We´re Not In Ireland Anymore

So apparently this didn´t actually post. Oops. Better late than never.

An absurd amount of photos here:http://www.flickr.com/photos/96341639@N04/

Belfast was another one of those places where we showed up and said, "well we're here. Now what?" Northern Ireland is a completely different country. After shuffling through the hotel tourist brochures we drew Paddy Campbell's Black Cab tour. We got the fellow at the desk to set up our reservation and the next morning Mr. Paddy Campbell himself was waiting for us in the lobby. He brought us around Belfast. Truth be told I'm uninformed about the conflict still going on in the city. So look into it. But the gist: loyalist vs unionists, Irish vs British, Protestant vs Catholic, those still fighting and those who don't give a damn. Problems: marches, bonfires, walls, flags, symbols, violence, habit, history, rubber bullets, petrol bombs. We stopped at sights of conflict and Paddy told us to get out for pictures and let him take some for us. It felt uncomfortable standing in front of portraits of murderers/war heroes smiling. But maybe the pictures will explain more. (update: I just saw on CNN- one of the only channels in English- about riots in Belfast Friday 9 Aug.)

Mr. Campbell also brought us to other sights north of Belfast like Giant's Causeway, Game of Thrones filming sights, and a small neighborhood tea shop for lunch. It was a luxurious way to tour. Not only did we have the big black cab to ourselves but we also had a personal chauffeur, photographer, and guide. Way better that getting motion-sick on a bus.  

On to Edinburgh.  Apparently there is a massive festival happening: comedy, music, military tattoo, art, etc. I think by the time we made it to Scotland we were worn out and it felt like there was too much to see to see anything. We spent a good amount of time at our hotel, a converted old house where we had a fancy room. We also did a city bus tour, walked around the castle and explored little shops. We watched performers from the festival doing previews on the street. There was a hardcore girl playing a drum. A vesty couple playing the guitar and fiddle. Singing, acting, etc. We found a stand with awesome hand painted shirts for the festival and got a couple for souvenirs. Saturday morning at 7am I walked mom out to the airport bus stop and waved goodbye. (She also took my laptop so figuring out formatting has been interesting) It was lonely going back into the hotel to eat breakfast at table for one. It was a classy breakfast with a big spread of fruit and little packs of gourmet cheeses along with a hot menu. After I ate my fill, I shamelessly filled my pockets with apples, cheeses, and toast. It was classy. I smiled at the girl at the desk as she gave my bulging pockets a disdainful look. It was made worse when I was 11 cents short for the bus to the train station and had to get change at the desk. Graceful exit.

I was excited to start my journey but I was also a bit nervous about having to figure out everything on my own. I can do anything, but I'm worried I'll end up doing nothing. Or just going through the motions of what I'm "supposed" to see. But I was off to London. The train ride was interesting. There were young families in front of me pulling out all the stops, candy, iPads, board games, to keep the wee little ones entertained. At one of the stops a group of 6 desperate housewife types got on in animal prints and wedges carrying a couple bottles of champagne each and trays of shots, and got hammered at 10 am on a train. At one point, one of the champagne stoppers shot out of the bottle with a bang, hit the ceiling and who knows what/who else. The women whooped and hollered and laughed until their carefully applied makeup was tear streaked. I arrived at Kings Cross. It wasn't what I expected. I went in search for the brick wall between platforms 9&10 and found a crowd off people waiting to stage their photographs and a Harry Potter gift shop.  At the hostel I got really frustrated trying to facetime because the connection wouldn't last longer than a couple seconds.

 I went to Buckingham palace there was some huge cycling race-thing going on. I sat on the steps and read my book and watched a barefoot man roll up his pants and search the bottom of the fountain for coins. Around 11am I watched the unchanging of the guards. Hundreds of people pressed in to the gates and stood impatiently for over an hour before the realization spread that the Changing of the Guards was cancelled. Weird. I stopped by  Westminster Abby to have a look around the headed to a Sunday market on Brick lane. I knew nothing about it but the name, I found the street on a map, and traveled the tube to the nearest station. When I got to brick lane I could hardly tell I was in London because every one and everything as far as I could tell I was in Bangladesh. Even the street name was also in Bengali. I didn't know what I was looking for so I followed the trickle of people down the street. When I came to a crowd all sitting on the curb of the street I assumed I was in the right place and went in the door where the crowd was the most dense. It was a huge warehouse-type-thing stuffed to the brim with food stands. From every part of the world. Really I can not think of a type of food that wasn't there. I sampled everything. Somethings twice. And mastered the art of looking interested in buying then making a slick exit. But finally I did buy some food from who knows where and went to sit outside on the street curb. An American sat down next to me. Carly. She had an internship in London. She showed me around the area. Lots of craft markets, flee markets, art galleries, graffiti and a trendy mall made out of freight cars. There was also a really awesome cake shop called the depressed cake shop, that promoted mental health awareness and all the cakes were gray.

