Get up early for breakfast.  Have some french press coffee, then a bowl of porridge–steel cut, nutty and rich, with a shot of Bailey’s Irish Cream over it.  Maybe a fresh scone with blueberries and raspberries.  Go on a tour of the city with someone who knows its history, and walk where the old waterfront was, and where the old city walls used to be (and in some places still are).  Hear him talk in a soft Irish accent about how the Spanish took over this town of 1000 souls with a fleet and an army of 3500 soldiers, how 6000 English soldiers laid siege to the town, how 7000 Irish locals laid siege to the English–all in 1601–and how the Irish lost in only three hours, and the Spanish sailed away, and it changed the course of history everywhere.  Now there’s a thought.  Go out to see Fort Charles, built by the English to keep control of this town forever.  It is a ruin now with the English gone (having left finally in 1922), with windswept aromas of the sea, cloud-dappled views of the town, the harbor, and the open sea beyond, and with pleasure sailboats now instead of war fleets.  Walk back along the bay, a couple of miles.  Visit the small town square, which used to be where they provisioned ships bound for the world, including the one that Alexander Selkirk was on–the real-life prototype of Robinson Crusoe.  Have lunch from the local farmers market: soft, fresh bread, several kinds of tangy cheese, washed down with local Irish whiskey, and some fresh cold water.  Watch the boats go in and out.  Take a nap–why not?  For dinner, have mussels, then local steak (or duck, or fish).  Then, go to a tavern, listen to music, and have some “crack”–ie, conversation with the locals, over a pint.  Or two.  Does he offer you a pint?  Refuse once, that is expected, then accept.  And then return the favor, the same back and forth of informal formality, to the tune of a fiddle and guitar in the background.  It’s a cool day?  “Aye,” you’re told, “in Ireland, many are cold, but few are frozen.”  “Did you see the Irish Birth Control signs outside?” I’m asked.  “They’re up by the school.”  [Caution: Children.]  Walk home in the late twilight, down the narrow winding streets, maybe a few clouds overhead catching the last light of the sun, and a few seagulls calling out overhead.  Sleep like you have no idea what day, month, or year it is, and couldn’t care less!

I don’t know if this is the only way to live in Kinsale, but it is the way we did it today.  And that works for me, and will continue to do so in my memory, for years to come.