We had built in time in Northern Ireland for research purposes, in case the trail from our research indicated that County Down was, in fact the correct place to find information about Brinsley Barnes. Downpatrick, being the governmental center of County Down, was where we planned to go on this day.

Except for one little detail. It’s a Sunday. A bank holiday Sunday, to be more precise.

We went to the bus station, and looked at time tables, and given that we’re looking at a Sunday, it takes a bit over an hour to get there from Belfast. It’s not a large city, which put the likelihood of records-type places being open were slim to none, meaning that it would probably be a lot of bus for very little to show for it. I had originally had this idea of seeing both the St. Patrick’s Cathedrals, and hiking to the place where the famous Saint is said to be buried. As we stood in the very quiet bus station and debated the trip, which was a mere £9, our enthusiasm for going anywhere just sort of dribbled away. We decided, instead, to see more of Belfast.

Because it was still the off-season, we had hop-on/hop-off tour companies genially competing for our custom, which lead to something of a bidding war, both in terms of places visited and discounts off the cost for three tourists in search of something to tour.  In the end, we picked the tour company that promised cemeteries, when the other companies did not. Also, they gave us like a 25% discount.

I think we were mostly not interested in the “hopping-off” part of things. Laziness, perhaps was ruling the day, or maybe we mostly enjoying all the sitting involved in the staying on the bus, and completing the tour.

We also soon realized that Belfast is much smaller than we’d had in our brains. Like, this is the view from the “farthest” out point we went on the tour, and while we are on a hill, looking toward the shipyards, it’s clear that when they were building the Titanic, you could pretty much see it from anywhere in town. If you’re not convinced, just look for the big, yellow Harland and Wolf building cranes in the top right of the picture just to the left. Of course, I’m just now realizing I hadn’t posted a picture of the cranes in the previous post, so, maybe I ought to post a picture of those. Then, you should be able to spot them easily.

 

 

From the castle, we went to see the murals and the neighborhoods at the center of The Troubles. The murals are hard to capture in one frame, and as we drove past backyards full of happy children playing, and people walking about, I didn’t feel much like taking photos. The were some really sad signs of a that time, and it feels like a barely scabbed-over wound.  In the picture below, the empty areas separated by fences are dividers between parts of this neighborhood. It’s hard to tell from this picture, but, there were remains of buildings with battle scars in them on the left side of that chain-link fence. on the opposite side of that lot, is a wall of murals.

I could barely look at the murals as we drove by them. They seemed so disconnected from the reality of the homes around, where the scars of the past still screamed to be heard. Those broken walls and empty lots filled with trash, so different from all the rest of the city, were much more powerful than falsely cheery images painted skin deep on a white-washed wall. The reality of the pain is not so easily glossed over.

Our guide was carefully neutral, and noted that there was blame to be had on both sides, but, like the damaged neighborhood, there was much more in what he didn’t say than what he did say. His tone and demeanor were much more relaxed when we had gotten out of the residential area and were on our way back to the city center.

As we got the edge of the city center, the guide pointed out this painting, which naturally denoted the border of the part of the city loyal to the crown. It is, of course, a portrait of William of Orange, the Dutch king, who is known informally as “King Billy” in these parts. He invaded England and deposed King James in the “Glorious Revolution,” taking the crown as William III. This is the William of “William and Mary,” and the Victor of the Battle of the Boyne. Basically, if you’ve never heard of him, you have lots of reading to do.

Waving farewell to the King William, we turn to see the Europa Hotel looming just ahead. Our hotel is a mere two blocks from this large hotel, with the dubious claim to fame as “The most bombed hotel in the world,” during the turbulent times in Belfast history, this was a common target because the international press corps stayed here.

If you are wondering when I am going to come to the cemeteries, since they were the selling point for this tour company, well, it turned out to be a disappointment. We did, indeed, pass by a cemetery. It was walled, and nothing particularly interesting was visible from the road. It was not a place where they had a “hop-off” stop, so, there wasn’t even the option to extend the visit.

The website for the city of Belfast is actually really good, and we had, before we left, downloaded the walking tour of Belfast’s cemeteries, so, if we found some time later, we could get ourselves back.

 

We were dropped off at the Europa, and we did some meandering around before we moseyed back to our hotel for the night, to get ready for the bank holiday Monday the next day.

After our day of research, we wandered back across the river, stopping at the train station to get a timetable for trains leaving for Belfast the following day. We also stumbled upon “The Pantry,” Dublin’s version of my dad’s breakfast place in Pueblo. He’s one of the “everyday” morning customers.

We strolled along this street, and I found a shop that had inexpensive luggage, as the straps on my new (bought for the trip) backpack were falling apart, and I needed a replacement. We got a few other souvenirs, and eventually, we headed back to the hotel to pack for the next part of the trip.

The next day, all packed and ready for the next leg of the trip, we headed to the bus station.  The trip from Belfast to Dublin, well, I posted that last week. After our neighbors got off, the trip was not nearly as interesting. I got caught up on journal entries at least.

Once in Belfast, we took a connecting train to the city center (our hotel was a block away from the City Hall), and headed to the hotel.

After stowing the luggage, we were ready for our now traditional “get a feel for the city walk-a-bout.” Plus, my sister and I needed to get us some local currency, so, finding an ATM was of some importance. Armed with a local map and some general orientation tips from the front desk, we headed first toward City Hall, where we checked “get local currency” off the list. My sister, who has been a titanic Titanic fan since long before there was a movie, wanted to head towards the Titanic Quarter. She was doing the navigation for us this day, and we meandered in the general direction of the famous shipyards of Belfast were located.  We walked along the river, and we walked, and we walked, and while we were clearly getting closer, we soon realized we’d taken the long way.  Having finally gotten there, we decided we might as well go in and tour the museum.

It’s a pretty elaborate museum. They’ve got some impressive interactive 3D animations that simulate walking through the ship, and a ride that takes you through the building process, how the teams of riveters did their part, and there are all the ship’s plans, which you can zoom into.  Belfast is rightly proud of its ship building, and of the flax industry which lead to linens and rope-making, and the growth of the city.

