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The Luxurious Side of Cork
County Cork is situated in the South West of Ireland, it is the largest of all the Irish counties and in many ways the most varied. Rich farmlands and river valleys contrast with the wild sandstone hills of the west, and above all there is the magnificent coastline scooped and fretted by the Atlantic into great bays and secret coves, strewn with rocky headlands and long soft golden sands.
Cork, or Corcaigh or 'The Great Marsh of Munster' had its historic beginning in the 7th century when St. Finbarr founded his monastic settlement on what is now Gillabbey Rock. The physical shape of Cork derives from its island beginnings. Water and tides, birds and boys fishing, bridges and Amsterdam-like house-fronts, all cajole the walker and casual visitor to the city. Up to the 1770s Cork was a city of waterways. Patrick Street was seriously damaged in the dying days of the War of Independence but much of the remaining fabric of the city remains as it was in the 19th Century. Cork has many physical qualities, steps, steeples and hidden squares and lanes. Over the years the medieval plot size and street pattern have been retained, despite much of the city being rebuilt in the 18th and 19th Centuries.
Cork people are energetic and fun-loving by nature. A quality of life has been retained within Cork that is attractive to the visitor and citizen alike. Nowadays an optimistic populace live within a calm and protected medieval island-city, a city reborn through major programmes of renewal and regeneration.
Strategically positioned by a deep harbour of the North Atlantic, Cork is essentially a city of trade. The city's motto Statio Bene Fida Carinis - A Safe Harbour for Ships - reveals the essential nature of port and city. Great volumes of traffic from the sea, import and export, emigration and immigration, have been the characteristic strength of the city for over a thousand years.
As well as music, theatre, literature and sport, Food is also an essential element in the mix of Cork life. By the 1770s food exports out of Cork were larger than those of Dublin. At the beginning of the 20th century Cork Corporation owned and supervised five Markets and nowadays the City Council supervises two markets, The English Market and The Coal Quay. In recent years there has been a resurgence of interest in fine food, in wholesome and organic provisioning. This renewal of interest and the widespread enthusiasm to establish high standards for Food Markets marks the return to the pioneering seriousness and professionalism of the 18th Century Butter Merchants. The city and its hinterland has a necklace of the most incredible restaurants.
A port city of trade and commerce, a major regional cultural centre with a deeply embedded artistic community, Cork is a city primed for a thousand welcomes. Galleries and arts centres, concert halls and cinemas, pubs and restaurants, all are available and eager to host the stranger and the returning friend. Cork people are curious and open, inquisitive and welcoming. It is within the welcoming hearts of Cork people themselves, a people used to great floodings from the sea, that Europe will discover yet another safe harbour for art and culture.
Cork Luxury Tour
Day 2 - Cobh and Cork City Tour
Day 3 - Cork City - Kinsale - Inchydoney Island
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