FAITH N' BEGORRAH - IRELAND FOR 18 DAYS!

Welcome to Ireland!!

PART I - THE NORTH 

After the Highlands of Scotland, I was looking forward to returning to Ireland. It has been 12 years since I first was here.  I came for a photography workshop that was based out of Westport, in the Republic. During that visit, I explored not only the west coast, including the Cliffs of Moher but also the Aran Islands, Waterford, the Wicklow Mountains and Dublin.

My husband's mother's family were Tobin's from Country Cork and it's always fun to see that name on signs or meet people who are probably in some way related. I was told that everyone in Ireland are related somehow!

This time I wanted to visit The North, so I flew into Belfast. I was met at the airport by the lovely, and extremely talented Ruth Forrester, an internet sewing friend and fellow blogger, who I had emailed from the States to say I was coming to Belfast and would love to meet her and buy her a cup of tea.  I'll tell you a little bit more about my welcome and Ruth when I tell you about the people I met.

Ruth whisked me away to a wonderful craft fair where demonstrations of beading and weaving, quilting and quilling, spinning and wood-carving were ongoing in at The Ulster Folk and Transport Museum.  This  museum of international renown, is regarded as being amongst the best of its kind in the world. Set in over 170 acres of rolling countryside overlooking Belfast Lough, visitors can wander through the past and discover how people lived and traveled over the centuries.

The Folk Museum tells the story of life in early 20th century Ulster. A bygone era is recreated in a rural landscape of farms, cottages, traditional crops and local breeds of livestock. A typical Ulster town of the early 1900s is brought to life with homes, shops, workplaces, churches and schools. Costumed visitor guides, working buildings and exhibits, as well as the chance to touch, hear and do, bring history to life for visitors of all ages.

For my 2 nights in Belfast, I stayed in an old, Victorian house where I had to lug my suitcase up 3 flights of stairs and share one bathroom with five other guests. Not quite as advertised on their AirBnB listing, but a good breakfast, this one I wouldn't recommend, so I won't share the link.  But the location was good as it had bus access directly to the center of Belfast right outside the door.

I decided to take the  double-decker Hop-On-Hop-Off-Bus for an hour and a half tour of the city.  These buses give you the option of getting off at any of their numerous stops along the way, then hopping back on the next bus when you are ready to move on.

It was a very cold, gray, windy day but I chose to sit outside, on top so I could see lots of the city.  Stops included Belfast Castle, the Titanic Quarter, Stormont (the Parliment), the Falls and Shankill Roads, the Peace Wall and the murals and the huge security gates that are still in place.

Stormont

Titantic Quarter

Woman with Hula Hoop!

The ramparts of Belfast Castle

The North of Ireland is part of the United Kingdom and still, if not as loudly and forthrightly, are still engaged in what has for years been known as the troubles.  Though there are no longer armed guards separating the Protestant and Catholic areas of Belfast (my tour guide was very proud to point that out) or guarding the borders between the North and the South (The Republic of Ireland), once evening falls, there are still areas that you do not enter or lines you do not cross, depending on your political and religious leanings.  

                      

                 

After 2 days in Belfast, it was time to pick up my rental car and set off to the far northern coastal areas.  But let me digress a bit and tell you about renting a car in Europe - specifically in Ireland.  DON'T!

I was told by a lovely Irish woman I met while in Germany teaching that the best deal was to rent through Rentalcars.com.  They will find you the best rate with the best company.  So I booked a tiny, 2-door, stick-shift KIA for $431.88 for 16 days.  That came to $26.99 a day plus gas - reasonable, I thought.  So off I go to the SIXT Car rental office to pick up my car.   This is when the s--t hit the fan and you find out that there is a few more added fees you didn't know about.

Now I already knew that not one American credit card company will cover the liability waiver in Ireland.  Why?  Don't ask me, they just don't.  They don't cover Jamacia either.  So I had to purchase a daily, full-coverage liability insurance for 16 days. Then there was the fact that I was going to drive the car 'across the border' into The Republic and that was an additional daily fee.  Don't forget taxes and VAT and, and, and.....for an additional total of $643.90!!!  I am now up to $1075.78 for 16 days or $67.23 a day for the pleasure of wandering around on tiny, winding, badly marked, in some cases, one-lane roads for the next 16 days, all the time driving on the WRONG SIDE OF THE ROAD!  The only good thing was they felt sorry for me and upgraded me to a 4-door which got 50 MPG, so  my gas costs were quite small - in comparison.

My little Kia with steering wheel on the Right (wrong) side.
Can't tell you how many times I got in on the left side of the car to dirve!

