Kilkenny Castle with Waterford on the Side

“Do not condemn the judgment of another because it differs from your own. You may both be wrong.”

-Dandemis

Day 179, Saturday, July 20, 2019

Sites Covered in this Post

• Kilkenny Castle
• Waterford Crystal Factory

Lesson Learned: New private lodging rentals in Ireland want you to be safe. They don’t care if you can sleep, but you sure the hell are safe. Rooms have a safety light mounted on the ceilings, sometimes more than one. During the day, with window shades open and lights on, you won’t even realize they are there. Turn out the lights and hop into bed and you’ll find your room bathed in an eerie green glow, like some kind of swamp gas from a B Grade Sci-Fi flick “The Thing From the Green Goo!”. I swear, I now know how a tropical fish in an aquarium feels.

If you sleep with a night light, you will comforted by the room-illuminating green beacon, and can always find your way to the bathroom to pee. If you normally sleep in a dark room, this safety system sucks, its worse than leaving the door cracked with the hallway light on so that the boogie man stays under your bed all night. Even more than that, if there is a power outage during the night a white light comes on (at least 75 watts) so that you can stay awake until the power outage is resolved. You might as well pack a deck of cards so you have something to keep you occupied.

If you are in a hotel, and these damned things are installed in the hallways, Great!, Good Idea! Inside your room, not so brilliant. If you don’t like this idea, pick a BNB that’s been open for a while. Hotels don’t have these, just the apartments for let.

In our last flat we tried to figure out how to darken the Green Lantern mood light (after we called the host at 11 PM to complain) and I finally snapped the elastic band of my fashion underwear around it. It worked pretty good, at least we could get some sleep. It did look weird in the morning with my BVDs dangling from the ceiling. Ellen just winked at the cleaning lady, blew her a “shhhhhhhh” sign, nodded towards me, and let her think we had one helluva night. I missed all that and when the maid gave me a naughty grin, I thought we’d better get the hell out of town.

Kilkenny Castle

Kilkenny Castle, was built in 1195 in a strategic location at river’s edge, to control both the main roads leading to town and the Nore River (Vikings always liked to build forts on the mouth of a river). A symbol of Norman occupation, Kilkenny Castle has been an important element of the city defenses throughout the middle ages. Kilkenny Castle has been an important site since Richard de Clare, 2nd Earl of Pembroke, commonly known as Strongbow constructed the first wooden castle, in the 12th century.

Strongbow’s daughter and heiress, Isabel married William Marshall in 1189. The Earl Marshall owned large estates in Ireland, England, Wales and France and managed them effectively, and brought these administrative efforts here spurring major growth and development in Kilkenny. The first stone castle on the site, was completed in 1213.

Kilkenny Castle also has the reputation of being one of the most haunted places in Ireland. Inside, along the corridors, there are spooky photographs of haunted houses and castles. Paranormal stories about this castle have increased in numbers over the years, passed over from generation to generation. One of the stories is of the white lady. A ghostly apparition often seen roaming the gardens and river banks below. She also is said to wander through the corridors and staircases of the castle, and may have been photographed as recently as 2010 (yeah, go look that up on Facebook or Instagram). The spirit is believed to be that of Lady Margaret Butler, born in the castle in 1454. She married Sir William Boleyn and through her eldest son Thomas, was the paternal grandmother of Anne Boleyn, second wife of King Henry VIII of England.  It is said that her spirit returned to Kilkenny Castle upon Anne’s brutal death at the hands of King Henry. I wonder why there wasn’t a headless Anne in the Harry Potter movies?

Unfortunately, we encountered no spirits on the prowl. We did enjoy our day touring Kilkenny. There’s also an impressive cathedral and the ruins of an old abbey you can kick around if you have the time. This is also where we got one of the worst meals imaginable in Ireland at Kyteler’s Inn. It looks cute from the outside and in, but it’s all show for the tourists. They could pay their cooks a bit more and turn out a meal worth eating. Maybe the spirits in this town should haunt this restaurant until they cook a decent meal.

Waterford Crystal 

Founded in 1783, Waterford Crystal is Ireland’s leading master in the art of crystal making. This is not news for most. Ellen and I have Waterford crystal given to us as a wedding gift back in 1980. In fact, Ellen found the exact pattern still in use and for sale at the factory. For generations the craftsmen at Waterford Crystal have been shaping, cutting and designing masterpieces of crystal, famous the world over. They still are, and I suspect the median age of these craftsmen is around 52.

We signed up and took a tour of the crystal-making factory. Be careful if you do this. There are always tour busses belching gray-haired visitors forty at a time. The tour group before us had 30 members, while our tour only had six. This manufacturing facility melts over 750 tons of crystal a year, although most Waterford Crystal is now produced outside Ireland. In fact, 70% of every new piece produced from this factory is made from recycled glass from previous object attempts that just couldn’t pass quality control. This makes me wonder if they might need to improve on their manufacturing process. The tour wound around the factory from the mold-making area, glass blowing, etching and engraving. I found it amazing that most of the work is still done by hand, even though they do have a couple of computerized engraving machines doing certain repetitive tasks.

It takes a person 8 years to become a certified master in one of the 5 areas of crystal production (glass blowing, engraving, design, etc.). There are 45 craftsmen working in the factory, of which only one of those is a woman. At most stages, there are at least two craftsmen reviewing the work so that costly mistakes aren’t made. Turnover is low. It seems, the last craftsman hired was 7 years ago. You need not bother sending your resume’.

In 1783 when George Penrose and his nephew William started the business of crafting fine flint glass that soon became world-renowned. It wasn’t all smooth sailing though. Nothing in this country ever is. The Waterford company closed in 1851, after Ireland was decimated by the potato famine, and didn’t re-open for 100 years.

In 1947, Czech immigrant Charles Bacik, re-established a glass works in the city. After so many years being shuttered, skilled crystal workers were not available in Ireland so continental Europeans were brought in to restart the business.  Aided by fellow countryman and designer Miroslav Havel, the company started operations in a depressed Ireland.  

Since then, Waterford has changed hands multiple times, filed for bankruptcy and reorganized operations to save itself. Who knows if they can hang on, but the glass is amazing if not just a little bit pricey. Even so, we really did enjoy the tour. It doesn’t take long, an hour for the tour and 30 minutes to look at their showroom and convince your wife she can’t safely pack crystal in her suitcase.