Leaving my Dignity in Ireland

Rough freaking day.

This was not the day to be productive or even alive on only two hours of sleep.  My “to-do” list was about a mile long and I had absolutely no desire to tick off even one of them. I had to basically pack up my entire life for the past couple of months, ship some of it to Spain, some of it back to the states and the rest of it packed up in a bag to take with me for the next week and a half of traveling. Oh and I had to do laundry. And I had to clean. And I had to get us all on a bus by 4 PM.

HA.

Ya right.

Of course we missed our bus. But I blame it on Brian and Emily because they were sleeping and not motivating me to get shiz done. In addition, this was the windiest day of my life. I literally got knocked over at one point and I couldn’t hear myself think – not fun.

Fortunately, the guy at the bus station wasn’t too upset by us missing our pre-paid bus and let us on downtown instead of at the GMIT campus which was where I bought the tickets from. The bus ride was basically just an extension of our incredible day before and was 100% spent gossiping about the day/night before and how we were going to make sure we continued to live it for the next 10 days.

We arrived in Cork still in bad form, so we had a couple of beers and passed out, ready to catch our 5 AM (or some other ungodly hour) flight to Munich. 

Peace out Ireland. See you on the flipside.

Slan.

To Drink or Not to Drink: St. Paddy's Day 2010

 

I’ve heard plenty of mixed reviews about spending St. Patrick’s Day in Ireland.  Though it is a national holiday where most Irish are given the day off from work and school, I’ve still heard that it is more of an American holiday than an Irish one.  This was certainly confirmed when I arrived in Galway and spoke of the friends who were coming to visit me for the special day.  Mr G rolled his eyes and said he, himself, had never been to any of the St. Patrick’s Day festivities.  Hmm… Well.

I narrowed out staying the day in Dublin after I had heard that Dublin is just a collection of Aussies and American’s in town for the holiday.  I didn’t really fancy the idea of spending this day with anyone other than Irish people.  So I spent the couple of months I was in Galway making plans and scoping out details of what was going on in hopes that I could give my American visitors a good time.  Like happens with most of my plans, once we started drinking, there was no way we were following anything I had put together previously.

Originally, we were headed to the parade that was heading up Quay Street and Shop Street in Galway.  Originally, we were going to head from there, straight to the bars and the plan was to be sufficiently pissed by 3 PM.  From there, we would pop around from pub to pub in our Irish regalia causing a general ruckus.  Ya. No. None of that happened.

We woke up at noon; the parade was at 12:30.  Scratch that idea.  Rather than head into the pub immediately, we decided we would walk up to the corner store and buy some pre-game drinks and lunch.  We then sat down at the kitchen table with Mr. G and drank mimosas, Guinness and cider while chatting about God knows what.  After a couple hours, Mr. G disappeared and we decided we should make our faces seen since there was no point in spending the whole day drinking with ourselves.

The only part of my plan that did actually occur was going to see my friend Matt at the Salt House.  I had promised him that I would bring in my lot with our feather boas and dirty up his bar as much as possible.  After putting on his fake Irish beard hat, there wasn’t much left to do here though, so we headed in town for our pub crawl.

I won’t pretend to remember what happened at this point.  All I know is that we went into Sonny’s for ONE pint before heading to the next bar, but we never left.  In true drunken bullet point style, I will now recount the pieces of the night that I do remember:

• Tequila shots (at least 4 or 5)
• Running into a friend from Inishmore
• Making some new friends (where have you been the whole time I’ve been in Galway?!)
• One of new friends stealing Brian’s St. Paddy’s Day Hat and him replying “That man has my hat. Go get my hat.”

That’s it. Almost 10 hours of my life and that is most of what I remember. The rest I can’t disclose because I don’t want to embarrass Emily. But let’s just say that when the two of us arrived home on our own VERY early in the morning and found we were locked out of my house, we had PLENTY to talk about as we sat down the street for breakfast.

