6:30 p.m. - 2006-08-30
The pipes, the pipes are calling
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Day 17
Another late start (thankfully) and on a bus to Cork.
For whatever reason, we were both feeling a little wiped out and just did a minor (2 hour) investigatory walk before heading back to the hotel for dinner. Noted a few good shots to take tomorrow.
First impressions of Cork, or I guess second first impressions seeing as we were just here, a little uh, urban? Cementy? Brickish?
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Day 18
So today was the big 'check out the city day'. Mission accomplished.
First came the clock tower, otherwise known as the Four Faced Liars, the reason being that they all told different times until very recently. Also of note, there's a big fish on top of it as a weather vane. I mean big. And gold. Quite subtle for a clock tour really.
Two blocks down the hill we have the North Cathedral? I gotta say, by this point places of worship are starting to run together. The names are all the same. There's three in a one block radius, and they're either grey stone or grey stone with red brick highlights. Oh ya, and old. Don't get me wrong, the first 25 I saw were quite enthralling, and I'm sure these are just as good, but I'm not feeling it today.
Naturally, our next stop is another church, though this one has the decency to be on the other side of the river, and at least slightly gothic looking. Except we ended up having to be on the other side of another canal to get a picture of Holy Trinity Church so we didn't go in.
Just down the block, again, we check out the Red Abbey, which is shockingly, not red. Maybe it used to be.
Since we're about two blocks from the Beamish Factory, and Beamish being the '3rd' stout of Ireland, AND seeing as it was about time for a pint, we attempted to catch a tour. Unfortunately, being only the 3rd most popular stout means they only run 2 tours a day, twice a week. We missed by half an hour. Man. So thirsty.
Trundling on (Actually trundling now...) we arrive at Elizabeth's Fort. Rather, the bottom of the fort, with no apparent entrance. Very secure idea, tricky to get into something with no doors. Fine. We would rather check out St. Finbarre's Cathedral anyhow.
Now this is a cathedral worth taking pictures of. Even worth the 3 euro entrance fee. Had that nice 'old' smell, dark wood everywhere, carvings, heavily hushed, you know, what's the word...reverent. I give it two thumbs and about 20 pictures up - very nice.
Coming out three quarters of the way up a street heading to the Fort we decide we might as well circle the thing just to confirm that its nothing more than a massive wedge of masonry. And behold, 90% of the way around there is in fact an entrance, however, as the place is now a Guardia station, we decided not to bother sauntering through armed with cameras. Now supposedly it IS open to the public, but by this time we weren't interested.
Finally, mercifully, on the way back to the hotel we pass by the Court House. Maybe, as I said earlier, I'm burned out from all the grey, but it looks a lot like the court house in Dublin. Or the Parthenon. Why is it that so many law buildings look like the Parthenon anyhow?
Got back, slept some more, then tried Beamish at the hotel (since we couldn't get any from the Beamers themselves). It isn't horrible, but it is rightfully the 3rd place stout. For the record: Guinness, Murphy's then Beamish. Final answer.
Oh yes. Got a little work sent my way while I was out, so, expecting nothing of consequence tomorrow, our third day in Cork, I settled in for about 5 hours of good, semi-honest labour.
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Day 19
My last comment for yesterday was mostly right. Nothing of consequence happened today, though we did spend an insane amount of time walking through shops to satiate my mom's appetite for post cards and memorabilia.
Topped the day of with a lot of Initial D.
A LOT (now half way through the Fourth Stage).
SUPAH MONTONNE DUHREEFTAH TEKNEEKUH!!!
Sweeeeeeeeet........
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Day 20
Hey hey, two days in a row of non-events. Massive bus ride into Dublin. Not that it should have been but the motorways (highways) don't bypass the small towns so if you try to get through a town of 3,000 people during lunch or a town of 15,000 during rush hour, you're stuck in the single lane of traffic going your way, along with all the local traffic. Throw in a little construction for good measure and BAM!! 250km = 6.5 hours.
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Day 21
Back into the Dub today to tie up a few less ends and spend the rest of these euros before they burn a hole in my wallet.
First stop though, the National Museum, which is actually opened today (as it isn't a Monday). Three things stick out to me. One, those bog men are really well preserved, you could easily pull fingerprints off them. Two, some of the brooches/pins must have done some major damage to the clothing they were meant to clasp, though the way they work is quite ingenious. Three, the interior of the museum is very impressive itself, a bit of a shame they covered the main floor tiling with ramps and exhibits.
