The standard way to County Kerry skirts the coastline of Bantry Bay and forges north past the Caha mountains to Kenmare. It's a spectacular road, zigzagging past coves and inlets with views across the sea to the wild and rugged Beara peninsula.
But for something extra special you can turn off the main road just before the end of the bay, following a signpost to Priest's Leap. It's a rough track with grass sprouting in the middle, and after a mile or two it gets steeper so you leave the car and set out on foot.
This is the old road into Kerry, and it's a walk that the biographer and novelist Victoria Glendinning returns to nearly every time she visits the west of Ireland: "It's amazingly romantic because you can feel its history - armies have been up it, sheep have been up, walkers have been up it. The track is quite gentle, but it goes higher and higher, and it's good to see the valley falling away on the left and hills rising on the right towards the Shehy mountains. On a bad day, of course, when the mist is down, you might as well be in Scunthorpe.
"But when the sun comes out and the sky is clear, it's like Greece and everything leaps into colour - the gorse, the heather, the thyme, the flowers. And then you reach the Priest's Leap, where he's meant to have made his jump, and you're suddenly looking down into the Kingdom of Kerry - one refers to it as that because in ancient Ireland it was its own kingdom.
"This is the top of the pass, and the whole of Kerry lies before you - lakes, rivers, valleys, mountains, of such a spectacular nature. And that's the absolute highlight, the whole purpose of the walk.
"You can go further if you want, towards a couple of lakes, but the ground is more tussocky and wet and so the heart fails and the party heads back with soggy feet. And on the way you often meet the farmers driving up in their little old cars, letting out their dogs to herd the sheep down the mountain with amazing skill."
Glendinning, whose biographies include Swift, Trollope and Edith Sitwell, is an experienced walker who recently followed the Alps on foot from Slovenia to Switzerland with her husband Kevin O'Sullivan. She prefers to have company but likes the way groups of walkers separate and re-form and don't feel obliged to talk all the time. "I often have very strong ideas about direction, which can be wrong. Kevin is the map reader and carries the compass and is generally the platoon commander. I spend a lot of the time just watching things - it's almost like being asleep, only your eyes are busy the whole time.
"It closes down the rat-race nonsense in your mind. Something chemical seems to happen and you slow down and even out and drop the things which aren't very important."
The old road to Kerry can be adapted to any length between three and eight miles, depending on the party. Glendinning often thinks about taking picnics, but never gets round to it: "So we usually end up in the pub eating salmon sandwiches, drinking Guinness and generally feeling pretty good."
'It's no coincidence the island's so green'
The story of the Priest's Leap dates from 1601, when the armies of Elizabeth I had just defeated Hugh O'Neill and his Spanish allies at the Battle of Kinsale.
Father James Archer was trying to rally the clans of Cork and Kerry into continuing resistance to the occupying forces. One day, English troops spotted him on the old road to Kerry and gave chase.
"It's at this point that the story, like so many ancient stories in Ireland, takes a leap of its own into myth," says Jim MacDonald, who organises walking holidays in Kerry. "From the rock at the pass, Father Archer jumped his horse away to safety in Bantry town, several miles away."
MacDonald, who started Irish Ways 11 years ago, says Kerry is an ideal walking area, being wild, quiet and close to the sea.
"But you have to know your map and compass," he says. "There aren't many paths and the weather changes fast. It's not by coincidence that the island is so green, and you can expect a drenching at some point. But it's likely to be followed by beautiful sunshine, and it's this ever-changing light and clarity of vision which makes it so special."
There are now 31 waymarked ways in Ireland, most of them circular like the Kerry Way, with a total length of 1,900 miles. Some are on riverbanks and canal towpaths, and few rise higher than 1,000ft.
The practicals
Sailings on Swansea Cork Ferries (01792 456116) Superferry costs £95 one-way for a car and driver, with up to five adults travelling free. The Midweek Special retrun fare, departing and returning any Monday to Thursday, starts at £139. Self catering houses in Cork and Kerry cost from £38.70pp per week (based on 6 sharing in low season). Prices include return car-ferry crossing. the Irish Tourist Board is on 020 7493 3201 or www.irelandtravel.co.uk. Ryanair has return flights to Dublin from £4 plus £21 tax. Transfers to teh West of Ireland by internal air services or rail.