For those of you haters who say that St. Paddy’s Day is not fun in Ireland – I beg to differ. The only way you can NOT have a good time is if you suck because it’s difficult to make any holiday dedicated to drinking not be fun. 

And that’s my two cents.

A Long Day of Rest Before St. Patrick's Day

Even though we went home early, we were dead this morning. Absolutely dead. To avoid paying €25/day to park near the hostel, we had driven the car down near the hospital and parked in a neighborhood, about a 30 minute walk away from our hostel.  Brian and I walked this morning to get the car to come back and pick up Diana with all the bags.  Problem is, traffic was terrible. And on top of that, what I remember to be a 30 minute walk, was actually a little over an hour. So when we left our hostel at 8 to be back by 9:30 and at the airport by 10 to pick Emily up, we were WAY off. Fortunately, I got a message from Em saying that her plane was delayed and that she wouldn’t be in until closer to noon.  Since we actually left the hostel at 8:30, didn’t get to the car until 9:45 and then took an entire hour plus to get back to pick up the luggage (not leaving the hostel until 11:15) it was a damn good thing.

Regardless, we walked into the airport RIGHT when Emily was coming out of the gate and she was none the wiser (until I told her – which I should have lied and said we were waiting for hours).

Back in the car. We’re off to Galway.

The drive was fun and uneventful.  The middle of Ireland isn’t exactly the most amazingly beautiful, and in addition we were on a four lane motorway (which I hadn’t seen until then) so there wasn’t much to see.  We pulled off the main road for about an hour to grab some food in Raheen at the Mill and so Emmy could have her first Guinness in Ireland.  We also tried to do some castle chasing, but by the time we got to the castles, Diana and Emily were both asleep. Sad day.

We rolled into Salthill about 5 PM and got ready to go out before taking the car back to the rental hut when it was due at 6 PM.  When I tell you that the doors to the Budget office were locked and I literally had to knock the door to get the guys attention so I could give him the keys and NOT incur another day’s worth of charges – WHEW!

From here, we walked down to the Spanish Arch to grab a pre-diner pint and say hello to my good friend Aidan.  We had dinner at the Front Door and then went pub hopping in hope of finding some good trad session music.  We went to Neachtains, Massimos, Taaffes and finally ended up at Kelly’s for lack of other options.  Naturally, when we left Kelly’s around 3:30, we headed to get late night Cheese and Bacon Fries and home to rest up for the amazingly GIGANTIC St. Patrick’s Day festival we have planned for tomorrow. 

WOO ST. PATRICK’S DAY!!!!!!

What happened to that bottle of Jameson?

After the disaster that was yesterday, I felt I should be classy and take it easy today. So we didn’t start drinking until about 2.

After all, today was a day dedicated to drinking. We had prepaid for a tour of the Old Jameson Distillery as well as the Guinness Storehouse. After a hungover meal at McDonalds (and getting hit on by the embarrassingly attractive Scandanavian McDonalds counter boy) we stumbled our way to the Jameson Distillery for our Whiskey tour! Now, I had actually been on this tour already, but only part of it, and only on accident. When I came here by myself a long time ago, I wandered into the Jameson distillery and started following this group of people not knowing that they were there on a paid tour. Next thing I know, I’m being selected as a whiskey taster and being offered drink after drink by the bartender at the lobby bar. I honestly didn’t know that I had been on a tour I should have paid for, but this time, after about 10 minutes and realizing I’d already done this before, I felt a bit bad.

Regardless, the tour was amazing, even for a second time, and I paid a lot more attention this time. Diana was chosen to be one of the whiskey tasters so at the end of the tour, she got to do a blind taste test of Jameson, Johnny Walker and Jack Daniels. I don’t think she was too fond of the whiskeys, so she let Brian on the Trout finish them off and I think he was quite grateful. We met some really nice people from Canada and sat and chatted with them for a good hour sipping our free whiskey drinks (I picked Jameson and Cranberry juice. YUM!) before departing and making the walk to Guinness.

