Where the heck are we now?: August 2017

Friday, August 25, 2017

A short trip to Dublin

We took the overnight WestJet flight from St. John's to Dublin which arrived in just under four hours! Since our next flight to Cardiff was late that night we decided to stay overnight in a small town just by the airport called Malahide.

It is located on the coast with long sandy beaches...

The town is very affluent as could be seen by the houses we walked by...

It also has a 12th century castle but we didn't have time to visit as we were tired from the overnight flight so didn't do much that day.

After our trip to Wales we flew back to Dublin where we met Dawn and took the bus back into the city.

We had a great apartment in the Center of the city by the River Liffey which runs through Dublin separating the North and South of the city. There are many bridges crossing the river.

Dublin is a much bigger city than I expected with a population of about 1.2 million. It is also filled with tourists!

The city is also filled with pubs offering traditional Irish food and live music throughout the day and night...

Since we were only here for four days to help Dawn celebrate her birthday we saw the inside of a lot of them!

This guy was checking out his betting options...

Looks like Don spent too much time checking out the Guinness...

We ran across some familiar people, including Molly Malone, whose song is the unofficial anthem of Dublin...

" In Dublin's fair city

where the girls are so pretty
I once met a girl named sweet Molly Malone
and she wheeled her wheel barrow
through the streets broad and narrow
singing cockles and mussels alive alive oh"

And what would be a trip to Dublin be without a stop at the Guinness Storeroom? Dawn booked us in on the Connosieur tour so we were treated to a history lesson about Guinness as well as a tasting menu of some of the lesser known brews. The brewery was started in 1729 by Arthur Guinness whose picture is in the left of this photo.

Guinness Brewery is a Dublin institution that occupies over 60 acres just a little ways from the city Center.

After getting our history lesson and some samples we understood the reasons behind this popular brew, even I liked some of the beers and I don't like Guinness we get at home!

Our historian and bartender...

Dawn learning to pull a pint...

Happy students

A view of Dublin with the Wicklow Hills in the background taken from the bar at the top of the Distllery....

Besides beer Ireland is also known for its' whiskey that is sold all over town...

I think that the Irish like their "drink"...

We also enjoyed some great good...

Irish breakfasts..

Delicious seafood chowders..

And of course desserts...

We also found time to explore some of the churches here in the city...

Loved the sculpture outside Christchurch...

Then there is St. Patrick's Cathedral named after the Patron Saint of Ireland. It was founded in 1191, is the National Cathedral of the Church of Ireland. With its 43-metre spire, St. Patrick's is the tallest church in Ireland and the largest

Next door in St. Patrick's park is this plaque...

It is said he used the Shamrock to represent the Trinity in his baptismals.

We took a city bus tour so here are some glimpses of Dublin...

Trinity College,founded in 1592 is a world recognized learning institution.

One of the museums which are housed in old buildings and have free admission, all of them!

Typical neighbourhoods...

A government building...

Many colours in the city...

Street art...

Another attraction in Dublin are the number of pubs that offer live music both day and night...

Overall we liked Dublin and thought it was a great place to visit with lots more to see and do than a few days would allow. Another time perhaps?

Northern Ireland

We also decided to take a bus tour to Northern Ireland, it was a long day but we all enjoyed it....

Some scenery along the way...

Ireland is very green...

Our first stop was Belfast where we could choose to visit the Titanic Museum or take a Black Cab tour with a local guide. We chose the Black Cab tour as we were interested in learning a bit about " The Troubles".

The Troubles refers to a violent thirty-year conflict framed by a civil rights march in Londonderry on October 5, 1968 and the Good Friday Agreement on April 10, 1998. At the heart of the conflict lay the constitutional status of Northern Ireland.

The goal of the unionist and overwhelmingly Protestant majority was to remain part of the United Kingdom. The goal of the nationalist and republican, almost exclusively Catholic, minority was to become part of the Republic of Ireland.

Connor, our guide shown here explaining the history to Don and Dawn was born an Irish Catholic in 1979 so he lived through this period here in Belfast. Behind them is one of the walls that separates two neighbourhoods, the Catholic one and a Protestant one. They went up during the war and have never come down.

Here you can see some houses that are near the wall with their balconies caged in to protect them from things being still thrown over the wall...

We started our tour on the Catholic side so the murals represent their view of that time, here is one of the first victims of the violence, a young boy. In the background we could see an apartment building that had the top floors taken over by British soldiers to be used as a watchtower...

There are murals in many of the neighbourhoods...

We also visited the offices of Sinn Fein, the political arm of the IRA

This mural on the side of their building remembers Bobby Sands who was the first to die in a hunger strike as a political prisoner...

We then went through a gate to the Protestant side, a gate which is still closed at night to separate the two sides...

Immediately we saw the Union Jack being flown everywhere...

And memorials and murals telling the other side of the story...

This one was particularly interesting as it glorifies the young man pictured as a hero in that he killed a large number of Catholics during that time. One of the young women he killed was a friend of Connor's sister and whose name we saw on a memorial as a victim of the violence on the Catholic side. She worked in a pharmacy at the end of their street and he came in and shot her in the face.

I was saddened by the things we had seen and the stories we were told and wondered if our driver had been Protestant how would they be different. Connor kept saying he hoped the next generation could learn to live in peace and forgiveness but it was difficult for him and his family.

Though he said that he now has friends from the other side because of being involved in sport but when they go for a pint after they don't talk politics!

But I thought about the children as just around the corner from this memorial was a primary school so young children walked by this every day. I wonder what lessons they were learning?

The wall on the Catholic side has a peace wall which has been signed by thousands...

Typical neighbourhood in Belfast...

Memorials to the victims of the sectarian violence are evident in all neighbourhoods...

During the Troubles, the scale of the killings perpetrated by all sides - republican and loyalists and the security forces eventually exceeded 3,600. As many as 50,000 people were physically maimed or injured, with countless others psychologically damaged by the conflict, a legacy that continues to shape the post-1998 period.

I think this picture is a grim reminder that the legacy continues...

After the tour ended we went off to catch the bus by the Titanic Exhibit which is located on the docks in Belfast where she was built. It is a very popular attraction located on the waterfront.

We then drove to an area which is a UNESCO World Heritage site...the Giant's Causeway is a magnificent, mysterious geological formation on the North East coast of County Antrim. It's steeped in myths and legend. The setting is a spectacular, dynamic coastal landscape of Atlantic waves, rugged cliffs, fascinating geographical antiquity, secluded bays and magnificent views.

Scenery as we drove along the coast...