One of the few pictures of all three of us came from here. Yes, it’s a novelty picture that they were happy to sell us.

My sister, having come this far, was not going back until she’d seen the berths where Olympic and Titanic sat during construction (which is really a big empty bunch of nothing), and the pump house where something got pumped, and the Harland and Wolf office building.

I admit, I’m not quite the fan she is, and by this point, we’d been walking for a long time and I was pretty cranky about being on my feet, especially to see stuff that wasn’t even there any more.

The only thing that keep me going, if I’m being really honest, was that my sister was so very clearly pleased to be there.

She is not the only one who is captivated by the tragic story of the mighty ship and its maiden voyage. As much as I’ve absorbed of the players in the tale over the years hovering around my sister, I still learned a decent bit. One of the things I didn’t know was that Ernest Shackleford was one of the expert witnesses who testified at the inquiries into the tragedy. He stated, unequivocally, that the sinking was the fault of Captain Smith, who was going way too fast for waters where ice had been reported.

I was not excited for the trip back, but, we started back towards the city center, and this time, we took a far more direct route, and it was a much more reasonable distance.  In total, is was just over seven miles, which was the most we walked in a single day for the whole trip. (Our daily average was five miles.)

 

As we got to the city center, it was starting to rain, so we found a place to sit, and had some dinner. From our vantage point, we could see the city hall out the window, and we could watch people heading for shelter as the sun was setting, another day coming to a close.

After returning to the hotel after the movie, we started researching how to get to the RCB, and what their hours were, and if we needed some sort of secret handshake to go visit the place. They were open the next day, and my sister figured out which bus stop we needed to get off at, and what the fare would be there and back again.  Instead of going all the way to the National Library and picking up the bus from there, we found a closer stop, directly across the river from The Custom House.

We got on our first Dublin city bus, and headed toward the suburbs, holding our breath that our directions were sufficient, and that we’d recognize our stop before we passed it. We passed a large cemetery, and saw a bit of what Dublin is like away from the city center. I wondered how often it was that “tourists” got out of the heart of the city, and saw what it was like in the less famous parts. No real way to know, I guess, but, for my part, I was glad that I was one of them.

The ride wasn’t long, maybe 10-15 min, but, as we rounded the corner of a street with a private hospital, we saw the stop number we were looking for, and were able to request our stop.

Now we had another dilemma. In which direction was this fabled place of records?

We wandered along the street, pretty sure we knew where we were going, and a private school I had not seen on the map made me doubt my navigational instincts. Just a moment later, when our fears started to creep into conversation, we saw the largely nondescript building we had seen on the web site. Even more confirmation came from the handy labeling in the form of the big honking sign on the building.

We walked up to the door. It was locked. We exchanged questioning glances. A guy came up behind us, and pushed a button. A speaker chirped to life, and a voice asked him to declare himself. The man told them it was “first name I can’t can’t recall,” and the voice from the box clearly knew him, and buzzed the door open. He-whose-name-I-can’t-recall looked us over, and then, holding the door for us, invited us in.

The man who snuck us in, went straight upstairs. We noticed the lockers just inside the door, and put our bags inside, taking only our pencils and notebooks.  Once all was stowed, we marched upstairs and nearly scared the staff out of their minds. Three people, appearing inside the building unannounced? Horrors.

I told them we’d come in with guy-whose-name-I-recalled-then-but-is-lost-to-me-now, and we were sorry for causing him distress.

He started breathing again.

For what seemed the millionth time, I launched into the basics of what we were hoping to look at, and the gentleman said, “Well, I’m terribly sorry, but, the Princess is in another castle.”

Actually, it wasn’t much better than that.

He told us that all the records for that parish had been lost in a fire. There was nothing left.

After having come all this way, I was not going to give up. I wondered out loud if there were maybe headstones that might’ve been moved from the church yard when the ground the church stood on had been acquired by Guinness for cheap housing, and he remembered something. There was one book. They were the only place in the world with this book, and it might help. It was a collection of transcriptions of vestry records from three Dublin churches (including St. Bride’s) that no longer exist.

Well, it was worth a shot.

We pulled up some chairs at the table, and opened the book. It was printed within the last 15 years, and it had an index, so, we looked in it for that fateful surname.

There was a single entry. It was a Barnes that was unknown to me, but, it seems that one of the members of the vestry, in 1680 and 1688, about 20 years before the baptismal record we’d gone to look at, was a Mr. Robert Barnes. Well, that could turn out to be an interesting tidbit of information. Not that we knew how or why that was interesting, but, with genealogy research, you really never know what will turn out to be important.

Having now exhausted all the resources the RCB had for us, we walked back to the bus stop. The next place to search was the Dublin City Library.  The driver that picked us up, was the same one that had dropped us off an hour earlier. I think he was as surprised as we were.

We took the bus back to the area around the National Library. The city library is on the other side of Trinity from the National Library, so we started hiking that way. I figured it was just as easy to cut across campus, and, given that it was not raining today, I knew I would not have that as a navigational scapegoat.  Since it was a nice day, no one was in the mood to argue, and it was an excuse to see more of the campus, and feel like college students. Or something.

This time, we didn’t miss any turns, and walked right up to the library, and followed the signs up the stairs to the research room. While the outside of the Dublin City Library isn’t much to look at, the inside has got a bit of architectural charm.

The three of us got to the research counter, and we told the librarian we were here to do research. She said, “Of course! You just need to fill out this bit of paper work, and if you have an ID, we can get you all set. ”  We all set to filling out the paperwork, and within a few short minutes, I was holding my very favorite souvenir of the whole trip: A Dublin City Library Card.

I couldn’t take my eyes off this shiny bit of plastic.

It might not seem like much, but, ever since I was little, the library was one of my favorite places on earth. Whenever we moved to a new city, it was the symbol of being a resident more important to me than enrolling in school, or knowing our address, and it is one of the first tasks on my to do list when settling into a new city.  And here I was, possessing that first, and most important, sign of being a member of the community of Dublin. I think that this makes me, officially, a Dubliner.  Sure, they would deny it, but, I have a library card. I belong. 

Really and truly, I love looking at it. I’ve shown that card more than I’ve shown pictures. And it was FREE. What a miracle.

