I traveled from Liverpool to Dublin, briefly passing through Wales via train, thus fulfilling my obligation to visit Wales. I passed through a town who's name was spelt with about 90 constanants, 6 vowels, and a few missing chromosomes, there were sheep, and I think I saw a fight. In my experience that counts as a visit to Wales. If I seem a tad harsh on poor little Wales, you have to understand that I spent my first Xmas away from Australia in Cardiff with my mate Jarrod. We ended up having a Xmas dinner of 4 pints of lager, a bottle of Cointreau, and one piece of meat which when cooked shrunk from the size of a large turkey to a starved spatchcock. We also had planned to have baked potatoes, but unfortunately Jarrod had underestimated how long ago he'd bought them and they had grown small trees in their sides. The moment where we hit rock bottom was when we decided to switch from watching Family Guy to checking out the news, just in time to see all the smug bastards in Australia on the beach in Santa hats. It's a testament to how good a friend Jarrod is that I still remember that Xmas fondly, but it's safe to say Wales has not been reserved a place in my heart.
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| Sigh....Yes Wales you used all the letters. Well done. |
The rest of my time in Dublin was spent just wandering around town, trying to figure out what the hell the locals were saying, and mostly hanging out with Colm and Anita. I have to write a special thanks to those two, as with just one days warning they ended up putting me up while I was in Dublin (and one night when I screwed up my buses from the west coast of Ireland to Northern Ireland and would've otherwise been stuck in the rain or at a bus station). Colm had only met me for one day a few years before back in Australia before I invaded his house, and yet he was waiting with a beer opened for me the moment I arrived, let me join his mates for a game of football, and didn't punch me when he had to let me in the front door after I came back to his house in the middle of the night/morning. As for Anita, I always knew she was an amazing, kind, beautiful person from going to high school with her, but she completely out did herself during my visit. I think the moment that captures how sweet she is, was when I was coming back from playing football with Colm the last night I was in Dublin. We stopped off on the way home at a convenience store and Colm said he had to grab something for Anita. He wandered around confused for a moment, and I asked him if I could help. He then told me he had been ordered to get me something sweet to put in my backpack for the bus trip the next day. Mother Theresa, take a knee. Anita's got this one.
Dublin was good for me in a lot of ways, but definitely not my liver. I've always heard that Guinness was different in Ireland, and I now realise why. They put crack in it over her, because that stuff is seriously addictive. So I decided that I should head to somewhere quiet, and get a bit of nature, some R and R, and some healthy living for a few days. I thought the best place for this was Galway, a small historical town on the west coast. I was wrong.
It took me literally 12 minutes from the time I checked into my hostel to the time I had my first beer on a pub crawl. Turns out Galway is somewhat of a party town. As an Australian it's quite funny seeing how Europeans treat historic buildings. The general rule I've noticed so far is anything built by the Romans = untouchable ruins, which people come and look at and imagine what buildings looked like. Anything which has a cobbled street surrounded by buildings which are all about 4 times older than the white version of Australia = party town. This in some ways makes sense. For one, most of the old buildings were pubs, because back in the day all there was to do in Europe was drink, and occasionally hang someone. So really you're just maintaining the history (though no hangings sadly). Secondly, most of these streets have gutters in the middle as they would have previously had to wash away the toilet waste which was then flung onto the street. This makes it ideal for washing away Australian backpacker vomit which inevitably flows after the tourists get a bit too much 'culture'. Thirdly, it means that the girls in outrageous high heels have to walk along cobblestones when they're drunk, which is hilarious. Anyway, Galway fits this trend perfectly, as its' beautiful old downtown is filled with pubs, kebab stores, and souvenir stores. My time in Galway was spent pubcrawling, watching Euro football with crazy travelling fans, and one day out getting some fresh air and seeing the sights on the Aran Isles.
The pub crawl was a pub crawl. With the exception of meeting a few Aussie girls who reminded me why I fled to Europe (not a slight against all Aussie girls there, just those ones, you know the ones), and the crippling hangover the next day it was a good night, with lots of Guinness drinking challenges, some spazzy dancing, and some dubious free shots. The night out watching the euro games was also a great (albeit unintentionally big) night. It was Germany v Netherlands, and as a massive dutch fan I was pretty keen to support them, and managed to find a few crazy Dutchies kitted out in Orange, and Netherlands flag face paint.The only problem was we weren't in the Netherlands, meaning that due to the fact that German tourists are EVERYWHERE, this was always going to be a bar dominated by ze Germans. Unfortunately, the dutch sucked, and lost badly. Fortunately, I made friends with the Germans after one of them inadvertently poured his beer over me after their first goal. This meant I got bought free beers all night, and once again went past my self imposed curfew.