Walk out and seeing as we're practically there already, I have to get a photo of the Oscar Wilde statue chilling out in Merrion Square.
Next up, a walk through some shadier looking areas of Dublin and on to revisit St. Patricks. Less a revisit than to actually go inside, as we did have a 5 minute photo op with the tour. I would have to say that this cathedral is equally as impressive as St. Finbarre's back in Cork but with two major differences. The first is that the stained glass is absolutely amazing (and all over the place), the second is that for whatever reason, it really lacks the reverent mood of Finbarre's. It could be the huge gift shop in the back, or maybe there were just too many people in there when we visited, but it didn't feel anything like a large old church should. Too bad.
Off to the Guinness storehouse again to see if they have any shirts in my size. Now if I thought we had seen some dodgy bits of Dublin on the way to St. Patricks, boy, was I set straight. For the first time since setting foot in Ireland I actually felt mildly uncomfortable (not that I mentioned it to my mom at the time...got to keep up the appearance of nonchalance otherwise she have made we walk the long way...ha ha). Only lasted a couple of blocks. Guinness still didn't have my shirt. Bummer.
From the south side we cross the river and check out St. Michan's. Took the crypt tour, naturally. The guide books mention that it may have provided inspiration for Dracula, but having read that, I was expecting something a little larger, more maze like. Still, there were plenty of cobwebs, dust and of course the 4 rather well preserved corpses (I declined rubbing the crusaders finger for luck). It was a fairly short tour lead by a fairly short guide who was a cross between Vincent Price and Pee Wee Herman, wearing jean shorts, a black t-shirt, fanny pack and carrying a cup of tea or coffee throughout the tour. Very odd fellow, but he obviously enjoys his work (or the whiskey in his coffee).
Speaking of which, we head out of the crypts and back to the Old Jameson Distillery so that I can pick up a few Irish samples for the road and then we call it a day. A very long day. With a lot of the wrong kind of Irish mist.
I did however have a Guinness at a pub for all the ladies (you know, relatives, friends, friends' wives, friends' relatives' wives, neighbours, and such). Cheers to all of you.
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Day 22
Boy oh boy. One day to go.
So why not start off with a visit to the Girl Guides of Ireland (no, I'm not linking to this one)? Well, let me tell you, I have a lot of good reasons against it, the least of which is that its a long walk from the hotel, but as my mother was very patient yesterday with all my wandering around, I had decided to let her run the show today, with myself as the navigator. Anyhow, it was closed.
Next on the agenda: Blackberry Fair, the largest and last of Dublin's flea markets, approximately as far again as we walked to see the Girl Guide shop. Its closed. Forever. Strike 2.
Now she wants to head into town for some shopping, so we catch a cab to Trinity college. I'm on the lookout for some Jonathan Swift graffiti that resides in the college chapel (if one is to believe my brother). Its closed. Ouch. Bad day for that, glad we didn't walk. Besides that, nobody has ever heard of the graffiti, so Sean, go check your sources again.
Before heading out for the shopping portion of the day, we decided to grab some grub at our favorite hotel pub where lo and behold we have some footy on the tube. Sweet. Liverpool vs Westham. So I tell my mom that I'll wait for her here, show her where all the stores are (they're all within two blocks of the pub) and then settle in with my Guinness. Intermission ends with my Guinness, no sign of mom so I grab a Stella and dedicate it to Chewy, Luke and the Princess...
The Stella is good. Liverpool wins. Dublin is happy. Me too. Home time.
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Day 23
Up in time to catch an 8:30 cab to the airport. Bounce from Dublin to Shannon then on to Toronto. Flew to within 85 km of Greenland and took a seriously hard (though subtly performed) left. A bit disorienting to have the cloud line appear where you aren't expecting it. Saw some icebergs (weird) off the coast of Newfoundland. Had a plane full of Irish Ladies Rugby and Football Union players en-route to some tournament in Canada. They managed to be Irishly rowdy by the end of the trip. Was refused a bottle of Coke at Pearson airport, for security purposes, though they happily poured it into a cup for me. The last stretch was mercifully uneventful and a few hours later I'm getting some hugging and smooching from someone who desperately needs me to do her laundry...=)
Aaaaaah. Good to be back, though I think I might miss a Guinness with my dinners for a while.
