Family Vacation

My family has Irish ancestors. So when an opportunity came up to go on an Irish tour, we decided to go as a family. We were a lovely boisterous group of seven canucks.

My siblings and I tend to be a little loud as a group. We laugh loudly, discuss things enthusiastically, and generally have a lot of fun. We fit in well in Ireland.

My sister and I took a “Viking Splash Tour”, which is just an excuse to have a quick ride around Dublin in a silly yellow boat/truck. We got to wear badly fitting Viking hats and startle people on the street by yelling at them like drunken raiders.

We learned absolutely nothing, but had a ball.

And we went to see the National Leprechaun Museum – which, despite its name, is not for children. We clambered on oversized furniture and rode down a rainbow to the pot of gold, but the stories told on the tour were scary and occasionally gory.  Not for the Irish are the pretty fairies of Disney fame. The faeries of Ireland are pale and ugly, living underground and taking children from their beds. And the secretive little leprechauns were vengeful when captured. The best that could be said about the little men was that they were excellent cobblers. That’s how they earned the gold in their rainbow pot: they played music to make the faeries dance until their shoes wore out, and then turned around and charged the faeries to fix them. Hmmm. Sounds like some businesses I know….

Unlike their leprechauns, the Irish are very friendly.  Every single resident that we saw smiled at us and usually wanted to engage us in conversation. Cab drivers especially would go on at length on any subject. But even people on the street were eager to stop and chat, and answer questions. One fellow even slipped my brother a bottle of moonshine to sample. 

Yes, we fit in very well in Ireland.

The friendliness of the locals seemed at odds with the strife that Northern Ireland went through not too many years ago. Even after 20 years, there are still pockets of resistance to British rule, and many of the buildings hold reminders of the messy war. 

In Befast, the police stations are wrapped in chain link fencing topped with razor wire. 

And even the townhouse that we stayed in had broken glass and barbed wire at the top of the courtyard wall.

You can’t say that the townhouse in Belfast was a small house. It had 6 bedrooms after all, plus a kitchen and 2 living rooms. It was tall and narrow, running 3 stories high with no basement, and I would be surprised if the entire dwelling was 16’ wide. That made for small rooms and cozy living arrangements. Good thing we all get along so well.

Despite the limited indoor area, I understand that 2 living rooms are common. The one is for family use, and the other to be kept in pristine condition for when guests drop by.

As we were travelling, I noticed that there was a pattern emerging. Each area, be it county or city, claimed to be better than any others. Only theirs had the best local produce, or the best sports team, or the friendliest citizens, or the best whatever. And in each city was the best or the oldest pub.

We, of course, had to test out each pub claim.

A lot of the Irish culture seems to center around drinking.

They are known for their famous Guinness beer and their Irish whiskey. One wonders about the state of the society when there are two or three pubs on every block. We even drove through one little town of maybe 6 or 7 blocks, and counted 31 pubs or drinking establishments. 

We fit into this type of atmosphere perfectly. 

Imagine our delight when we learned that they serve whiskey as an accompaniment to porridge!

In Irish vernacular, they have what they call “the craik”, pronounced  “crack”, which means having fun in a group with drinking and boisterous laughter.

I think we have it nailed.

W

Irish Country Road Bus Tour

It rains in Ireland.

 An awful lot, actually. It rained at least a little every day that we were there. Sometimes it was just an isolated case of fine, misty drops, sometimes it was a five minute downpour.  Sometimes it was an all day drizzle.

This is the reason that everything is so green. 

The mountains are green, and there is an incredible variety of green shades throughout the countryside. The first thing I saw, breaking through the clouds on the airplane’s descent because it was raining, was the patchwork of the farmer’s fields.  

So much green.

We are on holiday!

Which sounds really funny from a couple whose whole life is spent on the road, traveling around. But this time we didn’t have to plan our stays or book our stops. 

We took a 10 day bus tour around the island of Ireland, so we didn’t even have to drive.  It was a nice rest for my hubby, who does the majority of the wheel time when we travel at home. And the challenge of driving on the “wrong” side of the road, down narrow country roads, was in the hands of a professional. 

Our driver was excellent.

The rural roads are so narrow, without any shoulders at all, that 2 buses passing each other have to slow way down to avoid clashing their mirrors together.

 On the hardy western coast the sharp turns required expert manoeuvres. There was one spot that the driver’s side of the coach was almost brushing a rock wall while the other was inches away from the edge of a steep cliff, all at the same time that he was conducting a sharp hairpin turn. 

We, the passengers, applauded.

During the less exciting parts of the drive, our tour director would read us Irish stories, or play Irish music to keep up the ambience.

Our tour director was interesting. His name was, quite appropriately, Patrick. He had an artistic background, having been an actor and director, and he lent those stories the feeling and the realism that kept us mesmerized. 

He was also a little flamboyant, mainly in his brightly coloured shoes.  

Which of course, I envied.  Just a little.

