As we had a two hour drive to Waterford today we were up very early, for us anyway, to another bright sunny if dew-soaked morning. Breakfast, service the van then away around Cork and onto excellent main roads – made a nice change!
Our plan today was to take a factory tour around Waterford Crystal so we wanted to be there as early as we could. We found the dedicated parking and managed to slot into a couple of larger bays at the back of the carpark and take a two minute walk. We were lucky to find the next tour was in 15 mins so booked onto it then mooched around the showroom until our time.
We were surprised to find how compact the factory is, although we learned later this was not the original. Our excellent guide went through the history of Waterford Crystal before taking us around the factory, which even on a Sunday was fully working. We learned that to be a craftsman took a 5 year apprenticeship and if you completed the test piece, a remarkably simple looking bowl but on closer examination it used every skill needed, then you continued for another 3 years training before being recognised as a true craftsman. Be it blowing, cutting, engraving or sculpture that was the skill you learned in the 8 years “apprenticeship” - there was never any crossover.
We saw every aspect from the raw materials right up to the final finish, some pieces taking up to 5 months – and if there was ever a fault or mistake at any stage it was scrapped, it had to be perfect! Here is a montage of some of what we saw:
Once the tour was completed we were returned to the showroom (naturally) where Bren chose a new necklace for her birthday in a couple of weeks time (they had a sale on..............!) then return to the van for lunch. For our nightstop tonight, although technically we could have stayed where we were, we had picked out a wild-camping spot at Hook Head, across the bay and at the end of a landspit where reputedly the oldest working lighthouse in the world was located. TomTom was programmed and we rejoined more good roads before turning off towards Hook Head.
This is very obviously a popular tourist spot with tours of the lighthouse, cafe and giftshop and a childrens play area too, not to mention the nice views across the bay back to Waterford. Being a lovely Sunday afternoon everybody and their kids were out for the afternoon and we had some difficulty finding somewhere to stop. However as it was late afternoon people were beginning to return home and before long we had a choice of parking spots. We chose a fairly level gravelled area off the edge of the road and settled in for the evening, watching the sun set over Waterford.
Regretably we have now come to the end of our planned tour and tomorrow must begin the trek back north to Belfast and our ferry on Wednesday. Our friends are returning via Rosslare, which is only about 50 miles from here so will probably remain for another night as they too cross on Wednesday. It's surely a nice place.
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