The Burke's European Degestation: E

9

Friday, 24 June 2011

Day 9. 23rd June. Wales to Dublin

Today again was mostly a transit day, but this time by Ferry. We caught the ferry from Hollyhead in Wales to Dublin Ireland. But first we made a stop off in Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch

Yes, that is right the town is called Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch. There was absolutely no reason to go here except that the town is called Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch
Wicked.

Into Dublin we go. Now I really don’t quiet know how to put this. And I will still reserve judgment, because maybe it was just bad luck or a bad moment or something. But Dublin, was not great. This is completely shattering to me who loves the idea of Ireland so much. Honestly though, it was just not a great city. It lacks a certain atmosphere and the people were not all that friendly. It is a also a little bit dirty and not so safe feeling as some other big cities like Edinburgh, Sydney, Melbourne, New York, Seattle, Chicago, Bangalore, Tokyo etc that I have been to. So fingers crossed that it was just a bad day and when we come back in a few days time it will be amazing. I hope. ☹

We rode a HoHo (Hop on Hop off) bus again and the best thing out of that was the places that famous people lived, worked, studied etc that we passed and the fact that smack in the middle of this major Irish city is both a Guinness factory and a loony bin. Perhaps there is more justification for the stereotype of the mad or the drunken Irish. :P

Dublin is incredibly different to the rest of Great Britain, they have a “Wide Streets Commission” and so the streets are - you guessed it – wide. Everywhere else we have been has had teeny tiny streets that you have to scrape by the other cars, mirrors literally millimeters from touching in some parts. In Dublin however the streets are wide, multiple lanes, parking space and breathing space. Space, space everywhere.

After that we went to a game of Hurling. Now hurling is a Gallic sport played up here. Take rugby, field hockey, ice hocky, European hand ball and a at-whatever-costs mentality and there you have hurling. Oh and don’t forget the cricket ball with lead inside it (they add lead to make the ball bounce slower) or the mildly encouraged violence.

Now I don’t really like sports, I find it all a bit boring. This is a sport I could get into. It is incredible; you have to see it to believe it. We were watching an under 21’s national semi final and it was scary. The crowd also was something worth watching, they get so into it. The field is also used for soccer games and is ringed with a concrete fence with razor wire at the top.

They use something like a field hockey stick with the end pounded flat to hit the ball like you do in hockey, but also to balance it on the flat part (like a violent egg and spoon race) to bounce the ball with (like before serving in tennis – but fast) to hit the ball far like a cricket bat (but served like tennis or hit on the full. There is a lot of variation in any case. It really seemed to be “do whatever you can to get the ball into the goal”.

One thing that amazed me was their ability to catch a ball in their bare hand that had been whacked like furry all the way at the other end of the field. It must have hurt. Speaking of hurt, three guys went down in the first half, it was really quiet distressing, I was sure they were going to be badly hurt, but they all got up. Tough lads. Oh because you also get about six guys pilling on around the ball all gunning for it, people fall over, get hit by another player or get hit in the balls by the ball – as happened to one unfortunate player.

One of the highlights though, was the two players that got into a bit of a scuffle. One was barging into the other who would in turn elbow him in the ribs. You could clearly see how pissed off they were at each other. They got a warning for that. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a fight later that evening or week.

The game was sensational and I wouldn’t have missed it. If you ever get a chance to catch a game of hurling, do.

10

Monday, 27 June 2011

Day 10. 24th June. Dublin, Bru na Bonnie and Giants’s causeway.

This morning we set off again ready to brave the horrors of navigation in Dublin city. Oddly, Dublin is the first city or town we have yet been to with streets more then three centimeters wide and it is a city of one-way streets. This is an infuriating combination, plus Elizabeth Wooten-Bassett seems to not know that many of these streets are one-way. In any case, we did eventually make it out alive.

From here it was the road, a long few days of driving lay ahead with multiple stops and destinations.

The first of these was Bu Na Bonnie (Newgrange) a 5,000 year old burial mound. But it is more then a burial mound. It is a mound in which cremated human remains were found . Who knows what it was for, but in any case, it is magical. I cannot describe how breathtaking this place is. From the outside it does not look so special, just a mound of grass with a stone wall at one side. The stonewall part has been reconstructed out of the original stone that was found collapsed in the 60s’. Now this is something that I am unsure should be done, due to the interpretation of the construction. But that was all forgotten the second I entered. It is a stone construction that forms a sort of cave with a tunnel leading to it. The central cavern is as it was 5,000 years ago. The construction was so well built that it has remained in tact and entirely waterproof since then.

The tunnel has above it, a light box. A small opening above the door that lines up precisely with the solstice sunrise. The light streams in, illuminating the inner sanctum. Maybe it sounds sappy but I could really feel the magic here. A real connection to the earth and history and an astonishing agelessness.

The stone inside has a fair amount of graffiti on it, which seems quite appalling but is softened by the fact that some of the graffiti is dated. One stood out to me, a name, A M McAlroy, 1822. I wonder who he was. (I assume it was a he, might have been a she).

We managed a great success here by the time of our arrival, everywhere tells you that the place opens at 9:30am and you have to queue up at the visitors center and catch busses to the site and be herded in in droves. But Raina and her incredible anal and obsessive research managed to work out that it is in fact the mound itself that opens at 9:30 and busses begin at 9. So most people planning to be early rock up at half past, we and only two others were there at 8.30am and so only four people and the guide were in our group, the next bus in had 30 people. Nice dodge, thank you mother. :D

A drive up the very pretty Atrim coast. Famous for its beautiful beaches and coastal views followed. Views I will give it but as for beaches - pfft ptfffft lol, pebbely, rocky and cold is expected but what you don’t see on the calendars is the stench. I think it is because of the seaweed that washes up on the beach and then rots. But the beaches were all putrid smelling, disgusting rank and best avoided. And of course castles.

Next we hit up the Giant’s causeway. A remarkable geological phenomenon, something I still struggle to believe is natural and not man made. I think what happened was volcanic rock rose at a high rate and temperature from deep in the earth. Once it came into contact with the oxygen and cold ocean it cooled quickly, solidified and cracked like glass. It cracked in a remarkable geometric and even honeycomb pattern and bits rose higher then others with dead flat tops.

The more fun legend version of the creation of the Giant’s Causeway is that the Giant who lived there was fighting with a giant on a neighboring island (Scotland), throwing rocks at him and built the causeway (which looks remarkably like a staircase) so as to get closer to his target and throw stones more easily.