 1 car park that paid upon driving out similar to in the United States. There was 1 other car park that we stopped at where you paid a preset amount of time first. After you park, you go to the kiosk and select how much time, pay the amount, then display the pre-paid ticket in your car.

Jenkinstown House Shepherds Huts

Once we finally exited the car park, we made our way to our glamping spot for the night at Jenkinstown House Huts. It took us a little bit to figure out how to get there exactly. Google maps takes you to the park parking lot but the place we were staying at was walled off from that parking lot and the rest of the park with the exception of a locked door. We finally figured out to go back down the road and then we could take the next turn and get to the drive way of the huts. They were super cute and charming. The place looks almost like a castle or a monastery. The left side of the house is now an event center and the right side is where the current family who owns it lives. We met Karima who is the daughter of the owner and has little ones of her own. She showed us to the huts and explained that they were doing annual maintenance which would be done soon. We were the first one there so we were able to pick which of the 3 huts we wanted to stay at. We chose the hut to the right which was called the Holly Hut. Karmina said that it’s her mother’s favorite hut as well. We grabbed our bags and we were settling in when we heard voices outside. It was Caroline, the owner, who was going to clean the Hut’s windows but Karmina stopped her since we arrived early and were already in the hut. We opened the door and introduced ourselves. Both Caroline and Karmina were very welcoming and friendly. They were so happy to have us stay there and told us a few times to let either of them know if there was anything we needed at all.

There was still a couple hours of daylight left so we decided to take a walk through the park right in the backyard. Since we were staying at the huts, we got a key to the locked door which gave us direct access to the park. It was beautiful! We couldn’t help but stop every few feet to take pictures of something or another. There was a rock wall that surrounded part of the park with a round tower in the center. There was also a nature walk that circled all the way around the wall. We took the nature walk trail and spent time just enjoying being in the woods and taking in the scenery. We just couldn’t get enough of the views and the forest. Luke also took some time to play with different settings on his camera and I started to get more comfortable with the idea of posing for pictures.

We returned from our walk around 6 pm. It was getting dark and we were not sure about driving in the dark back to town to find food so we ate some snacks we had and settled in. At the huts there was no wi-fi but for those who want to disconnect from the digital world and connect with nature, this is definitely the place to go!

Safe Travels,
Luke & Jessica