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Archives:
January - 2007
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1/24/2007
Yesterday we went out to the north side of Kerry co., only about 30 minutes away, to Ardfert.
Ard- is Gaelic, meaning "high", so 'Ardfert' means "High part of the graveyard" or burial place. It was one of the highest points in the whole area and you could see down to the coast from the cathedral where we were.
The cathedral was being restored, so without a roof it was quite cold for the hour that we were outside. I felt bad for the rest of the group that continues to be sick, although I am feeling a good bit better than before. Either way an hour outside in 5 degree Celsius is enough to numb your toes inside your boots. But that was the price of seeing the 15th century cathedral, with a good deal of history and interesting features to it.
Cathedral: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/34/Ardfert_cathedral.jpg
Down the road, not more than a mile away was the Ardfert Friary, also a neat ruin to tromp around through. Both buildings were purposefully constructed once again. With the cathedral having windows to the south-east to catch the light, but barely anything on the north wall to block the heavy northern winds. Also, the cathedral was decorated to looking "welcoming" from the south and more "intimidating" to the north because passengers would come from the local area by the south, whereas invaders would have come from the river that passed along the north side of the building. The Friary also had the long windows to the south-east to let the sun into the long hall. They had a huge tower for defensive purposes that looked like a castle, and was out of place attached to the Friary walls.
The Friary allowed for much more exploration and many of us were climbing all along the broken walls. One student, Austin, was able to scale the wall over to the higher part and walked the entire length of the church balcony, probably 30 feet or higher, and then made it all the way around the long windows and down. It was fun to watch, although scary at times.
Friary (great pictures here): http://cloghmore.bravepages.com/kerry/ardfert_friary.html
We stopped at a beautiful beach were the Maharee islands were within view. We heard the story of Sir Roger Casement and the tales of his travels and life. Then we headed on to lunch and then to Fenit to see St. Brendan. He stands as a man three times the size of an average man, pointing towards America from the peninsula where the bronze statue is a top a hill at the very end.
For the rest of the week I believe we are focusing on our final exam and paper, although I cant say we have much idea what’s to be on them.
Today we’ll probably watch "The Quite Man" and tomorrow I have no idea, but Friday we are going on a 7 mile hike. I don’t know that I see a purpose in going on a hike when it’s this cold and you have sick people with you, but so far, it wouldn’t surprise me if we did it anyway. I do understand that this place is beautiful, but I’m not really one to go out in 2-5 degree C weather and hike just for the fun of it, with chances of rain at any time. And if it has something to do with Irish culture, then I’ll go along with it, but I think it’s a stretch towards that, and it doesn’t make me feel great to know we’ll be doing that as our last day trip.
Saturday we pack, Sunday at 6am we head to the airport, and by 5:40pm later that day we will be back in Richmond, hopefully…
Fun fact about Ireland of the week: There are mangy dogs everywhere. They are dirty and seem to have their own idea as to where they are going. We saw three just hanging around the beach yesterday, and they are all over the cities, no matter where you go. It’s funny to see them because they are as strange to see all the time as the sheep everywhere. I wouldn’t recommend petty one, because we were accidentally following one on the street and I think it thought we were chasing it because it looked back and then crossed the street as best it could.
Home in four days, and everyone is either talking about what they are going to eat or what they are going to do (like drive their car around). I’m planning to make a trip to taco bell as one of my first things, as well as put on pj’s, jump into my warm waterbed, and play with my puppy.
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1/22/2007
I've had most of this written, but not posted, so there will be a few to come today!
1-16-07
Officially my favorite place that we have been this far is Killarney. The landscape was beautiful and additionally the amount of things we were able to see in one day was quite overwhelming.
Our first stop was at a church ruin, Aghadoe. Everyone walked through the huge graveyard and made our way down to the ruins of the normal castle, Parkavonear which was a circle style church.(Since I am unable to load my digital pictures to this computer, I'm linking some really great images of where we were, they look just like these images in person!)
Aghadoe: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikip.../Aghadoe_church.JPG
Parkavonear: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikip.../Parkavonear.JPG
Ross Castle was the next stop, and my favorite site on the trip so far. It's located on an island, which was originally a peninsula. The castle was well preserved, as it has not been in any great battles over the 4 centuries. The myth behind the castle is that the original clan, the O’Donoghue clan, was very superstitious, as with most Irish people we have discussed. They believed that the only way that the tower castle could be defeated was if a ship were to sail into the harbor where the castle was. Oliver Cromwell took them up on this fear, and had his men drag the parts to construct a ship all the way along either side of the banks, and then put the ship together to then sail into view of the castle. The family promptly surrendered, as the legend goes, and the castle survived being destroyed for more than 500 years, although it has been changed slightly over the centuries.