So, now, imagine an episode of Buffy where they Scoobies spend hours in the library flipping through musty old books. Yeah. that was more interesting than what we were doing. Granted, we didn’t have to flip randomly through books without indexes,  we mostly used the computers to search through old newspaper archives and indices of records, and sort through the burial records that they had, and look for property records, and well, anything that might help us figure out the parents of Brinsley Barnes. This is the not-remotely-glamorous, tedious, you’ll-never-see-it-on-“who-do-you-think-you-are” part of family history research. It’s hours of mind-numbing searching, trying another tactic, looking again, and mostly finding nothing. This is not the same as National Treasure where the clues lead to clear and obvious steps. No. This is like wading through a swamp picking up almost everything, turning it over in your hands for a while, and then setting it back into the muck, because you don’t even know what you are looking for, but it’s probably not that. Probably. Maybe make a note of it anyway.

Anyway, my sister hit gold first, having simply searched the newspaper archive for the name “Barnes.” It turned up an ad from a Belfast newspaper, put in about 1700. It was offering the services of a Robert Barnes, to residents of both Belfast and Dublin. Robert Barnes tuned pianos and taught music, both organ and piano. Perhaps this was why he was on the vestry at St. Bride’s? Could he have been their organist? It also was the first actual clue we had as to why Brinsley was listed as being simultaneously from Ulster and from Dublin.  Perhaps the family had homes in both places, and spent one season in one city, and then moved south in winter. Who knows? But, it was, perhaps a clue. We also found other sources perhaps corroborating the story that Brinsley’s father was a doctor.  Certainly, his name was the same as one of the three potential sets of fathers, and the date would be correct. Of course, this was information about freemen of Dublin, essentially a business directory. Naturally, they didn’t have anything useful like, Yup, James Barnes, a surgeon, has a son named Brinsley, and that kid went to the American colony, and landed in Pennsylvania, and then moved to North Carolina, and yes, this is the guy and the answer to the question you were looking for.

Nope. No such luck. We’d just have to settle for the bits we got.

We finally ran out of steam, and called it quits, having looked through the most likely information, and even a bunch of unlikely information, in the event that something would jump out and surprise us.  It was time to move along. Plus, the library was going to kick everyone out soon, anyway. I wasn’t going to risk them taking away my shiny card.

This day we had planned to devote to research. Our plan was to head to the National Library of Ireland, which even has a staffed genealogy desk. It was a good day to do research, as it was expected to be rainy all day. Since I planned to be inside all day, it was the one day when I decided it would be fine to leave my poncho behind.

I know, I know.

The National Library of Ireland is not far from Trinity College.  We took out usual route there, and then I somehow missed the turn  (I’m blaming the rain) and we ended up on Grafton Street, which is parallel to Kildare Street, the one we really wanted. Grafton Street is one of the main shopping districts in Dublin, and we ended up following it all the way to St. Steven’s Green before we turned around.

Did I mention it was supposed to rain all day, and I left my rain gear behind?

Here’s the one picture I took of rainy Grafton Street. The big neon sign on the left side is Captain America, and it’s a restaurant. From a distance, the character looks more like Spider-man, and then I saw the label of Captain America, and, the shield is there, but, well, I was amused by it.

By this point I was aggressively damp, and annoyed that I’d failed somewhat at navigation, but, in the end, we got to the National Library of Ireland. If you get to Dublin, even if you don’t need to research anything, I really, really recommend going into this building. It’s right next to the National Archaeology Museum, it’s got beautiful mosaics in the floor, the reading room is beautiful, and was a favorite haunt of James Joyce, it’s got a really huge collection of materials, and, it’s FREE. Did I mention FREE? Heck, even if you don’t take my word for you, you can take a virtual tour of the place, online. Click your heart out. Trust me. It’s a wonderful space for reading, and just hanging out.

We got in, and following standard research protocol the world over, locked our bags and damp outer wear in a locker, got out our pencils and the little notebooks I’d packed for us to record whatever we couldn’t photocopy, and we headed toward the genealogy desk.  We waited a few minutes, as the librarian was busy with someone else, and then, he motioned to us. I briefly mentioned what were looking for, specifically, records from a specific church in Dublin, that has been gone for more than two centuries, but, was less than half a mile from where we were.

He gave me a slightly awkward grimace, one that wasn’t apologetic, as in “Gosh, I’m sure sorry, but, as much as it pains me to say it, we haven’t got anything from that church.” it was more like “How dare you ask me about that church, Infidel!”  With his words, he said “St. Bride’s was Church of Ireland,” and there was a pause while he let that sink in, and I made a short nod of acknowledgement, as, until that moment, I had not known St. Bride’s affliction. His pause was followed by “We don’t have any records for the church of Ireland. We only have Catholic records.” Again I gave a nod of “No, of course I won’t mention the Church of the Oppressor again, I’m so sorry to have brought it up.” He warmed to my silent promise not to mention uncomfortable subjects ever again, and pulled out an information sheet with local genealogical repositories, and told us that the Church of Ireland records could be accessed at the RCB (the Representative Church Body) which, thank all that is holy, happened to be in Dublin, too, and open to the public. He pointed to a spot straight outside, and said, you take the number 14 bus straight to it. They’ll be able to help you.” I heard the implied “And may God have mercy on your soul” at the end of his statement, and we dutifully turned around, gathered our things, and went back out into the rain.

We did very quickly find the stop in question, and looking at the post, the fare was going to be somewhere between 2.60 and 11.80, and exact fare was expected. Seemed reasonable, but then reality set in. What if we got there, and learned they were not open on whatever day this was? Or that it was by appointment only? And, while the sheet of paper had a really bad map on it, how would we know where to get off? Entertaining all these unknowns was a bit more bravery than we wanted to exhibit on this rainy day, so we decided we needed to look this up before we went any further, and might as well punt, and do it the following day, when we were better prepared. We figured we might as well go see the Archaeology Museum, since we were standing right in front of it, and it’s also FREE. Plus, it had the distinct advantage of being an indoors-sort of place, which tend to be dryer than the outdoors places where the buses come.

