My travel saga 2012 #5 - Ireland & small tidbit about Salisbury cathedral
Some of you on my email list may have already gotten this update so feel free to ignore. I am somewhat behind in the posting.
The next jaunt I was headed for was a tour in Ireland another country I'd never visited before.
While my experience landing at the airport in Rome had been a breeze, lack of any hassle, the departure experience was one of queue after queue it seemed, well four to be exact. I was flying Aer Lingus and there was only one person initially to check in a very long line of people. I, in full fretting mode had arrived three hours early for my flight but primarily so I could go back to the Hilton hotel where I had initially stayed to check if they had a sweater that I loved and had lost somewhere along the way. I first stood in the line at the airport to drop my bag after which I made the 10 minute walk to the hotel. Sadly, the sweater was not to be found in the 45 minutes I sat in the hotel lobby. That still gave me 2 hours to get through security and immigration. It took 45 minutes to get through the security line but the immigration line was only about five. I found the immigration agent this time rather amusing as he was texting while I approached, glanced up at me, down at my passport (still texting), asked me where I was heading (thumbs still flying on the keypad) and nodded me on my way.
Boarding the aircraft consisted of queueing as always, having the boarding pass scanned and then descending down the corridor to a bus. It was almost a fitting departure to Rome that we were sardined onto a bus and whisked to the awaiting plane where we climbed up from the tarmac.
When I landed in Dublin the climate felt like home, about 10 degrees, grey skies and a fine drizzle. Had it not been for the cars driving on the opposite side of the street and the bilingual (Gaelic/English) signs, I might have thought I was back in British Columbia. Well, that and the unmistakable accents lilting to the ear.
I had a day in Dublin before my tour started and I spent it exploring the city centre. St. Stephen's Green, a lovely park near my hotel offered a flutist band playing classical and contemporary music, beds of bright spring flowers, children playing, swans, ducks and to my delight, sunshine. I found the shopping district, crowded with people but the thing that made me giggle aloud was all the apologies that were given if someone was moving past you. I had come through the looking glass from one personal space experience to another. The balance of my afternoon after walking the downtown streets was a visit to the national museum for a look at the history of Ireland and then over to Trinity College to see the book of Kells, an illuminated manuscript of the first four gospels of the Christian new testament and dating from about 800 AD. I was in my element.
On the Sunday, after lazing about and a quick walk along the canal, I took a cab to the hotel where the tour was to start and had a very interesting cab driver who regaled me with stories of his visit to Rome including his feeling about the Vatican, it's appalling display of wealth that would surely pay off all of the debt of Africa and feed its hungry. He made a good point, this scrappy catholic man. He also got into it with a US secret service agent (he wasn't overly fond of Americans either) to the chagrin of his wife.
The tour of Ireland started in the afternoon with a bus trip around the city. The tour director (they don't call them guides because they do so much more than guide) throughout the entire trip told us stories of Ireland's history and myth, some of the two blending and making it the country it is. She, Carmel, was amazing with her knowledge and way of making the history come alive.
The one statue that touched me was found in the memorial gardens on the north shore. There is a myth, one that is common in other countries, of a family of children who were cursed and turned into swans. The curse was to last 900 years at which time the children emerged from the bodies of the swans again. The statue was of the children emerging and Carmel said this was symbolic of Ireland gaining its freedom from Britain after 900 years of foreign rule from the Vikings, the Normans, the Anglo Saxons. Pretty cool.
So the group of people and there were 37 of us, consisted of Americans, New Zealanders, Australians and Canadians and a mix of ages from about 23 to 88 and the 88 year old was one of the most energetic of the lot.
Not all of the stops had great appeal to me initially but I did get a great feel for the country. Monday involved a tour of the Irish National Stud farm, beautiful horses and there is one stud there who fetches 60,000 pounds for one go with the guarantee of a foal included in the price. We then had a drive though Tipperary and gorgeous green countryside. The stop that night was in Ennis and as an added bonus, we went to Bunratty castle for a medieval feast. The only utensil allowed was a dagger (okay, it was a steak knife but I could pretend) and had medieval singing and general silliness - a fun evening. It did start out with a piece of bread and salt being offered to all, a sign of friendship which brought to mind the bits from the Game of Throne books which used bread and salt as the way one was deemed protected once one ate of bread and salt under another's roof. Mead & wine were also consumed and the mead, even though a bit sweet for my taste was excellent.
