Filed under: Dublin
Last night we saw Madness!!! We met up with our old friend John Newcombe. We had dinner at the Bleeding Horse pub. (The Bleeding Horse got its name because it’s a place where people from the country would stop with their overheating horses. To cool them off they bled them.)
Anyways – the show was great. I caught loads of it on video.
My dream concert would be Madness, The Who, Southern Culture on the Skids – and maybe El Vez. Of that group, I had never seen Madness so this was a big deal for me to go to the show.
Filed under: Dun Laoghaire
Monday the girls and I went to Dun Laoghaire. We had a nice walk down the other pier, we did some shopping and we had a tasty dinner at Café Mao.
We thought we might see some Bloomsday characters – but if there were any around Dun Laoghaire, I figure they were probably there in the morning as any remotely Dun Laoghaire scenes in Ulysses happen early on in the book. I took a couple of snaps…
Filed under: Wicklow
On Sunday we had out final outing with Fearghal. Patrick ditched us to see some archive of letters near Kilkenny. If he wants people to know more, he’ll have to start his own darned blog.
The rest of us went to lunch at Hunter’s Hotel in Rathnew, Wicklow. It is an old hotel. I think Lily put it best when she described it to Patrick “It’s old like Shakespeare – no more like Yeats.” Yeats was closer. I think it was built in the 1700s and has been run by the same family since 1820.
The gardens around the place were beautiful. The restaurant was very, very formal and old school. I felt like I was in school when the waitress came to take our order. I didn’t seem to do it quite right – but it was funny. The food was very good.
The best part of the dinner was when a bird flew into the restaurant. The staff was incredibly calm. One hostess calmly and quickly grabbed the bird with her bare hands but he got away. So then another staff member – the official bird catcher we assume – caught it and set it free outside.
After dinner we went to Avoca, the real life setting of Ballykissangel – a TV show that airs occasionally on PBS. What’s fun is that I’ve always wanted to visit Avoca. Fearghal has a knack for picking just the right place to visit. He’s good that way. We are going to miss Fearghal a lot when we go home. He’s been so generous to us while we’ve been here. In fact, the weekend we were in Dromahair, Aine asked her grandma if Fearghal missed us.
Filed under: Uncategorized
Saturday morning the girls and I went to the Book Fair in Cabinteely, which is the big park near the house. They got their faces painted. Lily was especially excited to see some of the children’s authors. I got to hear Cathy Kelly, Martina Devlin, and Pauline McLynn. The big thrill was Pauline McLynn. She is the housekeeper from Father Ted, we saw her (loved her) earlier this year in Taming of the Shrew, and I didn’t realize it but I had read one of her books – The Woman on the Bus, where the main character is named Treacy.
So I was like a semi- stalker trying to take pictures of her while lamely looking as if I was taking pictures of a kid (one of my kids again so as not to look like the stalker I was). Hopefully one of them turned out and I’ll paste it below.
We also got to peek into the big house in the park. The Cabinteely House was owned by the Walsh family, which ran the Irish sweepstakes. We didn’t tour the house but it looks as if it is partially restored and furnished. The guide told us that it is mostly used for movies now. He couldn’t be specific about which movies, because I think his movie knowledge was about on par with my own.
In the afternoon and evening Ailbhe’s family took all of the girls bowling and to play. The kids had a great time. It’s funny how the sort of thing we might do at home have become a super big treat here. Ailbhe’s family has a car, which is now almost a novelty to us!
While the kids were off, Patrick and I went into town. We left in the afternoon and stayed past the last bus. We saw the Street Performance World Championship, which was great fun! The acts were amazing and/or funny – sometimes both. I have a ton of video so I’ll add that below.
After that we walked around town. The weather cool but dry – which is Irish for amazing weather – especially after last summer of 40+ days of rain in a row. We had dinner at our very favorite French restaurant. Sadly they changed my favorite item, which just took me back to 1989 when they took the barbeque pits off the menu at Baker’s Square – but I’ve learned to move on and the dinner was wonderful despite the poor decision making of the chef.
Later we met Conor and Sophie (classmates of Patrick) in town and visited a couple of pubs. It wasn’t a big rousing night but it was fun. It was amazing how light it was at 10:30 at night. It felt like 7:00, which is maybe why we ended out so long.
Filed under: Dublin
The girls were off from school 2 days last week. One day we went into town. I can’t even remember what the excuse was but I found a few pictures from the day. A couple of the pictures are taken in Stephen’s Green and the others are from Grafton Street with the pretend statue Elvis. (Pretend statues are kind of the rave in busking these days.)
Filed under: Dublin
On Wednesday we all went to Ailbhe’s house for dinner. Ailbhe is a friend of Lily. Her sister Cait is friends with Kate. They have 2 boys (Liam and Ciaran) around Aine’s age. The parents (Ann and Barney) were kind enough to invite us for dinner. It was a great night.