He directed us to all the best castles, and ruins, and scenic sights. Of which Ireland has many.

Every town, no matter how small, seemed to have its own castle, church or a ruin. 

And so much of the old structures were made of stone. There were old stone houses, old stone walls along the roads, and old stone pubs. 

It shows that the stone masons knew what they were doing, that so many of those are still standing many centuries later.

Apartment buildings are not favoured in this country, so in the city homes are generally built as townhouses.

And since you have a long street of these identical tall buildings, they paint each door a different colour. 

Probably so they don’t get lost coming home late from the pubs.

Sheep are everywhere in the rural areas. If they are in a field, it is bordered by hedges or rocks.

But many times they are just allowed to roam up in the mountains, or even along the roadsides. 

At least when they are on the road, they are quick.  We only had to brake hard for one or two during our trip.

There were many highlights of this trip. Castles could be one. How many castles did we see during our bus drive? We stopped to look at nine castles.

I know there were others that we passed, but after awhile it was, “oh, it’s just another castle”.  

The exception is Blarney Castle.

Because of the Blarney Stone, it was a level above the others. 

Despite the very high, very narrow steps to the top of Blarney Castle, I did ascend to the turrets and kiss the stone. 

They actually pay someone to sit at the Stone and hold your waist while you lie on your back, in the most awkward position possible, and give the stone your juicy salutation.

Trying not to think of all the other people in front of you who shared their germs first. 

After all, it’s the experience that counts, right?

Another highlight was the explanation of the game of “hurling” that was given us one afternoon.

It is a distinctively Irish game that involves a flat stick, a hurley, that is used to scoop the small, hard ball off the ground, bounce it in the air, and then hit it like a baseball towards the goal and the poor goalie. Then everyone tears off after it like in hockey, except that the players aren’t penalized for hitting other players with their hurley stick as long as they are “trying” to get to the ball first. The fellow demonstrating the game mentioned that players are often black and blue the next day. 

There is no professional game of hurling. The players are not paid, and will limp into work again on Monday. And amazingly, they then encourage their children to play.

So we saw old and new architecture and learned a new sport.

But then there was the natural world of Ireland. 

Like the 700 foot high Cliffs of Moher tower over the North Atlantic waves.

It seems that they lose the occasional tourist here. Some people just have to go to the very edge to get the best pictures.

The Giants Causeway is built of volcanic lava that cooled in columns.

When you see them from the top, they are reminiscent of stepping stones, which is where their name comes from.  

I wish that our visit hadn’t coincided with one of the irish downpours. It would have been fun to get closer to them, but during a rainstorm, they are notoriously slippery.

We also stopped at an avenue, far from the city, that had 200 year old beech trees embracing over the roadway.

Our knowledgeable tour director said that these particular trees were featured as The Dark Hedges in a “Game of Thrones” show. 

Our hotels during the trip were good, upscale places with all the usual amenities.

However, I could have done without the TVs in our hotel bedrooms. It is too attractive to watch the shows and the news until late at night. And the 6:15 wake up calls were brutal if you did. Hmmmm.  

Did I say it was a holiday? Yes, but one that you had to set an alarm for in the morning. Breakfast was usually served at 7:30, and you had to be showered and dressed with your suitcase packed and outside your door by then.

The only disappointment for me in the whole trip was not stopping for long within the town of Limerick. We only had one quick stop along the side of the road to take pictures of "another" castle, and only to “flash and dash”, as our tour director said. But I did catch a picture of a sign in the area:

Back to the rain that makes Ireland so green. An excursion on our own, for a walk in a new town, can often end up wet. A quick 20 minute trip to a store, although started when the sun was shining and the sky was blue, ended with a downpour long before we even got to the retail area. This happened more than once. Eventually I noticed that the locals always carried umbrellas.

Maybe one day I will be smart enough to do it too.

W

Drinking Games

Everybody’s got their own version of a drinking game.

About a hundred years ago or so, some people had the idea that banning the sale of alcohol would be fun. Even worse, they convinced the government that it was true. It was the Prohibition drinking game, only fun for the underground bars and smugglers.

I’m sure glad I wasn’t around in those days.

The game lasted 13 years. It probably took that long for the government to realize how much money they lost out on in taxes.

Since then, it has been quite the business making alcoholic beverages.  And I, in particular, appreciate that.

For one of our drinking games, we stopped at a brewery to visit the home of one of hubby’s favourite tipples.

The town of Pottsville is in a deep valley within the Pennsylvania hills. The streets of the town are very steep and many of the buildings are built into the surrounding granite.

Yuengling Beer was first produced in Pennsylvania by a German immigrant in 1829. The company has survived for all those years since, even during Prohibition when they brewed a much smaller amount of beer for “medicinal purposes”. They credit their survival to the creativity of the owner, who repurposed the plant to produce ice cream during those trying times.