Tuesday took us to the Atlantic coast and the cliffs of Moher, 600 foot cliffs pounded by the ocean and with a small round turret overlooking them. The cold wind buffeted me in the walk up onto the cliffs but it was worth it for the view. Lots of tiny flowers poked out from beneath the cracks of the rocks. This side of Ireland was much more rugged and challenging that the middle and eastern parts of the country. A great section of the coastline, called the Burren, is barren limestone, or it appears to be barren until you get up close to it. A walk over the surface revealed large crevices in the rock where again, flowers and other growth have taken hold. Driving through the town of Galway, Carmel told us about the Spaniards who had settle here after having been shipwrecked after the pounding the Spanish Armada took from the English. The Irish from the west coast had traded extensively with the Spanish and welcomed them. The part I found fascinating was that as the Spanish married the locals, their mixed genes, those of the Celtic people, fair haired and fair skinned, with typically blue eyes and the Spaniards with their black hair, dark eyes and darker skin produced descendants with black hair, blue eyes and darker skin, something that my father definitely had and my mother used to comment on, saying she though one of his ancestors had been a Moor. It turns out she was close to the mark there. My surname is in fact very common in Ireland and I suspect that my ancestors moved from Ireland to the west coast of Scotland in the distant past. There we go. The Galway Girl song, with hair of black and eyes of blue, has some interesting history. :)
After Galway, we went to a marble workshop that cuts and polishes this amazing green marble, appropriate for the Emerald Isle. Another great part of the day was a visit to Rathbaun farm where we were treated to a sheep sheering and then tea and scones. It was a very full day and the evening was left for relaxing.
Wednesday started off with a ferry ride across the river Shannon (it's a little odd that they call it the river Shannon rather than the Shannon river), a cold and blustery ride. The sun had deserted the country after my first day there but I had come prepared for assorted weather. The day was spent tour the Ring of Kerry, a very scenic drive through the mountains of Ireland. I wasn't actually aware that Ireland had mountains but indeed it does. They are similar in feel to the highland of Scotland in fact. It was a beautiful day with lots of scenic stops. I will say that bus tours do not afford a person much exercise, hopping on and off the bus giving little. The tours at the various stops did give us some walking but the pace was not exactly brisk. Not a complaint really but I was feeling in need of a bit more so in the evenings, when there wasn't a dinner planned, I did explore the streets of the various towns we were in and managed not to get myself too lost. That evening though, it was pouring and I chose to stay in at the hotel.
That night, I started to feel quite ill, my insides churning. I had eaten a bowl of seafood chowder for lunch that day and while it tasted lovely, clearly did not agree with me. The same thing had happened to me last year in Scotland, on the isle of Skye in fact, when I'd eaten a bowl of delicious smoked fish chowder. You'd think I would have learned. Here's hoping I don't have to do that a third time to remember.
Thursday is much of a blur as I slept or at least napped for most of the bus ride. I ate nothing and did so for most of Friday as well but drank lots of water to rehydrate myself. We did stop at Blarney castle where I got out and took a stroll through the grounds but never did make it to the Blarney stone. Kissing it involved climbing and laying down on your back, hanging out over the edge of the castle with a man holding your feet. The stone is built into the outer wall of the castle. Eleanor the 88 year old did kiss it though and we all gave her a round of applause back at the bus. We stopped at the Waterford crystal factory and had a tour there, seeing the molten glass blown. It is quite a craft as the items created at that factory are all done by hand, the glass blowing, the carving and the polishing. One of the molds had Justin Timberlake written on it as apparently he had commissioned a piece. That afternoon was to include a visit to a very old pub but I chose to pass on this and on dinner, the wisest thing I felt.