This castle was most interesting because of its purposeful design. Nearly everything had a purpose, rather than an aesthetic preference for being created in the castle. The staircase spiraled to the right so that intruders would not be able to use their swords as they ran up the stairs. The stairs themselves were called "stubble steps" because they were uneven in design so that unwanted guests would have difficulty when climbing upstairs. The windows were all "loop" windows, which allowed for arrows to fit, but nothing larger, and each had a hole slanting downward in the stone to allow for rain to be caught and return to the outside, keeping the rooms dry. The doors were cross platted to arm against weapons breaking them easily, and they were covered in long spikes on the front to avoid a blunt-thrust forced entry. The bedroom, which was the third floor, had a wooden floor instead of a stone one to decrease the amount of noise in the room, as well as to reduce the amount of stress on the walls of the tower, as wood is much lighter than the large stones which comprised the rest of the floors in the castle. One of the best parts of the castle was the guarderobe, or toilet. It’s a long corridor with a small room at the end to the right where there is a slab of stone, which would fit about three people, and the wall over the stone opens up to the castle floor below. It was created for multiple people to use it at a time, and they used moss as a means of toilet paper. BUT! What I found fascinating was that they built the corridor also because they would hang their clothes in it, and as the fumes from the human waste would filter back up the wall through the room it would contain a source of ammonia, which would kill off ticks and lice that would live in their clothes.
Everything about the castle was interesting, and the view was one to enjoy if not raining. Definitely my recommendation of a great site to visit.
Ross Castle: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wiki.../Ross_Castle.jpg
Our last two stops of the day were Muckross House and Muckross Abbey.
The house we were not allowed to enter because it was closed, but the view over the Killarney lake was amazing! IF you can come to the house, in it sold Victorian style, it’s a impressive site all around. The food inside the Muckross shop was great, and well worth the price. Also, there is a wool shop inside with great gifts and downstairs in the Muckros wool mills where a lot of people purchased the beautiful scarves and wool blankets made there.
Muckross House: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wiki.../Mucross_house.jpg
The Muckross Abbey is mostly a ruin, although they were doing renovations to it while we were visiting. It’s a peaceful place in the national park and the walk is nice if the weather is as well because it’s a bit of a walk. But the most fascinating feature of the abbey is the Yew tree inside the cloister. The tree rises straight out of the middle of the abbey, and you don’t barely notice it until you get inside and then it’s apparent how huge and old the tree is. You feel very small and young in this place.
Muckross Abbey: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wiki.../MuckrossAbbey.jpg
Check out the tree: http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/p/m/2fc232/
After tromping through two graveyards, a big house, a few castles, and some ruins we headed back to the B&B for some relaxation.
Killarney stands as my favorite place to see for historical sites in one day, as well as the prettiest place to drive through and stay for a trip.
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1/22/2007
Wednesday we watched “The Commitments”, which was mostly a lot of American soul music being performed by a group of Irish musicians. The lead singer Deco, played by Andrew Strong, had an awesome voice and I was jamming away with the movie.
Wednesday I got a taste of being sick in Ireland. A lot of the students have been getting sick, probably from being in and out of the rain and cold, and never being able to get really warm, but also because our bodies are use to the germs over here.
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Thursday we went on the drive around the Ring of Kerry and stopped into Daniel O’Connell’s house. The house was big and very lavish in decoration; you could tell it was a fancy sort of place. The view from the upstairs was lovely as you could see the huge waves crashing into the cliffs, with the background of the mountains not too far off.
Basically, because it’s an island filled with mountains, the main view is always beach-with big waves crashing into big cliffs, and always surrounded by mountains. The odd thing is seeing the mountains all of the time and the horizon at the same time. There’s nothing to block the view unless you’re in a city. It reminds me of being in New Mexico, but wet, cloudy, and green.
The Ring of Kerry would have been more interesting if it had not been raining and quite windy.
The best part of the day was when the students were challenged to throw a rock off a cliff and be able to hit the water below. The task did not seem impossible; yet, for all the efforts there was not a single person who could get a rock into the water. The cliff was probably a few hundred feet above the shore, but we had some guys that were hurling their whole bodies into the throw and just barley not flying off of the cliff when letting go. The wind was so strong that everyone was being blown into each other. Wind tunnels have nothing on Irish winds. It was fun to watch everyone try and retry, as well as the anticipation while watching to see if they would hit the water.
We ate at a good pub, The Blind Pipe, one of the best meals thus far.