We joined a tour group that was escorted down to the original tunnels under the brewery. They kept the beer down there to keep it cool even in the summer heat in the 1800’s when there was no electric refrigeration.

These tunnels were carved out by hand and pick ax, and still show the marks of the hand tools.

Before trying out the product, we were shown the new bottling areas, where the machines do all the work and the human employees supervise. 

I sure wish there had been a machine or conveyor belt to help us lug the 2 cases of 24 bottles that we carried out to our truck afterwards. 

Uphill. 

That part of the game wasn’t so much fun.

But now that hubby was supplied, it was time to satisfy the wife with the wine drinking game.

So after crossing back into Canada, we parked for a time at a winery in Picton. 

The Devil’s Wishbone winery is located about 5 kilometers from the Glenora ferry on the Bay of Quinte. It is a small and intimate operation compared to the bigger vineyards of the Niagara region.

They parked us in a field at the front of the property and overlooking the Riesling and Pinot Noir grape vines. 

This was early spring, and so the grapevines were still in their winter dormancy. It's exciting to see their potential!

Put my hubby anywhere that there’s work to be done, and he does it. The spring weather so far had not been conducive to working in the fields and the work of uncovering the vines and pruning them was far behind where it should be for the month. 

Although April showers continued to dog us, we did take advantage of the few dry days to get out among the rows to help remove last year’s canes.

Removing the canes was not easy. The tenacious grape vines tendrils would twist themselves around everything and had to be cut away from their supports. These tiny tendrils were often as tough to cut as wire, and we were precariously standing on top of their muddy base. 

It was a much easier job bottling last year’s crop inside the winery buildings. Because it is a smaller winery, there is very little automation. The procedures are very similar to those of the local “U-Brew” that we used to use, back when we tried to save money by making our own wines. 

I got to sanitize the bottles on a squirty thing before letting them drip dry on a “bottle tree”.  Hubby handled the corking lever with his usual finesse.

It was all fun and games for us. We don’t have to do this all year long.

But at last I could see an end result: wine in a bottle, almost ready for the games to begin!

The best drinking game at the winery is in the tasting room. It’s where one can enjoy the fruits of our labours and be the winner of the game every time.

I just want to play this game over and over and...

w

Transit

When in Rome, do like the Romans.

When in Washington, DC, take the transit. Trust me. You do not want to drive, or worse, park, in downtown Washington.

Transit in the city is widely available and fairly easy to navigate. It’s not nearly as complicated as all the transit maps make it seem. Even I could figure it out. And there is a reloadable payment card that you can use both on the subway and on the bus so you don’t need to carry cash.

From where we were camped, we would walk down this lovely wooded path to the road bordering the park and would catch a bus to the metro. It was only a 5 minute ride, and we were greeted by a very friendly fellow passing out free newspapers. What’s not to like?

A half hour ride on the subway got us right downtown to the National Mall where all the museums are. We took that particular route several times.

Our starting point on the metro system was in the north, in Maryland. There are actually 5 different metro routes that crisscross through DC .The longest transit trip we took was to the farthest western outskirts. It was to see the off-site portion of the Air & Space Museum located in Chantilly, Virginia. The jaunt south on our local line and the transfer to the end of the west line got us as far as Reston, Virginia. 

That part of the trip took one and a half hours. The bus that took us the rest of the way was almost an hour itself! It severely cut down on our museum time, because we knew that the return trip would be just as long. 

But we got to see some awesome flying machines in that place. It was huge! Big enough to hold the Discovery space shuttle, an Air France Concorde supersonic jet, the Enola Gay fighter, and hundreds of other fliers: helicopters, gliders, and everything in between.

Speaking of high fliers, some commuters in the capital city of the United States are a little more elitist than others. While walking through the cherry blossoms near the tidal basin downtown, multiple helicopters buzzed overhead, back and forth.

We were in the wrong area to see if any of them originated from the White House.

No matter how happy we are with taking transit, there are some places that it’s just not worth it. We drove to the National Arboretum because it only took 10 minutes compared to the hour long subway to bus transfer we would have had to incur. And parking there was free and plentiful. It may have been because not a lot of the flowers are in bloom yet, but that was okay by us. We still saw dogwood trees and lovely azaleas in full colour.

We would have gone there just for the bonsai trees. There was one that was greater than 400 years old.

The one I’ve shown is a youngster at only 150 years old. It is a Japanese Cypress tree and stands about a foot and a half tall.

Our last transit trip to Washington was to watch the Cherry Blossom Parade. It was a chilly 6C with a breeze that played havoc with the big floating balloons.

It wasn’t a particularly big parade, in number of participants, but it took 2 hours. They scheduled long breaks between each section of 3 displays; usually a band, a group of dancers, and a float or big balloon. Then another 3 or 4 minute break. It must have been hard on the kids watching. A lot of them dressed up in cherry blossom head bands for the event.

We just dressed in warm layers.

Our next commute will be to Ontario.

Look out Canada, we’re already in transit.

W