I knew this would be the highlight of Brian’s day, but I wasn’t sure he knew what to expect. I can’t speak for the kid, but I do think he had a good time, and judging by the amount of money he spent in the gift shop afterwards (including buying a Guinness tin whistle. Legend.) I think he was satisfied. We had our free pint of Guinness up at the bar on the very top floor which has amazing views of the city (and where Diana and I found quite a few nice things to look at inside as well). From here, we did even more walking, down to the Dublin Castle, to the old Viking Memorial which I still can’t figure out what it’s for, to Christchurch Cathedral and to St. Patrick’s Cathedral and park (my favorite in the city!) before heading to a Spar and back to the hostel to make some grub and get some work done.

One amazing thing about traveling with another travel blogger is that they understand (truly understand) when you have to sit down and write something. For me, it was putting the final touches on an article for Boots N All on the Irish language for St. Patrick’s Day. However, as expected, while I sat and wrote, Diana and Brian on the Trout drank an entire bottle of Jameson between the two of them and were, for lack of a better word, absolutely tanked.

I got jealous and needed to join, so we headed back to Temple Bar for some more Irish McLovin. We headed to a bar called Fitzsimmon's on the opposite end of Temple Bar which had a good live band going when we got there and we felt it a good place to sit for a bit. Only. Yet again. We never left. Diana (bless her) got us some friends by asking some random solo (gorgeous) boy at the bar if he would come sit with us because he looked lonely. He did (duh) and then his friends showed up (awesome) and they were amazing company. A French guy, a Spanish guy and a Hungarian girl – perfect. We had such an amazing time and the succession of musical acts playing were really great. I had a run-in with a drive by snogger on the dance floor and after about 5 or 6 tequila shots with Romaine for his birthday, we decided to head home around 3 or 4. Naturally, on the way, we made more friends. A bunch of Irish boys walking down the street heading back to a house party. Brian was riding the trout by this point (aka he had forgotten his own name he was so wasted) and I was thinking of poor Emily who we had to pick up at the airport the next day, so we politely declined and headed back to the hostel – but not before starting a fight in the street (some drunk man came up and started grabbing me and Knight Brian and my new troop of Irish man friends had their way with him – good job boys!).

This is going to be a long week.

How to go to Dublin and never leave the pub.

I’m starting to get super excited at this point. I have acquired Brian. And now we were on our way to Dublin to pick up Diana of D Travels Round. In two days, we’d be picking up one of my besties from college, Emily and we would be spending the week driving around Ireland partying our little heads off.

We left Belfast early because we needed to be in Dublin before noon to pick up Diana from the airport. Now, this was my first tweet-up, and I maybe didn’t tell Brian that I hadn’t ever, exactly, SEEN, Diana, before this day. So when I had to awkwardly admit at the airport, that I wasn’t 100% sure what she looked like, but that I had facebook stalked her before we left Belfast, so I should have a pretty good idea, I was expecting Brian to turn and run for the hills. But in perfect B Lee fashion, he shrugged his shoulders and said “I looked at her pics on facey too, I’ll help you find her.” Love this kid.

I think excitement is an understatement. When I saw Diana, it was like seeing a long-lost friend. I was dumb founded by how quickly we got along. It’s amazing what twitter can do. This is what the internet is all about. Embrace it. Oh and follow Diana if you’re not already @dtravelsround. Eh and while you’re at it, follow Brian too, because he’s funny (no pressure B Lee) and has great #songoftheday’s @brianonthebass. Plus, if you know his twitter name, later, when Emily and I start calling him Brian on the Bass, then Brian on the Trout, then Brian Rides a Trout, you’ll understand why.

Anyway. Dublin.

Mr G. has spent a lot of time convincing me that the only reason I am so obsessed with Dublin is that it was my first city in Ireland and rather than being obsessed with the city, I’m just obsessed with the country. He was wrong (Sorry, sir). I effing LOVE this city. We pulled in and wandered around looking for our hostel, which turned out to be right on the banks of the Liffey about a 3 step walk to the Temple Bar area. It was super cheap, really nice and just in the most perfect location. I was sad after not being able to book my favorite hostel, the Kinlay house, but I instantly felt relived that the Abbey Court Hostel was a good choice.

