Blarney Castle

Now this is a Norman Town House Castle!

In terms of scale, Blarney Castle is in fact eight such Norman Town House Castles stood together. It is huge! Twice as tall and twice as wide as the likes of the Castle at Athenry.

The Castle is worth a visit in it’s own right, but the main attraction lies on the ramparts of the Castle and is of course The Blarney Stone. One kiss of which will bestow the kisser with the lifelong gift of ‘The Blarney’, the ability to sweet talk the birds from the trees!

Like all good castles, Blarney has a gap between the top of the ramparts and the wall so that boiling oil could be dropped on invaders. On the far side of one such gap is the stone. That however would be a bit too easy. The stone that needs to be kissed is the bottom most stone, and lies below the level of the floor.

So to win the gift of the gab I found myself lying on my back gripping onto two metal handrails which you use to feed yourself down the hole while two guys grab hold of your waist and legs to stop you from falling to your death.

In years past accessing the stone was even harder. All ramparts need a floor where defenders of the castle stand down to keep their heads out of the way of incoming arrows and a step where defenders can stand up to fire back. In recent years this step has been cut away from in front of the stone, but for many years it was there, and you had to lower yourself down the gap, leaving only your shins and feet on public display!


Even so the stone was further down than I had imagined it to be, though it was easy to see where it was. As well as having a little sign next to it, the stone itself and the stone above it is blackened from years of tourist smooching. Taking a deep breath and deciding to worry about the germs later I moved in for the kiss!

Getting back up is somewhat undignified, though less so than the photos which emerged afterwards. Not missing an entrepreneurial trick, your friends are not allowed to take a photo of you kissing the stone. That is done for you by an employee of the Castle and you are invited to pay €15 for the privilege of buying your moment of one on one stone action. Not even those who are exposed to the Blarney on a daily basis could convince me it was worth more than €3, so you’ll just have to take my word that I did it.