The last day, Friday, when I was feeling much better, included a tour through the Wicklow mountains, absolutely gorgeous scenery, a visit to the oldest hand weaving mill in a lovely town called Avoca and a visit to the site of an early Christian monastery founded in or around 900 AD. There a several ruins of the old churches and lots of gravestones, some of which are pretty recent, some locals still having the right to be interred there. To me, the visit to the ruins was a perfect way to end the tour.
Friday evening saw us climb back into the bus for a trip to a hall that out on a cabaret night. It included dinner, wine (I did eat the soup and nibbled at the potatoes but mostly consumed water) a comedian and lovely Irish dancing and singing. All of the dancers were great but one young man really caught my eye, reminding me of someone although I can't put a finger on who - a young Ewan McGregor maybe - with the glint in his eye and the cheeky smile on his face. Even though the evening was definitely focused on tourist, it was fun. I even recognized and knew the words to several of the folk songs as I have heard Canadian groups from the east coast sing them.
So my overall impression of Ireland is that of a hearty people who have gone through much from the conquerors taking over, the famine and diaspora caused by it to the modern day which includes a return to their roots including the use of Gaelic in the schools and throughout. The countryside is beautiful alternately lush and barren with lots of history hidden and visible. Definitely glad I took the time to see it and highly recommend a visit. A warning though, if you don't like potatoes, the food will not appear. My first night in England, I had a noodle salad. Lol.
I'll try for catch up as Bath and Asylum 8 reports to come but I have to interject with a giggle I had this evening. I am now in Salisbury, a lovely city close to Stonehenge. I decided to go to the cathedral here for their evensong service tonight to listen to the music. I am not by any means someone who you would call religious as in the organized religion kind but I figured why not. So I followed on into the service and sat. Next thing I knew, there were five monks (pretty sure they were monks, cowls, long black robes, beanies) who sat down beside me. I couldn't help but look up, expecting the ceiling to burst open and brimstone to fall onto my head. Luckily, that didn't happen but I had one hell if a time holding back the giggles that were welling up. I managed to suppress them and stay calm but had a good snorfle on leaving the cathedral. Oh, and the choir was awesome. :)
The next jaunt I was headed for was a tour in Ireland another country I'd never visited before.
While my experience landing at the airport in Rome had been a breeze, lack of any hassle, the departure experience was one of queue after queue it seemed, well four to be exact. I was flying Aer Lingus and there was only one person initially to check in a very long line of people. I, in full fretting mode had arrived three hours early for my flight but primarily so I could go back to the Hilton hotel where I had initially stayed to check if they had a sweater that I loved and had lost somewhere along the way. I first stood in the line at the airport to drop my bag after which I made the 10 minute walk to the hotel. Sadly, the sweater was not to be found in the 45 minutes I sat in the hotel lobby. That still gave me 2 hours to get through security and immigration. It took 45 minutes to get through the security line but the immigration line was only about five. I found the immigration agent this time rather amusing as he was texting while I approached, glanced up at me, down at my passport (still texting), asked me where I was heading (thumbs still flying on the keypad) and nodded me on my way.
Boarding the aircraft consisted of queueing as always, having the boarding pass scanned and then descending down the corridor to a bus. It was almost a fitting departure to Rome that we were sardined onto a bus and whisked to the awaiting plane where we climbed up from the tarmac.
When I landed in Dublin the climate felt like home, about 10 degrees, grey skies and a fine drizzle. Had it not been for the cars driving on the opposite side of the street and the bilingual (Gaelic/English) signs, I might have thought I was back in British Columbia. Well, that and the unmistakable accents lilting to the ear.
I had a day in Dublin before my tour started and I spent it exploring the city centre. St. Stephen's Green, a lovely park near my hotel offered a flutist band playing classical and contemporary music, beds of bright spring flowers, children playing, swans, ducks and to my delight, sunshine. I found the shopping district, crowded with people but the thing that made me giggle aloud was all the apologies that were given if someone was moving past you. I had come through the looking glass from one personal space experience to another. The balance of my afternoon after walking the downtown streets was a visit to the national museum for a look at the history of Ireland and then over to Trinity College to see the book of Kells, an illuminated manuscript of the first four gospels of the Christian new testament and dating from about 800 AD. I was in my element.