Then I went to Leinster square, the theater district to look around. I found loads of street performers. A guy who was pretty good at beat boxing, mediocre magician, a couple of religious/political ranters, and acrobats. Then I went to see Only God Forgives at Empire Cinema. The theater was beautiful. I was waiting in the lounge when this eccentric guy came to complement my hat, though he thought I was a sir and in his embarrassment he began to ramble about a film he's making about a drag queen in  Albuquerque. 
The movie had comically few lines even less in English and was very gruesome. But the theater was awesome and worth the experience.

Something about a late night underground train ride makes music sound better. 

My last full day in London I meandered to a free walking tour. We saw all the sights and our guide, Paris, was an actor and he told humorous stories like the drunk Irish man who proclaimed he was going to chat with the queen.  Broke into buckingham palace,  found the queen in her nightgown, and asked her for a cigarette. He was only in jail for 1 day for drunk and disorderly conduct because at the time breaking into the palace wasn't illegal. 

I met a couple very nice people including Mathews a friendly gay Brazilian and Maria from Guatemala. We ended up running the the rain after the tour to get McDonald's and then all went to a pub crawl. It was a blast by the end I had loads of temporary friends and we danced to some mix of salsa and jitterbug the Elvis Presley. Needless to say by the end I was inebriated. I couldn't figure out the night buses so I tried to catch the last underground train. Well, I did, but I missed the connection. I had my maps on my phone so I started walking. Problem was it was 1am and my hostel was about 18 miles away. But I figured I would just keep walking. Problem was I didn't really know where I was besides the little dot on my map app. Which is fine except I only had 5% battery that was rapidly declining. The neighborhood was starting to look a bit sketchy and there weren't really any cars. No signs of life besides some yelling from some alley and an bottle breaking. Then appeared- the best taxi driver ever. He was a very friendly English man who politely chatted with me the whole drive which took about half an hour. Problem was he didn't know where the middle-of-nowhere-hostel was and I didn't know how to tell him because the street I had walked to it from was closed to traffic. And I had too much to drink. So he dropped me at the underground station that was 3 blocks away. Well a bit away from the station actually and I was lost again. So I pull out my phone to consult the map app except I don't have my phone. Or my rain jacket. And suddenly I'm cold and kicking myself. I ask a pizza place where the underground station is and the tell me but look at me weird because it's closed. I finally make it back. Thankfully I still have my wallet and backpack. I try to call my phone from a pay phone, no luck.  I message mom from my iPad at 3am (not her time thankfully) to please repeatedly call my phone. She was awesome and I waited in the lobby where there was wifi, half asleep until she told me it wasn't working. Defeated, dejected I went to bed. Around 4 am I hear a knock on my bunk and a guy with a flashlight asks if I'm me, that a taxi driver had dropped off my phone and jacket. I thought I was dreaming but I went downstairs and sure enough! The desk dude seemed a bit worried that he bent the rules to tell the taxi driver that that's where I was staying and that he had woken me up, but obviously I was very grateful. And the driver! He tracked down my hostel and drove back out to nowhere to bring me my things for nothing in return. I am so stickin' lucky. I know I'm making this sound dramatic but my phone is my safety net traveling around. It had all of my reservations, my London photos, my maps, contacts, a half unread letter from Amanda, and other really important things. I also don't have a mailing address so it makes a replacement not only very expensive but not really feasible. Anywho moving past that saga.

