Take Me Down to Dingle Peninsula, Where the Grass is Green and Sheeps are Pretty

I once wrote the following comment about Ireland’s Dingle Peninsula on a travel guidebook series I used to contribute:

“In my opinion, if you catch a plane from Sydney Australia, flying half way through the globe, then take a tour of Dingle , and fly back to Sydney right afterwards, it's absolutely worth it. I am surprised that there are still places like Dingle on earth - untouched and serendipitous. It seems that the outside world, which is only a couple miles away with full of big developments and crazy competitions, is completely absent here in Dingle. Many well-known movies, such as Ryan's Daughter,  were filmed right here. Tours depart from Killarney daily. You might also want to take a drive yourself to this beautiful heaven on earth. In Dingle, everyone will find something he or she likes. This is a place where everybody’s escape dream comes true.”

Dingle Peninsula

Now, please let me explain exactly what I was talking about.

"Three Sisters"

Flying half way through the globe 

Unlike everywhere else on the European continent, many of the tourists I met in Ireland, surprisingly, are not from Europe. The case became even more extreme in County Kerry, where the vast majority of tourists I met were Americans.  As part of County Kerry, Dingle Peninsula is no exception. I booked a tour with a local hostel the day before, and I ended up doing the tour with a group of Australians. Americans or Australians, anyways, looks like everyone needs to fly half way through the globe to see Dingle.

Coves and beaches near Slea Head, Europe's Most Western Point

Untouched and Serendipitous

If I can book a tour and go there the next day, it means that this place can’t be “untouched” (In fact, Dingle is popular with tourists). However the presence of the old way of living on Dingle Peninsula gave visitors the impression that this place is ageless. There you will discover the harmonious Ireland often depicted on posters and in music: a green island with farmlands divided by stone walls. Within the walls, there are cottages that pretty much represent the quintessential British Isles style as well as sheeps, which are seen as a very valuable resource for crafting traditional Irish sweaters and cooking the warm and delicious Irish Stew you had for dinner the other day. There just weren’t any big machines from the modern industrial age for agricultural purposes around Dingle. It just made you believe that everything came straight out of the early 19^th century.

Ireland's famous sheeps

The Outside World….Is Completely Absent Here (Well, not quite)

Besides the absence of big machines for farming, Dingle Peninsula gives me the impression that it doesn’t even have banks there. While in certain parts of America, people use helicopters for ranching / chasing animals around the ranch; in Dingle you can still find old school Irish shepherds walking with a herd of sheeps on the road. 

Dingle Peninsula

However, the fact is that there are banks (and souvenir shops) in the town of Dingle, where is just as touristy as Dublin or Killarney. There are also big machines around the winding roads of Dingle Peninsula as well – tour buses and passenger vehicles. Anyways, if it weren’t for the outside world, who pretty much everything in (including the banks and the tourists), the local residents might still live as impoverished farmers in a relatively remote area back in the Stone Age. If it weren’t for the tour buses and passenger vehicles, probably none of us would have heard about Dingle.

Dunmore Head

Ryan’s Daughter

I watched this movie on Turner Classics one day when there weren’t really any other options for me on the television. The movie featured a very long intermission, which definitely wasted a lot of Turner Classics’ precious commercial time. I didn’t recall much from the movie, not even any beautiful sceneries of the places where some of the scenes were shot. When I actually went to Dingle, I was totally blown away by the beauty of the place.  The Dunmore Head and the Inch Beach were some of the places that appeared in the movie.  Yes, Ryan’s Daughter made Dingle famous, but the real Dingle will make you totally forget about Ryan’s Daughter.

Inch Beach is actually miles long

Escape

Regardless of who you are or where do you come from, I think you will find Dingle to be a place where people can find their escape. Rich culture, beautiful scenery, delicious food, lively music, sandy beaches are among some of the best of what Dingle can offer to all. Still not excited? People say along the coast of Dingle you can even see America on a nice day!

It was a nice day. I never ended up seeing America. But I thought I did see Egypt though