And enter we did.

The Archaeology Museum is a mirror image of the NLI, and there are wonderful mosaics here, too. Plus, there’s some amazing treasures here. We had a special affinity for the reconstructed passage tomb, just having gone to Newgrange the day before, and some of the artifacts found on those sites live here now. There’s a collection of pretty amazing works in gold, and the bog people of Ireland are on discreet display, which sounds more oxymoronic than it actually is.

After a few hours, and now mostly dry, we were feeling peckish, and ready for some lunch. The cafe at the museum was packed, so we went to the museum shop. It was here that we found a suitable gift for mom. They threw in a free tote for it, which was good, because it was part cashmere, part wool, and water doesn’t agree much with it.  From there we thought, “Hey, there’s a cafe inside the library, let’s try it.” Sure enough, it was much quieter, and we had a lovely break.

From there, we decided to go to St. Patrick’s and if we had time, to go to the Chester Beatty museum.  We packed up, redistributed the spare rain gear, which means they took pity on my idiocy, and gave me an extra layer, and headed out.

I think dad appreciated his poncho, which looks pretty much identical to the one I’d left behind, but, I’m not sure if he’s at all pleased about this stomping about in the rain business. Me, I like the rain, and it was, as they say in Ireland “a soft rain,” not really cold, and not pouring.  I will take a soft rain over 8o degree weather any day.

My biggest interest in St. Patrick’s was, of course, the famous 18th century dean, a man by the name of Jonathan Swift. You might have heard of him, or know of his most famous creation, “Gulliver’s Travels.” And, by some curious chance, he shares a birthday with yours truly. I know that you’re amazed I don’t look a day over two centuries, and you’d be right. It pays to moisturize.

We were grateful to get out of the rain, and we stood in the entry way to try and drain the excess moisture off. It seems a tad sacrilegious to bring excessive damp inside, even if rain comes from the heavens.

I was surprised at how many visitors were here on a rainy weekday, during business hours, but, maybe I shouldn’t have been. There was much to see inside. Besides the grave of Dean Swift, there were some pretty impressive stained glass windows, a remarkable pulpit, and several impressive sculptures. There are also some early Christian grave markers that were from the church grounds, but, which predate the structure itself. St. Patrick is said to have had a holy well on the site from which he baptized locals when he was in Dublin. Today, it is an Anglican church, and has been since well, as long ago as its near neighbor, St. Bride’s church, which was likely where our Barnes ancestors attended, to the later dismay of the genealogy librarian of the National Library of Ireland.

There were interpretive signs all over the place, and I learned how very little I really knew about Jonathan Swift.

After exhausting our interest in the place, we started to head back to the Chester Beatty Library. Sadly, we got there about 20 min before it closed, and that was too late to do the tour. We decided it was time to head back, given the rain was not giving up.

Since the night was young, we decided that the seemingly barely alive cinema next to our hotel deserved some patronage, so, when we got back there, we headed in. We were slightly disappointed that the movie that fit the “right now” option was Pompeii. Yes, it’s every bit as bad as you suspected, but, it was fun, and I realized it was my first movie theater movie in a foreign country. Here we were, propping up the international box office.  Plus, it turns out that the main character is identified as a Celt from Britannia, which would probably point to him being Welsh. Yes, that’s me thinking too much about a movie that wasn’t very good.

One of the best things about traveling abroad is encountering local residents doing normal, everyday things. This is the story of my favorite such meeting.

When we boarded the train to Belfast, the car we choose was about two-thirds full. We stowed our luggage, and my sister and father chose the two remaining seats (out of a group of four) on the left side of the train, so I sat across the aisle from them. While we waited for train to go, a group of four older ladies come on board, and started trying to find seats together. One of the ladies was asking “which way is the train going? I must be facing the same way as the driver.”

With a bemused look, several of us indicated the direction the train was travelling, and she slid into the seat diagonally across from me. One of the others sat next to me, and the other two took the seats facing her, just behind my dad and sister. The lady-who-can’t-sit-facing-the-wrong-direction kept a commentary of things as she and the other ladies got settled.

Getting settled included pulling out a packet of snacks, which she promptly opened and offered around to everyone. She made sure to show the label so we could see what she was offering. They were Jelly Babies.

For those less nerdly-inclined than me, Jelly Babies are a sweet I had never eaten, but, had known from watching Doctor Who. The fourth Doctor regularly offered this sweet to strangers, diffusing tensions and putting people at ease. I wondered if this lady might be herself be a fan of the show, or maybe she just liked Jelly Babies.

I grinned, but declined, and the packet then moved across the aisle to her travelling companions. As the candies made the return trip, she-who-sits-the-same-direction-as-the-driver commented upon the cheek of Mary Katherine who helped herself to *two* Jelly Babies.

As the trip progressed, I learned the ladies were sisters, and one of them had come in from Wales to meet the others, and they made regular trips together. They chatted nearly non-stop, talking about their favorite ways to preserve cut flowers, (the lady with the Jelly Babies likes to use a tablet in the water. Tablets were her “go-to” solution for everything.) they discussed tabloid news, and the foibles of absent family members.

One of the sisters was moving slowly, and that brought out the story that she’d gotten hit by a car as she stepped off a curb in her village. “Eighty years old, hit by a car in her own village! Can you believe the nerve of them to hit an old lady minding her own business crossing the street! Disgraceful!”

Eighty years old. My traveling companions were four octogenarian ladies who looked younger than my dad, and who went on weekly adventures with each other. I hoped that when I was eighty, that I’d be making trips regular trips with my sisters, chattering like excited twenty-somethings and giving each other mock grief about taking an extra sweet out of the packet.

She was certain the gentleman across the aisle (my dad) was going to need a tablet after having all their chatter behind his head for so long. She asked if he was traveling with me, and I told her yes, he was my dad. She told us that they were sisters, and that was how they were. I smiled and told her it looked pretty familiar to me, when I got together with my sisters.

She was certain he would be glad to see the back of them, and probably I would too. As they were getting off, she made the same assertion to my sister, who promptly told her “No, she loved every minute of it, she’ll miss you.”

My sister knows me all too well.