On to Paris. I woke up not feeling so hot so a went to the train station super early instead of more walking around. It was a wasteful day. The train ride was uneventful, I mostly slept. I realized that my French classes were completely useless when a nice girl came up to me while I was waiting to get metro tickets and started talking so quickly I could barely tell if it was french. Caught off guard that I actually had to socially interact I gave her a horrified look and stupidly just said "no, no". "Non?" Then she realized I didn't speak french and explained I could have her metro ticket, she didn't need it. Very kind. I fumbled my thanks. Between leaving the train station and trying to find my hostel I must have done 30 flights of stairs. My backpack got heavier the whole way and by the time I finally found the hostel (at the top of a vary large set of stairs) I was out of breath and flustered. I managed a butchered "parlez-vous anglais?" Which thankfully she did. Then I chatted with my roommates (one American, 2 Australians and two french girls from Normandy) and crashed. 

Yesterday morning it was raining. My throat was (is) very sore and swollen and my nose has run a marathon by now. It made the loneliness a bit rough and the self motivation to face a foreign world near impossible. But I'm in Paris and it would be a waste to stay in so I went to Musee D'Orsay thinking I would have time to have a look around before the free walking tour. After and hour in line I was still a mile away and it started to rain. I'm not proud but I got out of line plopped down on the wet steps and threw myself a little pity party. Maybe I should have planned a bit more. But I was trying to do the things people do when they visit Paris. I shook it off "how dare I feel sorry for myself in a city like this" so I emailed my mom and took the scenic route to the walking tour. I walked across pedestrian bridge that looked gold at a distance but was entirely covered in locks. It was the bridge in the end of Now You See Me that I saw in Dublin. It was beautiful and personal and fascinating. My favorite sight I saw yesterday. Then I walked by the Louvre  and wandered through the gardens that were filled with sculptures. I got my first real view of the Eiffel Tower and the big arch. The walking tour was good but our guides were new. But I saw plenty and got oriented to that part of the city. A bit more wandering then I let myself go back to the hostel to rest and try to not get sicker.  

Today I went to the Rodin gardens (if you're ever there, the best part is the gardens and it only costs 1euro to go in instead of the 10+ to go in to the small building part and the garden.) It was a nice way to spend a few hours: tucked away benches, rose maze, and sculptures everywhere. I then went to a great reading spot where I had a view of the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre, the big ol'arch, of the ducks and coy in the pond. 

It's been an adjustment traveling by myself. I know I'll end up with the memories of a life time. I just am still figuring it all out. 

Wild Rover

There was some confusion *cough*lying*cough* on the part of the rental car company, so instead of "we'll pick you up" it was "we'll leave you waiting because we messed up and don't have the courtesy to let you know you don't have a car or a ride." Anyway instead of going to the Blarney Stone we went in search of another automatic-automobile and found a late start on the day. First stop- The Fishy Fishy in Kinsale: home of the Kinsale Hookers. I had the best meal of the trip so far, delicious tuna. 

Then mom drove us to this Drombeg Circle. Apparently it is some ancient druid circle and all mystical and what not. The drive was down the narrowest road possible. I am relatively sure that both mirrors of our micro-micra  were brushing the brush and driving on the left side of the road no longer mattered as it wasn't wide enough to have a side. There was a dirt path near the gravel car park that wound back along the hedges to the circle. When it appeared it was magical.... Movie magic, that it is. There was a full film crew waiting on the rain to pass. I don't know what they were filming for, but we were the only outsiders in sight, so we headed back to the car. Definitely not what we were expecting. 

When we rented the car we also rented a TomTom. You know, to keep from getting lost. Well Tom has a sense of redundant humor. So he decided to take us winding through the middle of the country, down only unnamed roads, until we were so hopelessly disoriented we had no choice but to keep following what he said. For the next 7 hours. Ireland's not even that big! It takes 2 hours to drive from one coast to the other. Let me also say those country roads are not a good place to have a car with subpar breaks, rain showers, and my mother trying to figure out what is left and what is right. She wasn't really sure where the left boundary of the car was so she told me to let her know if she was too close on my side. Well with the roads as narrow as they are you are always a bit too close. But when we were within an inch of stonewalls, drop-offs, trees, etc I would panic and whimper "too close". I definitely had to utilize breathing techniques not to have a full blown panic attack as we ran over curbs, brush, and our side mirror collided with a parked car. I was thankful for the herd of cows blocking the road as they provided a much needed break from the instinctual-rapid-intake-of-air-finger-nails-in-palms-'I-wish-I-had-studied-meditation' feeling of the drive.  It was a tense trip but mom got us to some beautiful views and to the Loch Lein Country House safely though heavy rain, never ending curves, traffic circles, steep hills, and tight spaces.
The "country house" was kind of the baby of a B&B and hotel. It was surrounded by farms and mountains and sat on the shore of lake Lein. We liked the place so much we decided to cancel our friday night reservation in Limerick and stay anther night in Killarney.

