England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales

Part Four: Northern Ireland

Before leaving Dublin, we paid a visit to the house where Oscar Wilde lived as a child.

This trip, in addition to being the Book Nerds' Tour of the Northern Hemisphere, is also turning out to be a porridge pilgrimage! Lish has an uncanny ability to track down a café that serves porridge.

Our selection this morning was:

Nut & honey; Berries, yoghurt, coulis and granola

Beautifully plated and delicious flavours.

Thus fettled, off we toddled to No. 1 Merrion Square.

We learned a whole bunch more about Oscar Wilde than we had ever known before. He was truly a tragic character (and also a bit of an idiot, not gonna lie).

In the corner of the park that faces the house, there is this statue to his memory.

This photo in the house:

goes nicely with a photo that I took in 2020, when Lish dragged us all through the Père Lachaise cemetery (which was really terribly interesting and I would never have thought to go there by myself).

They had to put glass up around it, because so many people kissed it with lipstick on, that it was damaging the marble.

On Sundays, artists put their works up on the fences of that park, for sale

We walked past the theatre, and saw a bunch of handprints in the sidewalk, of which my favourite is this dear old queer:

The colours up the motorway were just stunning. We took millions of photos of basically the same thing, over and over

We spent two nights at a little town called Kinvara, which has a beautiful little port

and a little ruined castle

which a group is attempting to raise funds to be able to reopen to the public. You can walk around the outside, but can't go inside.

I don't remember what we had for dinner, but the desserts certainly were noteworthy!

A cold but beautiful weather to go out exploring the countryside.

Our kindly hosts gave us a map with a big circular drive and info on good things to see.

We yell "COO!!!" every. single. time. we see cows. Even the Irish ones.
It never gets old

Lish particularly wanted to see the Cliffs of Moher

I can't get over how pacific the Atlantic is.

Beachfront at Lahinche. Obviously high tide at this moment - it's a very flat beach and when at low tide, would go out by maybe 30 or 50 metres from the bottom of these stairs.

Pheasants are about as bright as chickens when it comes to crossing the road!

Kilfenora High Cathedral

You can read all about it here:

Child shown for scale
These were not tall people!

Time capsule! To be opened in 2067!

Interesting how the Catholic and the pagan live side by side

Oh! So, funny story.

As usual, Lish plugged our next stop into Google Maps, and off we set. And we were about to turn right as directed, when we saw at the mouth of the street we were being told to take, THIS SIGN:

So we chortled, and did not take that road, going left instead of right.

And we were led the most merry dance around the countryside, through tiny roads, not large enough for two-way traffice, squiggle squiggle squiggle for a good half hour ....

and popped out

AT THE SIGN.

Fortunately we did eventually find our right path!

During the course of the squiggling, we passed this lovely old building

which appears to be in use as a private residence.

More amazing old ruins just casually dotted around the landscape as you go

There's a chocolate factory somewhere around, but unfortunately it was too late in the season, and it was closed.

What was not closed, was the Burren Perfumery.

We had a tour of the manufacturing, which was really interesting, and wandered around their gorgeous herb garden, and bought a few nice things.

More tiny roads to get home, and we came upon this schemozzle:

A massive truck who had met a car coming the other way. Normally someone has to reverse back to what they call a 'lay-by', to be able to pass.

The woman driving the car (click on the truck to see it) apparently couldn't reverse.

I was behind the truck, there was another car behind me ... That guy reversed back, turned around and went another way to wherever he was going.

I reversed back to a clearing, tucked myself in, the truck reversed back to a point in the road before the lay-by, then the silly woman drove up and tucked into the lay-by, so I could go and the truck could go.

What do you mean, you can't reverse??? 🤔

Here's the pretty castle in Kinvara, close up and at golden hour.

You can read about it here:

NORTHERN IRELAND

It was another biggish drive - Kinvara to Larne, with the intention of going to the Giants' Causeway, which turned out to be over-optimistic, and also, we sort of accidentally found Derry!

Derry was only supposed to only be a pit-stop - a bathroom break and some lunch, and carry on - but we found what we first thought to be a cethedral, but turned out to be the Derry Guildhall!

The reason it looks like a church is because the architect was a guy who only did churches. So it's got all these gothic bits, and gorgeous stained glass, and a bell (okay, clock) tower, and it also has a full pipe organ!!!

There was a terrific exhibition on just exactly how much the English were absolute bastards towards the Irish, starting with the Ulster Plantations, up to and including Bloody Sunday, which neither Lish nor I knew anything nearly enough about. Sobering reading.

On display in the Guildhall are the several Peace Prizes awarded to John Hume.

And then, after all the serious reading, we went and did something very silly and nerdy.

Lish adores the TV show Derry Girls, and there was an exhibition right near the Guildhall

Derry Peace Bridge

A very enthusiastic and knowledgeable docent in the Guildhall explained to us that the design of the bridge is not straight, but curved 'because peace-making isn't straightforward'. It links the very Catholic side of Derry with the very English side (where the military was based, and no Irish nationalist would ever set foot).

The Derry Walls, built between 1613 and 1619, to protect the Scottish and English populations that had been 'planted' there by the English to "control, civilise and anglicise Ireland". (see above, re: English bastards). As a result of the building of the city's defences by the Irish Society, which was a consortium of livery companies based out of the City of London, the city was officially renamed Londonderry in the 1613 royal charter. This is what has subsequently led to the naming dispute for the city and county of Derry/Londonderry. (Wikipedia)