I would have loved to have saved the expense of the car - and the stress which was a really huge part of driving here - but I could never have gone to the places I went, nor seen the sites I saw without a car.  So in the end, it was worth it - until I had to return it to Belfast on my final day in Ireland, instead of Dublin, which I was near where I was staying, because they wanted another $200 for drop-off in a 'foreign country.'

So I drove 2 1/2 hours back to  Belfast, arriving in the middle of morning rush hour.  OMG! -  I have never been so happy  to have a smartphone with GoogleMaps in my entire life!  I also learned, after-the-fact, that there are no gas stations along their highways, so I arrived without a full tank of gas.  When I learned the closest gas station where I could fill up was 8 miles away on a busy highway near the airport, I said 'please take an additional $45, I refuse to get behind the wheel again!'  I then took a cab to catch a bus to the Dublin Airport (returning along the same road I had drove on) to catch my flight to the Isle of Man.

But whoa - first we have to go back to where I started my driving adventure - picking up the car and heading North!

After studying my map in great detail, knowing I wanted to take the A2 coast road all the way up to Portrush, I said a prayer, got in the right/wrong side of the car and off I went.  I had just made it out of Belfast proper and was driving through the first medium-sized town of Carrickfergus when I glanced to my right and there it stood - my first medieval Irish Castle!

Carrickfergus Castle

Though I didn't have the time to take the self-guided tour, I did learn that this castle since it was first built in 1178 has remained fully garrisoned for 750 years until 1928.  It was besieged in turn by the Scots, Irish, English, and French and saw action right up to World War II.  Cool!

Now I left the 'big cities' and with them, the roads became much narrower and more winding.  Of course, round-a-bouts take the places of intersections with stop lights being almost non-existent.  I drove slowly up the coast, hugging the sea and stopping to take photos whenever the mood struck.  I stopped for a great little lunch at a local pub in Ballygalley and of course, had to take a pix of the quote above the bar.  

I arrived at my wonderful AirBnB in Portrush just a wee bit late, but could not have been more thrilled with the location, my room or my host!  Whiterocks Beachhouse was exactly what I hoped it would be - and more.  

The location was in the middle of all the places I hoped to visit - Giants Causeway, Bushmills, Dunluce Castle.

My room had huge windows overlooking the 5th hole of the Royal Portrush Golf Course, a links course and  home of the 2019 British Open, and the Atlantic Ocean - wide open to all the way north to the Artic Circle.

  

There was a white sand beach that was open for miles where the beautiful racehorses were brought each morning to exercise and run.

As evening closed in on my first night, the sun chose to put to on show of colors as it went down behind the faraway hills of Donegal while my host Ian and I sipped a wee bit of Jameson's and swapped stories of our lives.

My Canadian friend Linda had originally planned to join me for my Irish sojourn and that was why I had booked an entire week in one place.  When her plans changed, I thought why not just stay, relax, read a couple of books and take in the sites of the area?

Carrick-a-Rede Rope Bridge

Rocks at Giant's Causeway

Backside of Giant's Causeway

Whiterocks Beachhouse had other guests while I was there for my week and I got to be friends with a couple from NYC and a solo woman traveler from Portland, OR.  We decided that exploring together would be more fun so off we headed to Giant's Causeway, the Carrick-a-Rede Rope Bridge (no, I did not walk across this bridge - photo only!), the Bushmills Distillary and a delicious dinner at The Harbor Bar in downtown Portrush.

Bushmills Distillery

My friend from Portland and I decided that one day should be devoted to exploring Londonderry/Derry.  We chose to go by train as the ride there from Coleraine is said to be one of the most scenic in all of Ireland.  We lucked out with a bright, sunny day and enjoyed taking the Free Walking Tour.  We climbed a short flight of stairs and slowly strolled all around this fortified city on top of the city walls.  The Troubles played a big roll again in this divided city and murals depicting those times are still very visible.  They recently erected The Peace Bridge which spans Louch Foyle and has had such famous 'crossers' as Bill Clinton, Martin Luther King, Jr., David Cameron (British PM) and Courtney Cox (who married a guy from Derry).

The City Gate

Walking on top of the wall

St. Columb's Cathedral - Erected 1628

 

Counsil Housing

Beautiful little church in a quite corner of the city

The Peace Bridge

On my last day in Portrush, I walked just up the road a piece to the ruins of Dunluce Castle and village.  They had a great Visitors Center where the history of this one-time home of the notorious pillaging and plundering MacDonald clan  could be explored.