It was too early to check into the hostel so we decided to grab a bite to eat next door. We dropped our bags and Brian and I tipped our hats to Diana as she consumed her first (and I think, possibly, last) Guinness in Ireland and as she downed the Jameson shot like a champ with Brian on the Bass. We ate a bit, drank more, and then walked back next door to check into the hostel around 3 PM.

Time for a walk. Let’s go explore this amazing city.

My initial idea was to walk my little Irish virgins around the parts of Dublin we wouldn’t naturally cross when doing our beer/whiskey tour on Monday, so we walked up to the Spire, and then down towards the Temple Bar area. I suggested we have a beer at a pub in Temple Bar before we walk down to St. Patrick’s Cathedral. We stopped at the Auld Dubliner, so named because when you come here, you will not leave… ever… and eventually you will become and Auld Dubliner – or at least that’s what I think.

We arrived at the Auld Dubliner at about 3:30 PM. After about 3 hours, we just gave in that we weren’t going to leave and the following is what I recall happening next (the order, may or may not be chronological):

• Welsh boys in Dub for the rugby match buying us beer
• Showing every human who would listen how to stick a coin to the Budweiser beer tap
• Irish boys buying us beer
• Brian hitting on some German girl and her mom
• Walking up to a table of strangers and asking them if I could sit with them
• Diana finding a pilot boyfriend from Ohio (I think?)
• Waking up in the shower, fully clothed, soaking wet
• Mullets. Lots of mullets
• Singing very loudly in the streets

Anyway, word on the street is that I was in bed before 10 PM. Sounds like a productive day.

Trying to find normal in Belfast = Difficult

My first night in Belfast was hardly a day in Belfast. I arrived in the city just after dark, incredibly worn out after an incredibly long drive from Donnegal (including stops at the cliffs at Slieve League and a minor detour in Coleraine). I had to do some wandering after I found the hostel to find an ATM so I could pay them in pounds (of which I only had £10 left over from London/Luton). I found out quickly that the neighborhood I was in was a really cool one. I was right in the middle of the Queens University of Belfast so there were lots of little pubs, student centers, bars and large important looking collegiate buildings that were lit beautifully in the dark. I stopped briefly at a bar called the Globe for some dinner and then headed back to my hostel to write and go to bed early.

My second night in Belfast was after going to Scotland and picking up Brian and promised to be more exciting. Only. It wasn’t. Brian and I got to Ireland at about 1:30 PM. Naturally, his first priority was to have a Guinness (his first in Ireland). We walked around for about 2 hours before we ended up just coming back to the Globe to grab a snack (not really finding anything else that looked inviting or that offered snacky bar food). After this, we went back to the hostel, showered and changed and then plotted our big night out on the town. We left again, this time looking for a pre-dinner drink which we grabbed at a nice pub down the street called Auntie Annie’s that appeared to be having a rather large birthday party. They also boasted to have a full menu, but weren’t serving for whatever reason (it was only 9 PM). So we walked. And walked. We walked all the way downtown and back, twice. Literally. We couldn’t find a damn pub that just served quick food. By about 11:30, we were STARVING, thirsty and sick and tired of walking past closed restaurants, bars with no food and cocaine boasting night club after night club.

At this point, I’m getting REALLY cranky and I’m thinking Brian is rethinking coming on this trip with me. Finally, we found a fast food baked potato shop and walked in to order some baked potatoes which actually turned out to be some of the best hunger curing food ever. I got a giant spud with cheese and bacon (bacon cures all grumpiness). After this we headed back to Auntie Annie’s since that seemed to be a normal place and it was hopping. After closing time tho, at about 2:30, we headed back home and not out to the 4 or 5 “unce-unce” clubs we passed on the way home.