When we arrived in Belfast, I was determined to buy some Jelly Babies and share them with my traveling companions. That’s what a local would do. Or a Time Lord.

When we were planning our trip, one of the places on the top of my list was the passage tombs at Newgrange. Older than the pyramids, older than Stonehenge, the oldest solar observatory in the world, the more than 40 tombs in the Boyne valley are a World Heritage Site, and something that I felt must be on our list.  Over 60% of the neolithic art in all of *Europe* can be found at these quiet monuments. I had booked our seats the night before, and chose to meet the coach in front of The Gresham Hotel. When I chose that departure point, the travel office lady asked me if I knew where it was asking “by the Spire?” I nodded confirmation. The earliest departure time was fully booked, but, there was room on the later bus, so I took it.

By this point, dad had not appreciated churches, nor world-famous libraries, and I was worried that pre-Christian pagans were going to be yet another thing he was not going to appreciate. He had forgotten what we’d said about the place before we left, so, I turned to the correct page in the guidebook, and handed it to him. He didn’t seem to be excited about it at all. Inwardly, I sighed, and prepared myself for whatever commentary was going to await us.

We set out after breakfast, but, at a leisurely pace.  After taking our friend the LUAS (light rail) to the same stop as the day before, we headed in the opposite direction, this time heading north. As the main street of the main city in Ireland, there’s tons to see all around.  There’s the General Post Office, which was also a center for the 1916 Rising, bullet holes still mark the exterior (but aren’t very obvious from across the street).

Just as we were about a block from our destination, the famous Gresham Hotel, which is across the street and slightly north of the post office, I see it. It’s about half a block ahead of us, to our right. It’s the statue of James Joyce. It’s a sculpture I’ve seen in pictures, and always admired, and I’ve long had a fondness for Joyce’s short stories. I told my sister I needed her to take a picture, and she said, “Oh. Ok.” And she did take the picture. Dad finally realized we’d stopped, and asked my sister why we were stopping, and she told him, “Kate wanted a picture with the statue.” There was no flicker of recognition as they looked over the bronze man in front of them. They shrugged and chalked it all up to my general eccentricity.

I was not really surprised by their reaction, but, it’s a lonely feeling to be wandering this city of writers with two people who were not acquainted with any of the famous authors who called the place home.

We arrived at the hotel, with the Spire in front of us. The hotel was built about the same time as the post office, and famous Hollywood types used to stay there. The three of us held down the sidewalk in front of the hotel, and waited for our ride.

Once on the bus, we went across the river to pick up the rest of the passengers. Dad listened as our driver, Dennis from Latvia, reminded us that the fare we paid for the bus didn’t cover seeing the monuments.  Dad did a double take and looked at me. “Did you know that?”  I told him, yes, I did know it. It was on the brochure and it’s in every guidebook.  Dad was stunned. He couldn’t believe that we’d be shelling out more cash when we got there. He looked only slightly mollified about the situation, and I hoped he’d hold onto whatever lecture he was preparing until, well, the far side of never. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that at the peak season, there’s not even a guarantee that you will get a ticket, since they can’t be purchased in advance.

When we arrived, the driver told us that at the center they’d ask us if we wanted tickets to Newgrange only or both Newgrange and Knowth. We opted for both, and had just enough time to buy our tickets and trek across the river to catch the shuttle up to Newgrange.

We climb to the top of the hill, toward the entrance to the monument. The tour guide tells us about the place, and we wait for the group ahead of us to leave, and then we’d go into the place. As we stood outside, dad has apparently really absorbed the information from the tour guide. He’s actually excited, and he’s telling me that he’s really glad that I wanted to come here, and this was really amazing.

I was not prepared for that response.

And yet, I’ll totally take it. I can’t believe we finally found something that dad actually liked. Don’t let anyone tell you that miracles are a thing of the past.

Crossing the threshold to the passage that leads to the inner chamber, you travel back nearly 5000 years to see a space which is much as it was then. Though it was raining outside, the structure, made with no mortar, was absolutely dry. No moisture had ever entered here.

There is room for about 15-20 people, and we lined the outer wall of the inner chamber, and listened as the guide explained what happens every year on the winter solstice. On that day, the sun comes into the roof box, first diffuse, and then it concentrates into a beam straight to the back of the chamber, like a laser beam.  In a minute, she would turn out the lights, and they would simulate the phenomenon.

The lights went out. It was pitch black inside, just as it would be the entire year, until the shortest day. Everyone was silent.

And then the light came on.

On the solstice, the beam of light lasts for about 8 minutes.  For the purposes of the tour, the light stayed on for only a few minutes, maybe even only a minute, but, for me, even just recalling it weeks later, I still get chills to recall that magnificent light, the return of light and warmth to chase away the cold and dark.

As we made our way out again, the assembled group was quiet, still holding that sacred space that we had just shared. Outside, dad was even more excited, and wanted to know if I thought the gift shop would have a picture of the light coming into the passage, or a book for kids to show them this marvelous place. He wanted to share it with his grandchildren, and tell them about this place, built with almost no tools and surrounded by megaliths from far, far away.

I told him there was a good chance that they would have all of those things.

We walked around until it was time to return to the shuttle. Dad understood now why the tickets weren’t included in the bus fare, because of the limited amount of space in each tour.  He marveled at the effort it would’ve taken to move each of the kerbstones, and to fit all the other stones together in such a way as to keep out the damp and be a lasting structure.

He was glad we’d gotten tickets to the other site, Knowth, too, and was excited to look for souvenirs and gifts in the shop, and then go to see the other mounds.

At Knowth, there are a number of mounds, newer than Newgrange, and all of smaller size. A few are aligned to key dates on the solar calendar, but not all are. These are too unstable for tourists to enter.

Here, though, dad became curious about how they maintained the grass-covered mounds, and learned that they mow them with special equipment. He spent a chunk of our time here to seek out the mowing crew, which happened to be mowing that very day.

We wandered among the mounds, and climbed to the top of the largest one, Knowth, which had a pretty amazing view. From here, on a clear day, you can see the Hill of Tara, and, of course, Newgrange. Today, as you might notice, it was a bit overcast, and there were some scattered showers, so we could make out neither of these features. We could, however see the river, and yellow fields of the seed that gets made into canola oil.