Walking back to my BnB via the cliff path I was sad to be leaving The North but excited to grab the ferry and head to Donegal and my drive along The Wild Atlantic Way!

OPPS!  I almost left out one of the most interesting places I visited - DARK HEDGES. I met a new friend for coffee and we went to see this site the morning I was leaving Northern Ireland.  This was the location for several of the Game of Thrones episodes. When you see these trees and think what the 'throne' looks like on this HBO series, you can see why they chose this road!  It is now protected by the National Trust as a historic site.  The trees are 100's of years old and were the entrance to the very elegant Georgian mansion pictured below - which is now the clubhouse for the golf course.  

Because of the length of time I spent in Ireland and all the places I went and sites I saw, I couldn't begin to put it all in one blog!  So I'm doing 4 blogs on Ireland. The 1st is The North.  The 2nd will be The South - The Wild Atlantic Way and the 3rd will be The People.  

The Highlands of Scotland

Though I really don't like group tours; though I really don't like bus tours; I chose to take a bus tour of the Scottish Highlands because I wanted to see as much as I could in the 4 days that I had.

So I booked a Haggis Tour of  the Western Highlands, including the Hebrides and the Isle of Skye.

This was our bus -

Our bus was filled with 22 others from Germany, Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia, the States, and even Scotland.  Here we are having so much fun riding along as Greg, our Scottish driver, tells us what we are seeing in an accent so thick that I get about 1 out of every 5 words.  

We spent 5 days riding, taking one of the roughest 3-hour ferry rides ever to the Hebrides (waves up over the windows!)  seeing Highland cattle, old churches, Fairy Pools (Scotland has fairies!), mist-covered mountains, teenage boys in kilts and tennis shoes, beautiful castles, the famous Outlander Circle of Stones, tombs of long-dead knights, large, quite battlefields where ancient wars were fought (Culloden) and ending with the happy face of the Hairy Coo. 

During all this time, we spent our nights in hostels (never again!).  First 2 nights - 9 women, one room and one bathroom!  NEVER AGAIN!  Second 2 nights - 2 women - 2 men!  NEVER AGAIN - but actually not nearly as bad as 9 women, except the shower in the bathroom next to our room was out-of-order.  

Did I have a good time?  Yes.  Did I meet some really interesting people?  Of course!  Did I get to see the mystical, misty Highlands I'd read so much about? You bettcha!   Would I take another group bus tour?  Probably not!  Was I happy to return to Edinburgh and hop the plane to Belfast to start my Irish adventure - Yep!

So below are photos of just some of wonderful  the places I saw and of course, my favorite cooooos.  Enjoy!

Until next time....

Mooooooo

Fàilte Edinburgh!

This gentleman was playing his bagpipe on the corner as I hopped off the bus downtown Edinburgh for the very first time - what a wonderful welcome!

I had been booked for a 2 1/2 week housesit in a beautiful home in the area of Morningside, a short bus ride to the center of this ancient city.  With the mighty castle dominating the city center, overlooking both the Old and New towns, it is always in photos - no matter which direction you are pointing your camera.

A wee bit about my housesit - interesting.  It began with my being asked to sit for 2 Jack Russells and 1 miniature chihuahua. Things changed when I received an email saying that I would be sharing the house and the sit with a woman from New Zealand as the homeowner did not want the tiny little dog ever left alone - day or night.  Elizabeth and I exchanged emails - she is a retired teacher, in Edinburgh to visit her son and new granddaughter and we agreed we could easily handle the house care,  2 terriers, and one tiny chihuahua.

But about 2 weeks before the sit was to begin, Elizabeth and I each received another email from the homeowner stating that she had decided to put the terriers into the kennel and had asked a mother and daughter to also stay at the house (thank goodness, it was a big house!) with the 18-year old daughter's only job being to stay with the chihuahua full-time.  The mother would go to work during the day and Elizabeth and I could then take full advantage of literally over a 1000 events that the 3 big festivals were offering daily throughout the city -  The International Classical Music & Theater Festival, the International Book Festival, and The Fringe Festival.   OK!

Just so you have the picture, there are now 4 women (complete strangers except for the mother/daughter) in a huge house to oversee the care of one tiny dog that weighs less than 2 lbs, yips and barks at any and everything that moves and has been trained to pee and poop in any of the houses 4 showers (including those in the guest rooms) instead of using the lovely garden out the back door.  As I said, interesting.   The daughter was quite lovely, and the mother was a well, but she had such a heavy Scottish accent we could barely understand her when she would actually talk to Elizabeth and me, which was rarely  There is one TV in the house which the 18-year old commandeered immediately.