 

 

After breakfast we started the Ring of Kerry. After much persuading, mom let me try driving (the rental company has a policy against drivers under 25). I loved it. It was fun to make yourself think of everything as a mirror image of what you are used to. I thought I was doing a pretty good job until... well I'll get back to that. Our first stop on the ring was the Kell Bay Gardens. In all honesty we didn't know what we were doing only that the "Ring of Kerry" was supposed to be a nice thing to do. So when we were desperate for the loo we saw that the gardens had a tea room and it seemed like a safe choice. The road was steep and windy and narrow. And worth it. A thousand shades of green tunneled the road with trees, ferns, moss and the like. The recent rain made everything glitter and when we turned in the drive for the garden a waterfall was the first thing we saw. The tea room was in a green house and the man behind the counter said if we take a huge risk and explored the garden, he didn't think we'd be disappointed. There was a wall of shrubs and an iron gate leading into the garden. It was hard to tell what had been planted and what was natural because the garden was more of a forest with tiny touches added to enhance what was already there. The path we took was mostly a cleared patch of forest floor that twisted through the trees for two kilometers. There were streams and ferns and boulders and lilies and views of the lake and valley and dinosaurs. And I was all like "mom, this is my jam!" I'm not built to stay in a city so long, I forget what I'm missing. 

 

 

Anyway we moved along stopping to take pictures along the way. We were finally seeing the Ireland I had dreamed about. Green and stone cliffs, farms that make patchwork of the hills, wild flowers, and the rocky coast. And sheep. There were plenty of small town around the ring and we pick our stops based on the lack of tour buses. We ate lunch at a pub called The Blind Fiddler. When we asked the nearest ATM was three towns back inside a grocery store. A beautiful blue eyed girl waited on us and told us about the time she went to Texas, she was in Austin and one other city but she couldn't remember where. We had a revelation that aubergines, "a large purple vegetable kind of like a squash," was a eggplant. So we ordered goat cheese and roasted veggie stuffed eggplant and drinks. As she was getting our order she exclaimed "Fort Worth!" The other city she'd been to. It was another tasty meal. An eccentric looking man came in paused at our table and stared us down longer than what is socially normal, then moved on, sat down and began to write in a small book. I wonder if we made it into whatever he was writing. Another man was carefully searching the floor for something, and rather than making some bad joke about looking for his marbles I asked if I could help. He was looking for the screw for his glasses. But as I stood up to help I must have brushed my pint glass, and it fell off the table and shattered. So now his small screw was lost among glass and beer and promptly swept away by the staff. Very counter productive party foul. 

We made it around to Kenmare and went in search of another stone circle mom read about in the guide book. I made a series of disorienting turns, the saw one of the brown landmark signs the read "ring of mara". Oh that's what it's called right? I'll go that way. Well it was a pretty road, but it was also pretty much one lane. A large camper sped by and ran my left side into the brush. After a time we realized that the ring of mara was the name of the drive and not a stone circle, so we did a 180 and headed back. Be drove by a few chunks of some vehicle on the road and shortly saw a slightly beat up suv and the camper that almost ran me off the road. The driver of the camper was standing on the shoulder (there hardly was a shoulder) yelling at the other driver. I was glad it wasn't me. Well then a huge tractor pulled out into the middle of the road coming towards me and I had to swerve to avoid him. This would have been okay except I swerved it to the bushes, which also would have been okay if they weren't hiding large rocks. Mom squeals "too close!" but we are relieved to have made it. Until I hear the rough sound of driving on the rim and realize we have a flat. I instantly remember all the arguments that mom made as to why I shouldn't drive the rental because I am a bad driver. Proved her right. So I pull into the next service station to assess the damage. Good thing we have full coverage insurance on the rental... except for the tires. I got out the spare donut, the jack, the lug wrench, etcetera, and set to work. But after I set up the jack I realize not only is the lug wrench a skimpy piece of metal only about 7 inches long, but the piece that fits over the lug nuts was completely stripped from over use. We were obviously not the first renters to have this same tire issue. The guy running the service station kept trying to help us but he was the only one working the counter so he had to keep running in to help costumers. An older man with messy white hair hollered at us out of his car window "can you manage?" I embarrassed, said "we're fine, thank you" but mom muttered "no we're not". He came over anyway and we explained the problem with the lug wrench. "'We're fine'" he mimicked in an excessively high voice, "we'll just wait here until the tire falls off. You'll be here two weeks from now saying 'we're fine'". Mom told him I was embarrassed to ask for help (not helping with the embarrassing factor), and he said that I was obviously not Irish then because all the Irish girls are "always saying 'save me! save me!" We'll I don't know how true that was but he had a great set of tools and helped us out in no time. I appreciated his help and that the ordeal was resolved, even if I had to sallow a dose of damsel(*cough-bs-cough*) in distress. All the tyre shops were closed at 6 so we grabbed a bite in town. Then we bought a bottle of wine, and went back the our "country house" to sit by the lake, watch the sunset, and drink the wine. 