So by night #3 in Belfast, we were determined to find something more like what we wanted – a more traditional pub, more like what I was used to in Galway. A place where we could sit down at the bar or in a snug and have a Guinness with other normal people. At the suggestion of our wonderful Paddywagon tour guide, we headed to the Crown Liquor Saloon which is this REALLY amazing old bar closer to downtown with incredible architecture and the look and feel of an old saloon or soda pop shop. Very cool. Next door was Robinson’s which was a really cool pub with a great crowd, live music and a beautiful little courtyard outside. Finally. Brian and I finally felt at home and we instantly made friends with some Aussie kids at the bar (If there are Aussies in a bar, I will find you, and we will be friends – it’s just how life works). Belfast passes my Ireland test, though barely, and we catch a cab home late night and rest up for our early drive to Dublin in the morning.

Northern Ireland in a Day - Paddywagon Style

As a part of staying at Paddy’s Palace Hostel in Belfast, if you stay for two nights you get the option of going on a free Paddywagon tour up to the Giant’s Causeway, the Carrick Rope Bridge and Derry. Naturally, as a lover of free things, I was on board.

In addition to a day being driven around, I was really looking forward to a history lesson. When I first mentioned going to Northern Ireland to the boys back at the house, Mr. G shivered a bit and said something to the extent of “oh, well I’m not coming with you anymore then.” Turns out there is still quite a bit of animosity between the North and the South and him stepping out into Belfast with his thick Galway accent might cause trouble. I was instantly intrigued, as I love drama, and wanted to know everything I could about why everyone is fighting (and naturally, the Libra in me, try and fix it myself).

Our first trip was to Carrick A Rede, a supposedly “scary” rope bridge that links the mainland with a small tidal island used for fishing. I had heard from 3 different people that it was a must see stop and not for those with a fear of heights. I’m not sure what kind of drugs those three people were on, but this bridge was completely retarded. It’s not high off the ground, it’s not even really a rope bridge, it’s not the original, there is no pool of sharks with laser beams waiting to chomp your left foot off if you fall off the bridge and the island is about the size of a basketball court. Seriously? Seriously. B Lee and I were not impressed in the slightest and we cringed when we arrived at the bridge knowing that we had just paid €8 to hike 10 minutes uphill. The only thing of value that came of the side trip was an INCREDIBLY embarrassing picture of me jumping on the bridge resembling one of those troll dolls with bright pink hair we used to collect when we were teenagers. Hopefully Brian deleted it off his camera before Emily had a chance to take it and e-mail it to all of my potential future boyfriends.

Anyway. After the bridge we drove for another 20 or so minutes to the Giant’s Causeway which is a sort of geological wonder of the world where these large black stones formed in perfect pentagons. B Lee was hell bent on getting his picture taken in the exact place where Led Zeppelin took their album cover picture. Brian wanted to ask nearby women and children to take off their clothes so we could replicate it exactly, but I told him that I’m not friends with pedophiles and since he values my friendship so much (and my ability to drive him to Dublin) he didn’t. It was pretty windy and the causeway was one of those things that is only cool for about 20 minutes – especially since I left my camera in Scotland (good move, Hesser) – so we went in the little touristy restaurant and got a bowl of stew and a beer.

Now is where my interest peaked. The drive from Giant’s Causeway to Derry/Londonderry was about an hour and we got a thorough history lesson from our tour guide who had a really dry sense of humor that no one else on the bus seemed to get aside from Brian and myself. We heard about how recently the last bombing was in Belfast (2002) and the significance of the paintings on the sidewalks (if the town you’re driving through has it’s sidewalks painted red and blue, it means they are supporters of being a part of the UK and not the Republic of Ireland and if the sidewalks are painted Orange and Green it means the town supports the Republic). We heard all about Bloody Sunday which I will not recount because you are perfectly capable of clicking the link and reading the Wikipedia article yourself.

Originally, the town we were in was called Derry, but when England took control, they renamed it Londonderry. All over Derry, you see signs that say Londonderry and the “London” has either been painted over, scratched off or vandalized in some other way. There are remnants everywhere of conflict. There are some old derelict buildings, but mostly it’s graffiti. Graffiti everywhere supporting either side of the cause. We came to an area known as Bogside which is where a bunch of artists painted murals on walls of some of the horrific scenes of Bloody Sunday and just the conflict in general – including the sign that says “Now Entering Free Derry.”