We came home and a group of people left for a trip to Amsterdam for the weekend.
I got my sick head into bed and rested before I packed for Dublin the next day.
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1/22/2007
- 3 days will do, unless you’re in a hotel with your own bathroom and a place to eat, if you have either of those, then you might stay longer, but I was ready to leave by Sunday.
We took the train to Dublin, ran us each 62 euro because the Student cards that the school made us pay for do NOTHING for us here- in Ireland they don’t accept them because they were scammed a lot in the past two or three years- so do NOT purchase an ISIC card if traveling to Ireland.
The train ride was fine, the seven of us, Meg, Mallory, Allison, Ginny Neal, Kevin, John and I, slept most of the way there. Once in Dublin, we took the bus to our hostel, the Litton Lane Hostel.
For those who have seen the movie HOSTEL, I have not, but I can tell you that they are quite intimating from my experience, although I did not witness any torture while we were there.
Litton Lane Hostel is in the middle of Dublin, literally block away from the HUGE Spire (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:SpireOConnell.jpg) and by the O Connell Bridge over the Liffey River which runs through Dublin. We walked to our hostel from the bus stop, and on the way we experienced the stop lights which tell you when to walk/no walk. They are hilarious because you wait for the little red man to turn green and then you’re in a video game as the light starts ticking quickly like you’re in Frogger, which it feels like you are, Dublin is a colder version of New York. The cars don’t stop for you, and the roads are lined with warnings of “Look Right à” for those people, like myself and many others with us, who were nearly hit because the roads are opposite.
Once we reached our alley for Litton Lane everyone’s jaw dropped because it was a dark, sketchy looking alley, that didn’t seem welcoming in the slightest. We found the rules of the hostel much more welcoming, with 24 guards and a pass required to enter after 11pm. Our room was one dorm-sized room with eight beds bunked together in it. We realized quickly that we were not in the cleanest of places, with a community bathroom for the whole hall and comforters were obviously had not been washed in some time. I made the bad decision of looking into the pillow case, and promptly threw it on the floor where it belonged. The room was ours, and we didn’t mind having our two guys sleeping closest to the door “just in case”.
We began our day around Dublin with lunch at a little café type of place called Café Belle. It was a great meal at a great price, 6 euro for a huge salmon flaked sandwich with coleslaw and a little salad. Next we headed for St. Patrick Cathedral. A few of us didn’t go inside, b/c it was a bit costly, but the cathedral was beautiful even from the outside. We then traveled across town to Dublin Castle. Huge in size and a little confusing on what era the architecture was from because it had little flow about the buildings, but we made our way to Chester Beatty library. The exhibition available was on world religions, and explanations of each, with artifacts and beautiful things from the countries. I found it extremely interesting and enjoyable.
(Chester: http://upload.wikimedia.org/.../ChesterBeattyLibaryInside1.jpg)
We walked around a bit more and filtered in and out of some shops. We met the guys back at the hostel and then headed out for some drinks in the pubs. We went to the famous Temple Bar, which was packed and over priced, but was a great atmosphere and location. Then we met a friend from Macon studying in Dublin across the river for another drink where we met his friends who were all American and very nice. I headed home with some others for some sleep, as it was getting late and it’d been a long day, while others stayed out and enjoyed the craic.
The next day we woke up early and headed over to the museums. The National Art and History museums are both free and both VERY much worth the walk, which anything in Dublin is decently within walking reach.
In the History museum I saw preserved bodies (well parts of the bodies) and gained some great knowledge on how to make a man not able to be a king- you cut off his nipples- b/c back then they would kiss a kings nipples....also they had an Egyptian room with mummies and great scultures.
The art museum was great as well! I saw my first Picaso and Monet that I can remember, along with some other great names. And great portraits of the poets and artists like James Joyce and Shaw.
We then started our shopping and made our way after lunch- again very delicious and reasonably priced- to Trinity College where we looked around (there was a wedding going on which was funny to see), and then went over to the Guinness factory where we spent the rest of the afternoon.
Guinness factory is cool, very interesting and the best view in all of Dublin at the top in the Gravity Bar where you get your free Pint of Guinness – if you’re of age of course.
We made our way back home, changed, and went out on a Musical Pub Crawl. We made it to three different pubs that had been reserved for us for the night while we were there. The leaders were the two musicians, and they sang and played the “real “ things, not the crap that they trya dn sell in the store.
At one point, in the last bar, they asked for people to share a song from the “area” or country. A woman from England did, and then I got volunteered to sing a song. So I sang the only thing that came to mind, “Cant Help Loving that Man of Mine”, because I know it’s American and old. I saw a bit sick, but everyone seemed to enjoy it and I got a good deal of compliments which was nice.
