Here in Durham we have a small, privately-owned pharmacy
called MacDonald's. If America is the Eckerd's of countries,
Ireland must be the MacDonald's, full of wonderful, unusual
things you never knew you needed . . . until you see them.
Mary and I left New York for Dublin on February 26th. New York
was the first pleasant surprise. The city was experiencing one of
the prettiest days of the year and everyone was giddy. People
were holding doors for us, guiding us to where we needed to go
and in general showing the best face of New York possible. As
nice as this was, we were anxious to get to Ireland and it seemed
to take forever to get the Airbus into the air. While at the
airport, we were treated to the scene of a group of Irish
college-age students getting drunk in the airport bar and
expected a rowdy flight, but the trip turned out to be quite
sedate and the boys behaved themselves quite well.
Our flight landed in Dublin
at daybreak and we took a bus into downtown and our first
B&B. On arrival we found our room would not be ready until
eleven, but in true Irish fashion we were welcomed to leave our
bags in the living room and enjoy ourselves about the town until
the rooms could be cleaned. We had breakfast and saw parts of Dublin that surrounded the
B&B. I quickly learned that I would love the Irish for their
sense of humor if for no other reason.
(Of course, there were MANY other reasons.) We walked around the
city for about 4 hours after which I went back to the room and
collapsed.
O'Connell Street is
one of the major thoroughfares in metropolitan Dublin. Much
commerce, and a great many monuments dedicated to past greats and
ideals grace this boulevard. The Irish don't easily forget, they
make sure of that.
Dublin, indeed all of Ireland, is
steeped in religion. Not all of the religious history, as well as
the religious present, is pleasant and this is not a place for
taking sides, but there are some beautiful places
of worship in evidence everywhere you go.
Culture also figures prominently in the
capital city as evidenced by the museums
and universities that reside here. Dublin has long been a
center of learning and there are schools of thought that during
the dark ages, the Irish monks were the saviors of western
civilization by preserving knowledge and writing skills. Trinity
College was especially interesting, as was the National Museum.
Both should be high on your hit list should you decide to visit.
After our
time in Dublin, Mary's cousin, Joe McDonnell, drove in to town
and collected us to came stay with them. Mary's family, in case
you missed it, is from Dunshaughlin, just a few miles north of
the Capital. Joe, and his wife Anne,
are two of the nicest people and will always have my thanks for
taking the time and trouble to take this crazy American around
with them. Joe conditions thoroughbreds for sale as a sideline.
The Irish have traditionally had a deep relationship with horses,
and Joe has a special way with horses. While we were there, in
addition to sightseeing, we went to a thoroughbred horse race.
After the big excitement, another of Mary's
relatives, yet another Ann, took a day off from work and her
daughter Lorna out of school and drove us around the local area.
This included Navan, Dunshaughlin,
and, especially, the town of Trim where
the movie "Braveheart" was filmed by Mel Gibson.
Oooooo, Mel!!! (That for all the ladies in the audience.)
From Trim,we went to Tara where the High
Kings of Ireland sat. Apparently, there were many kings of
Ireland, but eventually, 5 ruled the others and one of their
seats of power was here. Also, here was the site where Saint
Patrick confronted the Druids and it was here he converted them
to Christianity by using the shamrock as a symbol of the
Holy Trinity. (Then, of course, he drove out the snakes,
discovered heavier than air flight and formed the NFL or so the
story goes.)
Next on the agenda was Newgrange a site
unusual, even for Ireland. Most of Ireland is small towns, close
to one another so travel is easy, even for one unused to driving
on the "wrong" side of the road. I learned about
driving in Ireland soon enough when we rented a car in Dublin and
set off on Ireland's roads on our own.
Ireland's highways are very narrow by American
standards and you have to share them with bloody great lorries
driving fast against you and taking no prisoners. There are major
highways which we would consider interstates here and which are
really wonderful, but by and large the roads are narrow and
winding.
Despite this,
with Mary navigating, we set off for our first destination, the Rock of Cashel. The history of the Rock is
too long and convoluted to relate here, but it is a very special
place.
We spent several hours touring the Rock and the adjacent town by
the same name and then set out again, this time to Kilarney.