The next day we bought a new tire and had it changed at the shop, all in under 10 minutes. Nice. We found our way to Ross castle and hired a jaunty cart (horse drawn cart) to take us through the Killarney National Park. Our driver was named Jon. His horse was Rosey. He had just retired form his life long profession of butchering. He was a 6th generation butcher and his 5 brothers were also butchers. He complained about the convenience of supermarkets ruining the business and how you pay 20euro for a steak at a restaurant that costs them 4. He told us about when he went to NY and how he and his friends were kicked out of TGIFridays for no good reason, except maybe they didn't like their singing. He also told us about the park, how 3 different estates had been donated and the park was made of those estates and 3 lakes. The largest lake was Loch Lien which contain several islands. The smallest island was nicknamed honey-moon island because there is only room for two. 
After the jaunty ride we got in a small wooden boat to see "the meeting of the waters" where the 3 lakes met. Our captain had a small fluffy dog that rode in his lap. He showed us the sites. He explained that the lake is very well know for predicting the weather. So well know that people will always come down from the town to ask the people at the lake the forecast. The key is the mountains. If you can see the mountains- it's going to rain. If you can't see the mountains- it's raining. We finished off the day with dinner at a pub and a traditional music session we stumbled upon. 

 

Monday I finally got to go horseback riding. I convinced mom that it was a good idea an the two of us and a guide led us through another side of the National Park. Mom's horse's name was Pepsi and mine was Aladdin. Pepsi was slow and kept snaking, but was steady and didn't scare mom. We saw Irish red deer, Japanese Sitka deer, rabbits and a cat getting rained on. 

 

We got rid of the car after a stop at Bunratty Castle (very cramped staircases sums it up) and were on to Galway. I really wanted to see the cliffs of more, so we took a tour bus. A very bumpy, rough, lots of tight turns, tour bus. Motion sick central. But the cliffs were incredible. We had a picnic on the precipice and then walk along the trail that followed the edge. We didn't have much time in Galway itself and I was disappointed to realize we miss the Galway Races by a day. 

 

Anyway next we took a train for my last day in Dublin. I took mom back to the Old Jameson distillery, where we had ample samples. I was picked for the tasting along with several others. (One of the other tasters was a hyperbole of a hipster with a overly groomed curled mustache, and over confident, under informed complaints about the way the complementary tasting was run.) By the end we were just inspired enough to buy a couple tasty souvenirs. We stayed at the Shelborne. If it's nice enough for Michelle Obama it's nice enough for us. Probably too nice for us. We don't have any clothes nearly nice enough to go in the fine dining Saddle Room. I did have a lovely side car from the bar though. Leaving the hotel we had a very friendly cab driver who asked all about my time in Dublin and internship. He apparently lives on the north side of Dublin near a brain injury hospital if I understood him. This lead into all sorts of stories about there being less than 6 degrees of separation in Dublin. As we unloaded our bags he warned us about the marching in Belfast. Told us to avoid areas with loads of British flags.

 

Another train to Belfast. I had to switch to sterling, which stinks. One pound is not 16 ounces but a hefty $1.52 a piece. It adds up. There are British flags everywhere that is not walled off.
I'm trying to detail the stories I don't want to forget. The ordinary and extraordinary people we meet. But so much happens from moment to moment I can't hang on to it all.