Elizabeth and I decided the best way to handle this very interesting situation was to go out the door the first thing every morning and cram as many of events and performances we could into each and every day - from musicals (I saw the Cambridge University Players production of Pippin), comedy shows, Breakfast with Shakespeare (Hamlet 3-D), book readings, discussions by famous authors on numerous topics, street performers, walking tour of the city, etc., etc.

Fringe street performers on the Royal Mile drumming up business for their daily theater production

Rubbing Bobby the dog's nose brings good luck!

We did try and made up an  evening cooking schedule - I think I cooked 3 meals during the 2 weeks.  The homeowners were quite good about having the fridge totally stocked before they left and had a 2nd delivery arranged for the 2nd week, so we had everything we needed to cook and eat 3 meals a day. The mother and daughter were good cooks and they did several evening meals, as well, but as you might imagine, time around the dinner table conversation was rather difficult.

The highlight of my first week in Edinburgh was attending the Royal Military Tattoo held on the Castle grounds.  Over 1400 cast members from countries as far away as China, Australia and U.S. (the Citadel's Bagpipper's Band and the US Air Force precision rifle corps) played, danced and performed to sell-out crowds of thousands twice a night, every night for 2 weeks.  I had gotten my tickets before I left the States and had excellent seats as well as attending a fabulous Whiskey Dinner before the show at a lovely restaurant - while sitting next to a family from Kansas! The photos don't begin to do justice to the evening - but here are just a few!  I've made them as small size but if you click on them individually, you can see the full-sized photo.  I even managed to upload the video I took during the finale - hope it works!

          

But the most wonderful thing that happened during my stay was getting to know members of the International Women's Club of Edinburgh.  This is one of the Open Door sister clubs of Chicago's IWA.  These wonderful women went way out of their way to make me feel welcome and to include me in many of their ongoing events.  I met the lovely Monica for coffee at the National Portrait Gallery on almost my 2nd day in the City.  She gave me so much information, about the club and what to do and see while in her city.   She even treated me to coffee and a delicious scone and invited me to attend me first Fringe event!   Next I meet with Grace, the Club's current President, her husband John and Monica for lunch at the infamous Canny Man pub - what a delightful time we had.  Then Ann opened the door of her home - one of the most beautiful I have seen - to host a coffee in my honor.  

The ladies and I all enjoyed a yummy lunch (mussels) at the Cafe Royal where we got to know each other even better.  But there is even more....

Grace and John belong to the Scottish Chapter of a wonderful organization called La Confrérie de la Chaîne des Rôtisseurs.  This is an international gastronomic society founded in Paris in 1950. The Chaîne is based on the traditions and practices of the old French royal guild of goose roasters, whose authority gradually expanded to the roasting all poultry, meat and game. 

It is dedicated to fine cuisine and promoting and developing the gastronomic values while at the same time widening its focus to table art. 

They invited me to attend their Chapter dinner held on the evening of the Closing Festival Festivities with the Scottish National Orchestra performing a 45-minute classical music program coordinated to the fireworks display shot off from the Castle!!! The dinner was held at the Royal Overseas Club with an outdoor balcony where we stood, directly opposite the orchestra in the park and the Castle perched on the hill above us!  What an amazing view!

This was a formal, black-tie (dress kilt) event, so you might ask what did I have in my tiny suitcase that would fit such an occasion, because as you might guess, I certainly hadn't packed anything close to 'formal attire'!  

I had packed a calf-length, sleeveless, black Chicos Traveller dress.  With that as a base and at the suggestion of Monica, I hit the 'charity shops' (resale to us) that were up and down Morningside Road.  I was able to find a lovely lavender sequined jacket, necklace, earrings, heels and black satin evening bag for the grand total of £34!  And what's great is I will wear it all again when I attend my friend's birthday celebration in Ireland in mid-September.  Then I will donate it to a local charity shop for the next person in need of 'formal attire.' 

Again, photos do not begin to do justice to the event but I love my new camera with it's 'fireworks' setting and I adore a man in kilts!  The dinner, as you can imagine - all 8 courses - was delicious, the conversation wide-ranging and the music and fireworks display were an unbelievable perfect conclusion to my stay in Edinburgh.  

Our beautiful table w/view

Handsome Scottish Men!

The men decided the ladies would look brilliant in flashing Minnie Mouse ears that were being sold down on the street!

Edinburgh with the sun setting is magical!  And then there were fireworks!

A spectacular way to end this blog post!  There is a wee possibility I may return to Edinburgh for 3 months beginning in February, but you'll have to wait, along with me, until I learn for sure at the end of September.

Until next time......