All too soon, it was time to turn back.

As I started writing this on Thursday night, I learned that there was a pretty horrible act of vandalism at Hill of Tara this week.  This sort of intentional harm to such an important monument makes me sad that we weren’t able to visit that site.

Of course, I admit, the Hill of Tara is mostly just a hill, even if it has great significance to Irish history and folk lore. With the curse of limited time, it was a site that just didn’t make the cut. And, while I didn’t feel too much guilt then, well, there’s a bit of regret from here.

Day three ended with Micheal dropping us off where he picked us up. He had mentioned to us that he was from Tipperary, and as the next place we were trying to get to was in Tipperary, and the details of getting there were discouraging, we asked his advice about getting there. To drive there, it would take, at most, an hour. By bus? More than two to get there, and almost three to get back. He told us he knew of no better way to get there, and that over 2 hours was more than ridiculous.

We also mentioned that we were going to go to the train station to check out transport to Dublin on Tuesday, and he offered another tidbit, which was that the Limerick to Dublin Express (a bus) only cost 10 Euros, and left from right where we were.  That seemed a good solution to us, so we filed that away.

Monday dawned, and we decided to just see the sights in Limerick.  King John’s Castle, which we saw pretty much every time we stopped at the tourist office, seemed pretty obvious, and there were a few other places to see in that area.  We decided to start at the castle, as it was the furthest point out from the hotel, and work our way back.

What I hadn’t really known, until we got there, was that the King John in question was the King John of Robin Hood fame. Which is interesting for another data point, which is that there is a possibility that the line from the ancestor we came to Ireland to investigate goes back to King John’s uncle, the illegitimate son of King John’s grandfather, Geoffrey V. And we made the mistake of telling dad this little possibility.

He then decided the castle was, technically, *our* castle. He kept wanting to measure rooms to see if our furniture would fit, and asking if we could get part of the gift shop proceeds, or maybe just be able to put up a lemonade stand right near the exit.

He finally stopped saying this sort of thing when someone, on hearing his pronouncement of ownership exclaimed, “Ah, a pretender to the throne!” That line met with a flabbergasted look and silence from he who had kissed the Blarney stone. Clearly, there are limits even to that magic.

The castle just added a bunch of exhibits and new spaces, including some interactive video and some things for kids. There were costumes, and some nifty scale models of the castle and its surroundings in the early 13th century. The exhibits talked about how it was built, and the history of Limerick with the castle as the centerpiece. In fact, the castle was built on top of the Viking’s original settlement. It’s a strategic point, an island in the middle of the Shannon, with good views, and easy defense from the mainland.

The castle declined some, and then was damaged and declined some more during a series of sieges in the 17th century.

Surprisingly, the castle took more time to visit than I expected, but, it had some great views form the top of its many towers, and a nice glimpse into Anglo-Norman Ireland.  I was somewhat surprised at how few people were there when we were. We practically had the castle to ourselves, which did limit the number of people who dad could annoy with tales of our distant connection with the place’s namesake.

From the top we noticed the treaty stone on its plinth across the river. Getting tired from the castle, with several other places on our list for the day, we decided there was no way cared enough to go see it up close. This would suffice. If you’re scouring the picture to the left, the stone is just to the left of the church, just in front of the really green tree in the church yard. It looks like a black blob on top of an almost triangular blob, just on the edge of the river.

We moved on from the castle to St. Mary’s church, which is also a construction of the Anglo-Normans, and it is the oldest continuously used building in Limerick. Yes, it’s still a church. And, if you’ve heard of the “Bells of St. Mary’s,” this is the St. Mary’s in question. Ironically, we never really heard the bells.

However, the church itself was worth the visit. It’s a very strange hodgepodge, clearly its primary purpose is as a church, and while they are glad of visitors, and there are some interpretational signs about, there’s also stuff just shoved in a corner and covered with tarps, that give this sense of a college dorm where the tenants have hidden stuff just before mom and dad came to visit. The dust on the cover just tell you that they didn’t need to get anything there, it was mostly stuff that no one quite knew what to do with, and were glad it was out of the way and not bothering anyone on a daily basis.

Dad did not seem particularly impressed with the place, and I’m not sure why. I figured a church would be right p his alley.

We spent some time puttering about in the church yard, which has a graveyard which is still in use. The older parts of the church yard are in the front, and, naturally, within the church itself.

After St. Mary’s, we were heading to the Hunt Museum, which had a convenient cafe, which we’d agreed would be a place to rest a bit, and have a bite to eat, and then we’d tour the place.

Only a few steps from the church, but back onto the mainland from King’s Island, we arrived at The Hunt Museum. A place at which I took absolutely zero pictures. So, I’ll use one from the public domain.

The exhibits were the private collection of the Hunt family. John and Gertrude Hunt were prominent art and antique dealers, and not wanting their unique collection to be broken up, donated it to the city.

As we arrived, we bought our tickets, and were offered a guide to give us a free, personal tour. Forgetting that we’d all agreed we wanted to sit a bit, and get some food, suddenly, we had a guide, and we weren’t slowing down. For the next hour or so, we followed our very knowledgeable guide, who really added to our experience of the collection, but, by the end, my feet wanted to fall off.

We headed back to the hotel, stopping at Tesco’s for some necessary items, and had dinner from the Hotel’s restaurant, which was actually a very good way to spend our last night in Limerick. Well, until we would return before returning home. But, that’s another story.

To set-up  our third day of adventures, there are a few things I should highlight.

First, we’d been looking for ways to tour to the Dingle Peninsula. It’s not on a train line, and the bus goes there, but, it takes over three hours from Limerick, and once in Dingle, how would we drive around it? We looked into several options, including renting a car (but neither my sister nor I were keen on this being our first foray into driving on the left side of the road, especially since it is narrow.). We’d also found a company that does Dingle tours from Limerick online, but, the only day they had availability was on Sunday, and that was already the day we were going to go to the Burren and to the Cliffs of Moher, so, I didn’t book it.