The kids ran around the house just like they would at home but haven’t been able to do for a while. One of the neighbors (Maria, a fellow library mom) stopped by and never left. I may have had my weight in wine. But it was a great night.
On Friday we had parties for the girls. From 3:30-5:00 we had 18 preschoolers. From 5:30-7:00 we had the 8-9 year olds. I won’t say it was fun for me but it was pretty painless.
You can get an idea of the activities with the pictures below.
Patrick was tired – from what I don’t know since I planned and prepared the whole thing; I was hungry so after the party we went for an Indian meal. I love Chicken Korma.
Filed under: Dublin
This week is arts week at Johnstown Girls School. SO the girls have had tons of art projects going all week – pottery, film, plays… The girls especially enjoyed the pottery – but really the whole week has been fun for them. (I love the idea of a whole week on the arts!) Below are 3 clips from Lily’s play:
Filed under: Uncategorized
Sunday morning I had a walk around Dromahair. It is a nice town but I could see that some suburban looking development was on its way, which is kind of a shame. In the pub I heard that folks would really like the town to remain a rural village but the development is starting to take over. Dromahair is close to Sligo so I suspect that it the draw for many people.
Sunday morning we took a boat trip around Lough Gill. The weather was perfect! Lough Gill’s most famous island is Innisfree. I suspect many people will recognize:
I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made;
Nine bean rows will I have there, a hive for the honeybee,
And live alone in the bee-loud glade. (see more)
The boat ride was really nice. The baot was nearly empty so we could run around – those of us who felt like we needed to run. George, the boat captain, gave a nice running commentary on what we were seeing, which including some poems and music. But it wasn’t too much – and the area is really beautiful.
After the boat ride we toured Parke’s Castle, which is really where the boat docks. It was fun to tour too. The Jordan girls knew the tour by heart – but they seemed to enjoy it too. They’ve done a good job of preserving the different ages of the castle. My favorite part was the pigeon’s tower. There they kept pigeons from other castles in case they needed to send a message via carrier pigeon. However, in time of strife or famine, they could eat the pgieons. (I’d be training those pigeons to go to pick up pizza in times of strife or famine!)
After the castle we headed to Dooney Rock, which reminded me of Northern Minnesota in a lot of ways. It’s giant rock (think Wisconsin Dells) that you climb up to see a view of the lake (this Lake Superior). We had the quickest picnic lunch thanks to the bugs but a nice climb with a beautiful view.
It was just what the doctor ordered before a 3 hour train ride home.
Filed under: Dromahair
After the cemetery we headed out to Lissadell, a huge castle (nearly castle) where the Gore-Booths lived. The most famous Gore-Booth was Constance Markievicz – a patron and good friend to WB Yeats. (See the theme of the area?) The house reminded me of the James J. Hill House back home – with a ton more land.
The house was fun. The coolest thing was in the dining room the family had etched their names in one of the windows to prove that someone’s diamond engagement ring was indeed a diamond.
The gardens were amazing. We learned from the vegetable garden that 2008 is the year of the potato. So, happy year of the potato!
The strangest thing about the house was that there was a tunnel behind the house and that’s how the servants got to and from the house so that the people of the manor born would not have to see them coming and going.
While Patrick and I toured the house Mary and Paul kindly took the kids to the nearby beach. The beach was to the North Atlantic but it was shallow enough to be fairly warm – or so it was reported to me. I know the kids had a great time.
That night we had a really nice meal at their house. The kids ate hamburgers first and then the grownups had steak – and mine was a perfect medium rare! Living in Dublin we have remarked how we miss having people over for dinner or going to other people’s house so it was very nice to just relax.
After dinner most of us pretty much fell asleep after a long day. Poor Paul had to sell raffle tickets at the pub, which mustn’t have been too bad since rumor has it he came back pretty late.
Filed under: Dromahair
Saturday morning we headed out to Drumcliffe, where Yeats is buried. I have a picture or two of the grave – his epitaph is famous:
Cast a cold Eye
On Life, on Death
Horseman, pass by!
The cemetery is very unassuming. The grave is nearly in the shadow of Ben Bulben, a mountain made famous by Yeats:
Under bare Ben Bulben’s head
In Drumcliff churchyard Yeats is laid.
An ancestor was rector there
Long years ago, a church stands near,
By the road an ancient cross.
No marble, no conventional phrase;
On limestone quarried near the spot
By his command these words are cut:
Cast a cold eye
On life, on death.
Horseman, pass by!
Also in Drumcliffe is a great Celtic Cross. I hope the picture turns out, as you can really make out the scenes in the stone, starting with a picture of Adam and Eve. The grownups were talking about the picture, which the kids had trouble seeing over the wall of the cemetery. One of them (Imogen maybe) climbed up and was sorry disappointed to see that we were talking about a picture not real live Adam and Eve.
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