We made our way to dinner, where we had bad pizza- IRELAND= BAD PIZZA, and then I headed off to bed as it was getting late, and wanted to catch an early train home .
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early train means 1pm, and that got us home- after a change in trains in Mallow, around 5 30.
I took my first hot shower – well shower period- in three days as soon as I got in, and then unpacked and waited for the others to come home and share their stories.
Dublin in great, a beautiful new-york style place filled with diversity and history. But bring lots of money- everything is expensive, be careful at night, and wait for the little green man to start the video game- or else you’re likely to see the front of a bus barreling at you!
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1/15/2007
The weekend was quite eventful.
Meg, Mallory, Kelly and myself got up early on Saturday morning, found the bus station and traveled to Cork to then travel to Blarney Castle. We met a very sweet Irish woman, probably in her 60's who was able to correct our travel a bit, seeing as we had had a mis-communication with the ticket lady at the bus station. We saw her later that day and she helped us once again when trying to find our bus back to Kerry out of the 10 or so buses that were flying in and out of the station.
The trip was three hours long, two hours longer than we had expected because the bus went all the way out to Killarney and then backtracked south to Cork.
The moment we got off the bus, we grabbed some info from the station and then just barely caught the next bus out to Blarney. Once we reached Blarney, we happily followed a group of people who looked like they were heading for Blarney Castle. 6 euro later, we were in Blarney Castle gardens.
Blarney Castle is a feat to be seen. It's HUGE, but still intact for the most part. The entry walk is beautiful, with a following river and huge trees overhanging the walkway. The castle is accompanied by a tower, gardens, and wishing steps further down the path.
The four of us took the journey up to the top of the castle. The stairs were not only windy, but became so narrow that by the end we were all walking sideways and squished into the wall on one side. The first step out on the top of the castle is a breathtaking view of Blarney and the whole garden area. By walking along the top of the castle we made our way over to kiss the Blarney Stone. As you sat down a man holds on to your waist and then while only holding onto a pole on either side, you lean all the way over the edge of an opening in the wall until you are incline with the stone and then give it a big kiss for good luck.
There was a lot of history to learn while at the castle;however, the bus schedule provoked us to return to Cork soon so that we could have time to get dinner around 1:30pm. The pub we ate at was cheap, but delicious! I had a salmon paste sandwich and salad (salad here is coleslaw and spinach lettuce), while the others had egg salad, as we all watched the soccer game that everyone in the pub seemed hypnotized by.
We'd mainly gone to Cork because it's said to be one of the best places to shop. However, this meant 'trendy' shopping, not authentic Irish shopping, which was what most of us wanted to do. I had better luck while we were in Dingle than in Cork, with Dingle being a port city and tiny compared to it, for neat things to buy.
By 3:30 we had exhausted ourselves in Cork, with little purchased, and caught the next bus home for another three hours ride back to Kerry.
The total cost of the day was just over 35 euro, or about 47$ roughly, and it was definitely worth it! Traveling here is the cheap part, eating is the most expensive thing!
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Sunday was uneventful for the most part. I slept in until 1:30, which was well needed seeing as I had not gotten a full night since we'd been here. (The rooms are cold here, and the beds are even colder at night, so waking up is no fun when it's only to shiver until you can get some clothes on.) I met the group for dinner at 1:45 and then a few of us ventured around Tralee together. No great things found on our walk, other than the museum, and a better understanding of how to get around the city.
Everyone has to keep a journal of their travels, so you can find a lot of the group sitting around journaling the days events, playing a game of pool (of which the balls and rules are slightly different here), having a pint, or just sitting around watching the three channels of tv that we get, if not out in the city.
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Monday found us at the local library where everyone was doing some research on famous leaders, places we are traveling, and history of Ireland. Our prof likes to let us on our own, so we have not seen him since, and wont until after dinner later today. We're watching an Irish movie later for class, and potentially having lecture, although we might end up in a pub for class, as we have with the prof. two other times thus far.
-I'm enjoying the food, but I think it is funny that the main things you will always see on a menu are 'Pork', 'Lamb', 'Seafood', and 'Lasagna'.
Also, one of my favorite things thus far is that the clocks are always wrong here. In Cork alone we saw four or five clocks on big churches and along the main roads that were on the wrong time or didn't work at all.
Now it's on to dinner with the group and prof. and tomorrow it's off to Killarney and then Thursday we travel to the Ring of Kerry :)
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1/12/2007
so today we spend the entire day traveling around the Dingle
Peninsula. One of the most beautiful days I've ever spent
traveling.