Rather than go shopping or go to a museum (the two suggestions of our tour guide while we were in Derry after our little history lesson walking tour) we decided that our time was better spend in a pub watching the Ireland v. Wales 6 Nations Rugby match and drinking a pint. So that’s exactly what we did. Brian had his traditional Guinness and Jameson shot (I told him he doesn’t have to do a shot EVERY time he orders a beer, but it’s B Lee and he insisted that it’s necessary) and I had a cider. I felt bad for a small moment that we weren’t doing something more traditionally touristy, but then I quickly reminded myself that the reason I came to Ireland in the first place was to soak up the culture, this part of the culture, not to spend day after day in museum or on cheesy (I mean, incredibly entertaining and informative) bus tours.

So I finished my cider, and ordered another.

Scotland. Or Anywhere. It doesn't really matter.

Almost a year ago exactly, I was standing in a pub in Wrigleyville, Chicago spending the week of St. Paddy’s Day with Brian, Tom, Dave and Greg. Naturally, as happens when you are traveling, we began discussing our next trip. That conversation morphed into a discussion about where we would spend St. Paddy’s Day next year. Naturally, the idea of spending the day in Ireland was thrown out and with raised eyebrows we discussed how possible that actually was.

“We’re doing it. That’s it. No matter what, we’re going to Ireland next year,” Brian says, suddenly. And I agree. Who knew it would actually happen.

After I decided to retire at the end of 2009, it was pretty easy to decide where I would call home first. Ireland was an easy choice. The visa requirements for Ireland are much easier than for other countries in Europe. I had been to the island before, knew I loved it and knew I needed to live there for a bit to see if it was just a dream I’ve built up over the past couple of years, or whether this really was a place I could call forever home.

Though three of the five ditched (thanks guys), Brian came through (surprise, surprise) and I was also able to convince one of my besties from college, Emily, to come along as well as Diana of www.dtravelsround.com. Emily and Diana were meeting us in Dublin a couple of days later, but Brian decided to fly in a bit early into Glasgow, Scotland so we could visit our beloved roadtrip friend, Mark, who lives in Glasgow and who you might remember from the epic journey Brian, Dan, Mark and I took from LA to Canada in a weekend.

I flew from Belfast to Prestwick and took the train up to Glasgow to meet with Brian, who was flying in from Los Angeles, and whom I hadn’t seen in almost 6 months – which in my books is a hell of a long time for one of your best friends. The poor kid was quite a wreck when I met him. He hadn’t slept at all on the flight over and looked like he might die. We grabbed some beers and grub at a restaurant downtown while we waited for Mark to get off work.

The rest of our trip was pretty much amazing. We saw a little of Glasgow on the day of our arrival and then Mark drove us to Edinburgh the following day. We spent the whole afternoon talking, walking and taking in the beautiful city.

We had an absolutely incredible dinner at one of Mark’s friend’s restaurants in Glasgow with Mark and his girlfriend Nicola (who is absolutely amazing). Mark’s friend and his dad (who is an Italian immigrant) have an amazing Italian restaurant in Glasgow and they gave us the royal treatment. We had so much food, we were bursting and the conversation was so entertaining as we heard stories of Mark when he was growing up and got loads of stories about living in Italy.

This trip was less about seeing Scotland as it was about being with friends and it was a perfect change of scenery for me as I haven’t seen a familiar face in a long time. Though this trip could have taken place anywhere in the world and it wouldn’t have changed much, spending time with these cool cats was something I was really looking forward to. I still think back to the time when I met Dan and Mark, at a bar in Santa Monica via Couchsurfing and how, even though I’ve only spent two short weekends with Mark in my whole life, I still feel like he is a really close friend. It’s crazy how this twisted little world works. But I love it.

Thanks for an amazing time, Mark. Love you to bits.