On the Sunday, after lazing about and a quick walk along the canal, I took a cab to the hotel where the tour was to start and had a very interesting cab driver who regaled me with stories of his visit to Rome including his feeling about the Vatican, it's appalling display of wealth that would surely pay off all of the debt of Africa and feed its hungry. He made a good point, this scrappy catholic man. He also got into it with a US secret service agent (he wasn't overly fond of Americans either) to the chagrin of his wife.
The tour of Ireland started in the afternoon with a bus trip around the city. The tour director (they don't call them guides because they do so much more than guide) throughout the entire trip told us stories of Ireland's history and myth, some of the two blending and making it the country it is. She, Carmel, was amazing with her knowledge and way of making the history come alive.
The one statue that touched me was found in the memorial gardens on the north shore. There is a myth, one that is common in other countries, of a family of children who were cursed and turned into swans. The curse was to last 900 years at which time the children emerged from the bodies of the swans again. The statue was of the children emerging and Carmel said this was symbolic of Ireland gaining its freedom from Britain after 900 years of foreign rule from the Vikings, the Normans, the Anglo Saxons. Pretty cool.
So the group of people and there were 37 of us, consisted of Americans, New Zealanders, Australians and Canadians and a mix of ages from about 23 to 88 and the 88 year old was one of the most energetic of the lot.
Not all of the stops had great appeal to me initially but I did get a great feel for the country. Monday involved a tour of the Irish National Stud farm, beautiful horses and there is one stud there who fetches 60,000 pounds for one go with the guarantee of a foal included in the price. We then had a drive though Tipperary and gorgeous green countryside. The stop that night was in Ennis and as an added bonus, we went to Bunratty castle for a medieval feast. The only utensil allowed was a dagger (okay, it was a steak knife but I could pretend) and had medieval singing and general silliness - a fun evening. It did start out with a piece of bread and salt being offered to all, a sign of friendship which brought to mind the bits from the Game of Throne books which used bread and salt as the way one was deemed protected once one ate of bread and salt under another's roof. Mead & wine were also consumed and the mead, even though a bit sweet for my taste was excellent.
Tuesday took us to the Atlantic coast and the cliffs of Moher, 600 foot cliffs pounded by the ocean and with a small round turret overlooking them. The cold wind buffeted me in the walk up onto the cliffs but it was worth it for the view. Lots of tiny flowers poked out from beneath the cracks of the rocks. This side of Ireland was much more rugged and challenging that the middle and eastern parts of the country. A great section of the coastline, called the Burren, is barren limestone, or it appears to be barren until you get up close to it. A walk over the surface revealed large crevices in the rock where again, flowers and other growth have taken hold. Driving through the town of Galway, Carmel told us about the Spaniards who had settle here after having been shipwrecked after the pounding the Spanish Armada took from the English. The Irish from the west coast had traded extensively with the Spanish and welcomed them. The part I found fascinating was that as the Spanish married the locals, their mixed genes, those of the Celtic people, fair haired and fair skinned, with typically blue eyes and the Spaniards with their black hair, dark eyes and darker skin produced descendants with black hair, blue eyes and darker skin, something that my father definitely had and my mother used to comment on, saying she though one of his ancestors had been a Moor. It turns out she was close to the mark there. My surname is in fact very common in Ireland and I suspect that my ancestors moved from Ireland to the west coast of Scotland in the distant past. There we go. The Galway Girl song, with hair of black and eyes of blue, has some interesting history. :)
After Galway, we went to a marble workshop that cuts and polishes this amazing green marble, appropriate for the Emerald Isle. Another great part of the day was a visit to Rathbaun farm where we were treated to a sheep sheering and then tea and scones. It was a very full day and the evening was left for relaxing.
