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We found that something in Fota Wildlife Park. I am conflicted on the idea of zoos - but that's not really what this entry is about. Suffice to say that Fota isn't like any zoo we'd ever been to. From the website: "FOTA Wildlife Park is not like an ordinary zoo. Wherever possible we have chosen animals that thrive in a free-range environment, which allows them to roam free, while mixed with other species and with us human visitors." It's not the kind of place you go to see an elephant or a camel or reptiles behind glass. It's the kind of place where you can walk along a stream bank where kangaroos are lounging, completely uncaring about humans. It's the kind of place where you can watch monkeys on islands and tell that they just don't give a crap that you're there. They're just living their monkey lives. It's the kind of place where you can see a pretty peacock.
We saw that peacock up there when we first arrived. I'd never been so close to anything so pretty. I really wanted it to open so I could take a picture. We waited about twenty minutes and finally it opened and I got a picture and we moved on. We emerged into the larger areas of the park...to find another peacock. And another. And another. And they were all open. I couldn't stop taking pictures. They were so beautiful. This second picture here, I think, is of the prettiest peacock of all. It was a comedy of errors trying to photograph him. I was down on my knees on the ground and every time I'd have him framed, he'd swing around. I swear the bugger was doing it on purpose. It was hilarious. Greg was laughing and laughing and I was trying not to because it would make my hands (and by extension, the camera) shake. Finally he stopped, right in front of me, and I got a picture. I think he decided it was time to put me out of my misery. We couldn't figure out why there were so many open peacocks. I mean, there were tons of birds everywhere - pelicans and flamingos and lots of smaller birds, and, of course, a slew of peacocks. Why were they all open? There were so many I actually got tired of taking pictures of them. Greg and I kept saying, "Oh, yeah, a peacock. Blah blah blah. Showoffy peacocks." (Isn't it amazing how quickly you get jaded? Three days into our Ireland trip in general, we were driving past castle ruins without a second glance.)
It turns out that it was peacock-peahen mating season. Apparently the way the peacock tries to attract the peahen is by opening up his feathers and then shaking them at her. Once we knew what to look for, we saw this repeated time and again all over the park. The peahens were having none of it, either. The peacocks would be all "Look at me! No, at me! Hi! Hihihihi!" and the peahens just turned and walked away, as evidenced in the final photo. It provided a great deal of entertainment for our afternoon. It's not even the funniest mating story we have from Fota, but I can't find my pictures of the tapir right now. back | next
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Late in our trip to Ireland, we were driving from Castletownbere to Cashel. When we were researching our trip, we were looking for interesting places to stop. We planned to drive through Cork, but there wasn't anything specific we wanted to see there (most of the attraction of Ireland is outside of the cities). We wanted to see something else, something a little more unique.