We saw the Minard Castle, as well as Tobar Eoin Baiste, or the well of
John the Baptist. We all drank the water from the well, for "good
health", and listened to the story of the sea and well while standing
next to the holy bush which was growing through the ivy tree, an
amazing site to see.
While twisting and turning along the tiny roads in our bus, the prof.
told stories and history of kings and princesses and druids. One
of the best places was where we could see "The Pregnant Nun" - which
was an island off the western coast that was a picture-perfect version
of a woman laying in the water with her hands over her pregnant belly.
More stories and some laughter ended us at a famous pub, known to have the BEST GUINESS in Ireland.
O'Neil's pub was great, everything "Irish" you would see in a pub, and
there was some singing, but mostly Guinness and the "craic" - or fun-
The wind, which was so strong on our first stop that all of the
grass was permanently bend over and grew that way, probably around 50
mph gusts where we were able to lean forward and be held up by the
force, was amazing all day long, and the only rain we experienced was
on the bus. The lack of rain our prof. attributes to his asking
John the Baptist to give us good fortune while we were traveling, and
we did have it!
More fun to be had this weekend, with many people traveling the sites until class resumes on Monday.
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1/11/2007
So the last day has been quite the adventure.
To sum things up in short, seeing as it costs a good bit of money to
use the internet here, I will be brief and leave out a good deal of
explanation.
- we all arrived in richmond at the proper time to leave for our flight
to Newark, NJ. We started off late, and they waisted time asking one person to offer
their seat because we were over the weight limit.
-As we were taxing to take off, the plane suddenly came to a halt and
the captain informed us that we were unable to fly to Newark because
they were under a 'ground stop'-
LONG NIGHT short, everyone on this tiny jet had to sit on the plane for
about 3.5 hours- with only peanuts and water to keep us company, and
not being allowed to get off the plane or move in any real way other
than standing up.
-When we did FINALLY get to Newark, we had to run up the gateway, have
the little cars waiting with attendants waiting for us, and then speed
over to our flight- which they were holding- all the way across the
airport.
-The flight to Shannon was HORRIBLE. The worst turbulence that the
'frequent fliers' could remember. It was like riding Apollo's Chariot
@ Busch Gardens for 5 hours. The food was welcomed, but not
satisfying. Sleep was impossible and unfulfilling for everyone it
seemed.
-We landed, obtained our wet baggage, that we were thankful to find
made the flight through all of the hustle-And boarded our bus for the
two hours drive to Tralee.
-On the way, most people passed out, while others listened to the bus
driver stumble over explanations of passing sites, in very
hard-to-understand Irish.
-We arrived later that morning. It was nearly 9am and the sun was still not up- a new site for me.
-The B&B we are staying is actually above a well-known bar in the
middle of the city called "The Whitehouse". It's cute, and fits
all of us, although it's continually cold and I have yet to be able to
find hot water.
-We had dinner at 2pm, which is customary, and then visited a local pub from 3 until now, approx. 5:30.
-The keyboards are strange here.
-Tomorrow we are traveling to the furthest west part of Europe that you can reach, Dingle Peninsula.
I'm excited, but exhausted, seeing as it's 1pm my time, and I haven't slept since yesterday morning.
-Hopefully as we all try to avoid the jet-lag by staying up tonight,
we'll all get some rest and have a great time tomorrow roaming around
Ireland in the wet and wind.
- I learned some new phrases... and the prof. has already pinned me as
"Katie Daisy"- which is a character in one of the pub songs that we
learned earlier this morning, in addition to singing, "Keep away from
red-haired Mary" to me as well :)
---so far so good!
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1/9/2007
It's the day before we head to Ireland and my mind is filled with anxiety, apprehension, as well as excitement. I've never flown over seas before- let alone been anywhere much in the US.
We leave tomorrow from Richmond around 5pm, flly to Newark, and land in Ireland around 8am the next day. From that point we hop on a bus, having just met our professor, and begin with our first day of class as we travel 2 hours from Shannon airport to Tralee.
All I know of the B&B where we are staying is that it is in Tralee and that breakfast will probably be provided...I think... I know we'll have roomates, and get to spend a good deal of time together as a group.
(Here's a pretty good map- http://www.countykerryholidays.com/images/mapirlsm.gif )
No idea as far as books, papers, lecture, traveling, or anything specific to the trip- they have kept us largely in the dark as to what we will be doing. So most everything will be a surprise and a new expereince!
Hopefully I'll be able to post twice a week or so, although I have no idea about what kind of internet access we will have!
But I look forward to going and to experiencing this with the other students.
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