Do you remember that we did the Cliffs trip on Friday, when we arrived?

We got let off the tour from Blarney about 2 blocks from our hotel. Frank II gave us directions to get back. We took this opportunity to hunt for the train/bus station to start arranging our other adventures. As we headed toward where I remembered the station to be from the maps, we stumbled onto the Tourist Information Center. We’d been here a few times, our tours both days stopped here. We were all of three blocks from the hotel. I was now embarrassed that I’d not realized it sooner.

As we rounded the corner across the street from the tourist office, I see a big advertisement for the very tour company I’d seen online that had Limerick to Dingle tours. They had an office right inside this small shopping mall. It was 5:56 on Saturday night. We stepped in, and walked into their door as they were closing at 6:00 pm. In fact, the employee closed the door right behind us, and had already closed out her till. We inquired about the Dingle trip, and she said, yes, they had a tour leaving the next day, right from the stop across the street. We asked if there was space on the tour, and, booked it on the spot. Perfection!

This was the first time we were especially grateful we were traveling in the “off” season. It would not be the last.

Early Sunday morning (not really that early), we went to catch our bus.  We met the first (and, perhaps only) tour guide in Ireland not named Frank. His name was Micheal.  We learned that we were going to make a shortish stop in Killarney. Killarney is known from songs, and as the original Irish tourist town. If you’re practicing your Irish, it’s name is Cill Airne, and Cill means church, and Airne well, that’s something to do with sloes, which the Internets tell me are, essentially, prunes.

This is where you learn it’s better not to translate some things.

 

Back in Prune Church, we stroll around a sleepy Sunday morning. Beyond prunes and churches, Killarney is the place where Michael Fassbender grew up, and where he lives when he’s not Magneto.  The Michael who drove the bus pointed vaguely into a hillside with several possible places as being the area where he might have a house, so I might’ve seen his house. Or his sheep.  The sheep might be the neighbor’s.  Fences are as nothing to sheep.

I’ve heard that Mr. Fassbender was an altar boy. Maybe he was at this church. Or the other one. Maybe both of them. I have no ideas, but, these two were within 1/3 of a mile from each other. Clearly, a Cill-rich environment. The prunes were inexplicably unseen.

We got back on the bus, and started to head toward the Dingle Peninsula.  We caught sight of the most amazing and impressive Kerry Airport, clearly the most talked about airport I’ve ever encountered. At least, Michael the driver really talked about it.

We stopped just outside of Killarney, to see the famous lakes and the tallest mountains in Ireland. While not really what a Coloradan would call a mountain, there is something really pretty majestic about them. The panorama was somehow very comforting to me, even if I couldn’t really get the whole scope in the picture. I will read the camera’s manual one day.

We took our few shots, and then got along to the main show.

Dingle is the smaller western peninsula. It’s less famous than the Ring of Kerry, but, we had it on good authority that if we had to choose, Dingle was the better option. It’s one of the regions where Irish is commonly spoken as a daily language, and it’s packed full of breath-taking vistas, lovely beaches, and some archaeological gems.

We first stopped at Inch Beach. It’s a blue flag beach, which means its super-awesome. Micheal said it’s the highest ranking a beach can get, and its based on the quality of the sand and other beach-criteria that sound like wha-waa-wa wa to people from landlocked states. Or maybe just to me. I don’t care too much for beaches. People were surfing, and looked like they were having a great time. My sister and I collected some seashells, many of which we’ll probably send to our nephews. The debate over whether they’ll still be coated in sand when we send them is ongoing, but, will probably end in clean shells, since my nephews don’t care for mud. I’m worried about them, too.

Moving on from the beach, we moved along to the Slea head, the most westerly part of Europe.  We stopped at many places to take pictures. Here, look at them. They’re better than the ugly words that keep going on about nothing much.

This journey was about 11 hours, round trip. We stopped briefly in the town of Dingle, and met the bronze version of the local hero, Fungie. He’s a playful dolphin, who likes to entertain tourists. Don’t worry, they didn’t reward him by encasing him in carbonite. This is just a sculpture.  We got expensive ice cream, but, to its credit, it was much, much better than what we got in Cork. The dairy was so fresh, and the texture was rich and creamy. We somehow missed getting actual lunch, and were slightly sad about that. We came back to Limerick, and got some dinner to take back with us to the hotel, and I’m pretty sure exhaustion claimed us all.

A funny thing happened on the way to the post.

By “the post” I mean turning this into a post while I was still in Ireland.

You all still love me, right?

So, where was I?

That’s right. I was in Ireland. Limerick, Ireland, to be specific.

On day the second, we were headed to Blarney Castle and Cork, Ireland’s second largest city.  We were picked up at our hotel by our tour guide, whose name turned out to also be Frank.  We referred to him as Frank the II when he was not around. He was no Frank I, that was very clear.

This was one of the two days where it rained pretty much all day.  If you’ve heard of Blarney castle you know about the famous stone, but, what you might not know is that the castle is a ruin, and it has absolutely no roof.  The famous Blarney stone is located at the top of the roofless structure. The way up is via a steep circular stone stairway, which has acquired a lovely coating of Irish moisturizer due to that unfortunate “no roof” thing.  There is a rope “banister,” and that is the only reason I made it to the top.

My dad, who is already a gabby individual, was really excited about the whole Blarney stone thing, and had, for the first, and pretty much only time on the trip, shot ahead of me and my sister, and raced up the tower to the top, ready to pucker up with the legendary stone.  He beat me to the top by such a large margin, that I completely missed his big moment. The moment I was sure meant that the world would explode from the enormity of the world’s gabbiest guy getting gabbier. Fortunately, like all tourist traps the world over, they have their own photographer, and they will gladly sell you the photo. My sister, who refused to go up the treacherous tower, was only too pleased to buy that bit of blackmail.

My lips were not going anywhere near that filthy thing. Especially because, for some reason (my money’s on a “let’s make the tourists do ridiculous things” tradition) you have to be lying on your back and hang your head, upside down, over the open death-slot to put your lips on a stone kissed by millions. I can’t say that I’m that taken by the notion of third-party stone smooching millions of people in one go. Even if these millions include people like Winston Churchill.