Wednesday started off with a ferry ride across the river Shannon (it's a little odd that they call it the river Shannon rather than the Shannon river), a cold and blustery ride. The sun had deserted the country after my first day there but I had come prepared for assorted weather. The day was spent tour the Ring of Kerry, a very scenic drive through the mountains of Ireland. I wasn't actually aware that Ireland had mountains but indeed it does. They are similar in feel to the highland of Scotland in fact. It was a beautiful day with lots of scenic stops. I will say that bus tours do not afford a person much exercise, hopping on and off the bus giving little. The tours at the various stops did give us some walking but the pace was not exactly brisk. Not a complaint really but I was feeling in need of a bit more so in the evenings, when there wasn't a dinner planned, I did explore the streets of the various towns we were in and managed not to get myself too lost. That evening though, it was pouring and I chose to stay in at the hotel.
That night, I started to feel quite ill, my insides churning. I had eaten a bowl of seafood chowder for lunch that day and while it tasted lovely, clearly did not agree with me. The same thing had happened to me last year in Scotland, on the isle of Skye in fact, when I'd eaten a bowl of delicious smoked fish chowder. You'd think I would have learned. Here's hoping I don't have to do that a third time to remember.
Thursday is much of a blur as I slept or at least napped for most of the bus ride. I ate nothing and did so for most of Friday as well but drank lots of water to rehydrate myself. We did stop at Blarney castle where I got out and took a stroll through the grounds but never did make it to the Blarney stone. Kissing it involved climbing and laying down on your back, hanging out over the edge of the castle with a man holding your feet. The stone is built into the outer wall of the castle. Eleanor the 88 year old did kiss it though and we all gave her a round of applause back at the bus. We stopped at the Waterford crystal factory and had a tour there, seeing the molten glass blown. It is quite a craft as the items created at that factory are all done by hand, the glass blowing, the carving and the polishing. One of the molds had Justin Timberlake written on it as apparently he had commissioned a piece. That afternoon was to include a visit to a very old pub but I chose to pass on this and on dinner, the wisest thing I felt.
The last day, Friday, when I was feeling much better, included a tour through the Wicklow mountains, absolutely gorgeous scenery, a visit to the oldest hand weaving mill in a lovely town called Avoca and a visit to the site of an early Christian monastery founded in or around 900 AD. There a several ruins of the old churches and lots of gravestones, some of which are pretty recent, some locals still having the right to be interred there. To me, the visit to the ruins was a perfect way to end the tour.
Friday evening saw us climb back into the bus for a trip to a hall that out on a cabaret night. It included dinner, wine (I did eat the soup and nibbled at the potatoes but mostly consumed water) a comedian and lovely Irish dancing and singing. All of the dancers were great but one young man really caught my eye, reminding me of someone although I can't put a finger on who - a young Ewan McGregor maybe - with the glint in his eye and the cheeky smile on his face. Even though the evening was definitely focused on tourist, it was fun. I even recognized and knew the words to several of the folk songs as I have heard Canadian groups from the east coast sing them.
So my overall impression of Ireland is that of a hearty people who have gone through much from the conquerors taking over, the famine and diaspora caused by it to the modern day which includes a return to their roots including the use of Gaelic in the schools and throughout. The countryside is beautiful alternately lush and barren with lots of history hidden and visible. Definitely glad I took the time to see it and highly recommend a visit. A warning though, if you don't like potatoes, the food will not appear. My first night in England, I had a noodle salad. Lol.
I'll try for catch up as Bath and Asylum 8 reports to come but I have to interject with a giggle I had this evening. I am now in Salisbury, a lovely city close to Stonehenge. I decided to go to the cathedral here for their evensong service tonight to listen to the music. I am not by any means someone who you would call religious as in the organized religion kind but I figured why not. So I followed on into the service and sat. Next thing I knew, there were five monks (pretty sure they were monks, cowls, long black robes, beanies) who sat down beside me. I couldn't help but look up, expecting the ceiling to burst open and brimstone to fall onto my head. Luckily, that didn't happen but I had one hell if a time holding back the giggles that were welling up. I managed to suppress them and stay calm but had a good snorfle on leaving the cathedral. Oh, and the choir was awesome. :)