One of the most lyrical
names in Ireland, Kilarney is a major
tourist center and now has a special meaning to me. We had
checked into the B & B and while I was getting ready to go
out for the evening meal, Mary had gone downstairs to ask the
owner for recommendations for dinner. When she approached him, he
suggested she should tell "The Lieutenant" that he had
left the lights on in the car. DANG! I had been given a nickname.
It was also in Kilarney I made one of the few mistakes of the
trip. After dinner we retired and I forgot to lock the door to
the room. I was awakened about four in the morning by a strange
man in the room. He was in his underwear and staggering towards
the bathroom. Before I, in my groggy state, could stop him, he
opened the door to the bath and staggered in where he proceeded
to relieve himself for what seemed to be 10 minutes. When he
opened the door and re-entered the bedroom I asked if he could at
least flush the toilet. His reaction was, "Oh, so I'm in the
wrong room am I?" and staggered out into the hall. The next
morning Mary and I were breakfasting in
the dinning room and (we will here change the name to protect the
innocent) Michael came in, fully dressed this time. He looked
around and saw me, put his hand over his eyes and said,
"Faith, I was hoping it was a bad dream." At that point
what could we do except invite him to join us for breakfast and
become introduced properly.
Michael turned out to be yet another charming person we were glad
to have met on our tour.
Tralee is another
"tourist" center for Ireland. Of course, the entire
country is a tourist "black hole'. It is really hard to
leave once you get into the place. Your heart just doesn't want
to go. Mary claims you can always tell the American tourists in
the airport . . . they are the ones who are crying because they
have to get back on the plane.
Tralee has a lot of interesting
things including a STEAM TRAIN ENGINE YOU CAN RIDE ON . . .
which, unfortunately, was not open as it wasn't the tourist
season quite yet.
FINALLY! Dingle, and the
"Sunny Gulfstream Coast" at last!
The Dingle Peninsula has the highest mountain pass in Ireland,
(The Conner Pass) and we decided to take it. We had just gotten
to the parking area at the exact center when the weather unloaded
on us and we got rain, hail and snow, all at the same time.
Interesting. Ah Ireland. To know her is to love her.
Ireland has ancient cultures and The Dingle has some of the
oldest.. We ALSO got some rather wonderful Dingle Bay Mussels,
which were amongst the freshest and tastiest I have ever eaten.
Then we started on the adventurous part
of the trip, the circle route 'round the Dingle.
After returning to the
mainland we headed north towards the Shannon River and several
small towns near Limerick. We went through Listowel, Tarbert, and
Glin on the way to Foynes, and the Flying
Boat Museum . . . which, unfortunately, was not open as it wasn't
the tourist season quite yet. (One of the very few disappointing
aspects of the trip was that being there in the off season there
were several things we wanted to see but couldn't, due to them
not being open yet. But, given there is far more to see in
Ireland than you can reasonably be expected to see in one
lifetime, we suffered little.)
Retracing our steps, we went back to Tarbert to
catch the ferry across the Shannon to County Clare, the Cliffs of Moher, and Ennis.
We never got a chance to take any photographs in Ennis, which is
a shame for it was one of the prettiest towns we visited. Ennis
was, perhaps, more faithful to its medieval past than other
cities. The streets were very narrow and twisting (one of the
main streets in the city center was so narrow it was one way and
you could barely fit one car through it), and the layout was far
from contemporary, but all this merely added to its charm. We
never had the opportunity to take photographs due to arriving
there at sunset and our our flight leaving the next morning, but
an anecdote is in order here.
We went downtown, or to the city center, and had dinner in a
great restaurant. (I had baked chicken breast stuffed with smoked
salmon . . . and they say the Irish can't cook . .HAH!) We were
eating at a table for two right in front of the fireplace and
behind us was a young family, (mother, father and two children)
celebrating Mom's birthday.
When they finished singing "Happy Birthday", Mary and I
congratulated them and I made some silly compliment to the mother
. As they left, they sent a quarter of her birthday cake to our
table.
Hell of a way to treat total strangers
God bless the Irish.
And God bless Ireland too.
Finale.
Any comments or suggestions concerning this web site are
earnestly solicited. You may e-mail me at dstractr @acpub.duke.edu
Thanks for coming this far.