One of the things that you never really hear about Blarney Castle is that the grounds around it are really quite spectacular.  There are lovely flowers and trees all over the place, and a stream runs through the grounds. There’s a poison garden where you can find all of Snape’s favorite lethal plants, and there’s caves and a dolmen, plus a whole bunch of other stuff I didn’t really get to see.

Because dad ditched us.

We’d planned to head to the nearby Woolen Mills, to look for a gift for our mom, so we were trying to hurry back to have some time to look. We had started back, and dad was lingering at the gift shop. We told him we’d be just outside, waiting. We waited just a bit down the path back to the bus and the shops.  And we waited. And waited. We kept watching the paths, and we retraced our steps. No dad.  We posted ourselves at strategic points to see him, and we never saw him.

At this point, we only had a few minutes to get back to our ride, before Frank II left us in the rain, so we headed back, hoping that dad would know to go to the bus.

We got back a few minutes late, and as I walked up, Frank II pointed into the shops at the Woolen Mills. I was *so* close to launching into a “Don’t make me have to pull this trip over, young man” lecture.  Parents.  Geesh. You can’t take them anywhere.

The group back together, we headed to Cork.  For shopping.

Most of you know that I’m not so much of a shopper, but, since we’d missed the Woolen Mills, and needed to find something for mom, this was good. Plus, we’d not eaten anything, and it time to find lunch.   We left the bus just as the rain got harder, and we spotted a place for lunch. The golden arches called. As we got in, I realized this was the first time I’d ever even been inside an American fast food restaurant in a foreign country.  Given the rain, it was easier to stay and eat than to find another place, so, we settled in for a meal.

In between bouts of rain, we did see a few things. The fountain on the left was just behind the city council building, in something of a small park. It’s hard to photograph. It was a collection of seven large geese(?) artfully arranged like on a mobile, around the fountain.

The distant church in the picture on the right?, well, I admit, I have no idea which one it is. It looks nice, though, doesn’t it? It’s got that nice view of the river, and old and new bits of Cork nicely blended.

We did try to find something for mom, but, most the shops had stuff that mom would not find interesting, and the rain was occasionally really heavy, so, we kept trying to dodge into shelter.  One of our sheltering spots was a crepe shop that had ice cream. So, we had some.

It could’ve been better ice cream, but, it the shop was nicely situated right along the river there, just to the left of the edge of the picture with the church.

Eventually, we gave up the search for the right thing for mom, and went around the corner from the crepe shop to wait for the bus to return us to Limerick.

When last we talked, there was the challenge of jet lag facing our heroes.   I cruelly showed you a pint, and a donkey. Yeah, I know. Mean.

So, more pictures.

At the airport, our ride asked if we wanted to do the tour of the Cliffs of Moher and the Burren today (Friday) instead of Sunday. This required very little thought, and as he cheerily said, “but you probably would rather just go to the hotel and relax…” We said, “no, if we can go today, that would be very helpful.”

I think he was actually a bit disappointed.

To his credit, it passed quickly.  He called his guide, and the after a stop at the hotel to drop our luggage, and a heading to an ATM to get some local currency, we were off. Just the three of us with our guide, whom we refer to as Frank I.

And this is the first thing we saw:

I can’t this moment remember *which* castle, and I’m not feeling the need to look it it up right this instant. The tour company’s website advertises the stop as the place we’d hear a dramatic tale of fiery redheads. The story is not half as interesting as the descriptor you just got. Your version is better than the tale we got, and which I’m going to be honest, I barely remember even now.

We didn’t stop very long. It was windy and a bit chilly.

They we went to this bronze age stone fort. Dad wanted to watch the sheep dog herding demonstration, so my sister and I went to look at the fort. (This was the one in the teaser. The donkey lives here, too. Well, not in the fort, but, the same people who have the fort have the donkey. )

This is all in a protected area know as The Burren. It’s a geologically fascinating area, with its own unique flora and fauna, and mostly tons of rocks. “The Burren” .which is a name that comes from an Irish word meaning “rocky place.”

We only had about 45 min here, but, that seemed just about right. Dad didn’t get to see all the tricks that a sheep dog can do, but didn’t seem too disappointed.

Practically, just across the road from this is the stone fort sheep herding place, is the Poulnabrone dolmen. This is a portal tomb, and this is this first of many times that I was grateful to be here during the slow season. There were more than a few tourists here, but, not so many that I didn’t get several pictures that were without people. 

There are more than 90 such tombs in the Burren, and I feel a tad sad that the quiet of this sacred space in a rugged landscape is pretty much a revolving door of peeping tourists for half the year. Of course, as I am a peeping tourist, well, I can’t say too much, can I?

After this, we drove with the Burren to the southern edge of Galway Bay. (It’s there, the blue between the darker mountainy bits just under the clouds, and just about the gray and green of the rocky foreground. Those limestone rocks are the general ground cover of the Burren.

We continued along until we stopped for lunch at Ballyvaughan, on the edge of the bay. Something of a touristy place, we got there before the big coaches, and had the place to ourselves. I got fishcakes, and the pint of Guinness seen in the teaser. The food was much better than one would expect from a tourist place, and it was a fair price. The view was pretty good, too.

From here, we worked our way along, out of the Burren to the Cliffs of Moher.

They are as advertised. It was a clear day, if windy, and cool, but, you could see the Aran Islands from the top. It’s likely hard to tell how high up we are, standing on the tops of these things, but, it’s not a fall you’d recover from. There is a wall, but, there are places where you aren’t supposed to go, which were visited by people with little sense, who could, with a good gust (of which there were clearly many) and a bit of unbalance, would find themselves getting a burial at sea. I myself offered a sacrifice of Euros, after pulling my hand out of my pocket, not realizing it had dislodged from the depths, and in a heartbeat it was zooming its way to a watery grave. (It’s ok, just a bit of money. I was not stupid enough to try and catch it.)

This beautiful place was the highlight of the day, though, it was hard getting my jet lagged, out of shape self up the hill to see them.  But, hard or no, we all made it, and it was actually light duty compared to the days that were to come.

 

And that was just the end of day one.