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| Say what you will about the Dutch, they come prepared for patriotism. |
The day on the Aran Islands followed my back to back benders, and I'll be honest, I felt a tad rough waking at 7am. But after a two hour bus and ferry ride, a conversation with a classic older American tourist ('My gosh, what a long flight that is, that's so long; Maury, isn't that a long flight this young man took, gosh could you imagine'), and being first person off the boat and renting a bike, I had the island to myself, a bike between my legs and fresh air in my lungs. I also had a massive tail wind behind me, and I cruised down to the far tip of the island in barely an hour. Life was good. Unfortunately life got worse after that. I was too hungover to notice I had such a massive tail wind, and so it came as a bit of a shock when I turned around to find I was riding into a small hurricane. This would've been ok if it weren't for the fact it started raining....heavily. The effect of this was amplified by the fact that I was wearing a very lovely woolen jumper given to me by the ever generous Ms Rosy Goodrick, which unfortunately in the rain shed impossible amount of fibres which ended up all over my hands and thus face as I tried to clear the water from my vision, and which also I later learned bled dye all over my shirt and torso. I slogged back, and even stopped at a couple of ruins and look outs in true backpacker spirit, but the real pain came during the boat and bus trip back (no heating on either). The worst thing was the boat was delayed and I missed my bus to Northern Ireland, meaning I had nowhere to stay (Galway was booked out), and could only get to Dublin that night. I tell this mainly to once again emphasise how much of a hero Anita and Colm are for putting me up once again that night. A hot shower has never felt better! Having said that, the Aran Isles were absolutely beautiful, and I'm definitely glad I suffered through it all, because I'd been getting a bit sick of beautiful European cities at that stage (woe is me) and was definitely hanging out for some nature.
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| mmm nature.....ergh Guinness burp |
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| Happier times, before the deluge. |
From Dublin I ventured north to Belfast where I stayed with another amazing host. This one was a couchsurfing host. I've had some amazing experiences with couchsurfing, but I think this one tops them all. My host was a guy called Phil, who originally hails from Australia, but has lived and travelled pretty much everywhere. Phil lives by himself, with the exception of when his son stays over every so often, in a massive 4 bedroom house, which also has a huge lounge room. Apparently he'd previously hosted 12 people at one time, and he's just the most generous open person I've ever met through the website. While I was there he hosted a couple of American lebian vegitarians with nose rings (classic couchsurfers), a Scottish couple, an American lad who was going to Oxford, and he also was visited a few times by a girl he had hosted when she first moved to Belfast who now lived there. Of the many awesome things I remember from my time in town some of the highlights were
* Getting a backpackers breakfast from the local markets (free samples). The local markets were quite diverse, and there really is nothing quite like a burp which is comprised of 12 types of olive oil, 10 curries, chocolate, muesli, coffee, fish jerky, and a caramel slice.
* Getting a guided tour from Phil of the murals on the side of the buildings in the Catholic and Protestant parts of town, and then seeing the artwork and graffiti along the dividing wall.
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| Memorial showing the ages of some of the people killed in the conflict. Quite a lot were aged between 4 and 10. |
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| Nyeah I wrote on the wall. |
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| But so did Bill Clinton so it's all good. |
It was interesting seeing the change in tone from the Catholic side where the murals had a mourning/hopeful attitude, to the Protestant side of town where the murals were a tad more confrontational. The one that stuck with me the most was the mural that said 'We defend our basic human right... to retaliate after being attacked'. I think Ghandi came up with that one.
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| Aww Titanic memorial |
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| Aww protestant and catholic kids getting along |
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| Aww terrorist group |
* Renting a car and heading to the beautiful north coast and seeing the Giants Causeway and a few other cool natural sights. I was joined by a couple of American girls who were also staying with Phil at the time. It was really fun being behind the wheel again and speeding around the quiet lanes of country Northern Ireland. The most amazing thing was that the weather was perfect. Sunshine, and barely a cloud in the sky. The only hairy moment during the day was when I gave the keys to my friend Emily (definite flower child), while I went and climbed around an old castle. When I got back Emily had made herself a very lovely flowery headband, but unfortunately had lost the keys somewhere in the long grass. Luckily we didn't have to spend a night camped out on the coast as we found them about 5 minutes later, but I decided to hang onto the keys from that moment onwards.
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| My fellow couchsurfers |
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| Amazing how nice this part of the world looks when it's sunny |
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| Giant shoe/bed |
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| Giant's causeway |
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| Yeh, no the bubbles are great, but where the hell are the keys? |
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| You didn't think I'd go a whole blog without at least one jumping photo did you? |
Apart from that it was just awesome hanging out with Phil and the other travelers, drinking wine, making spaghetti for everyone, going out in town, and playing drinking games without the drinking with Phil's son.
Overall Ireland and Northern Ireland were brilliant. The people were great, although you could definitely tell there was some tension and a lot of unemployment due to the recession. One thing I loved is how the Irish express their anger. Twice I heard full blown shouting matches in the middle of the street in downtown Dublin. The first was a local who was screaming at someone I'm guessing was an immigrant to the country saying stuff like 'You come here, take our jobs for half the feckin pay. You'll never be feckin Irish, you'll never be Irish'. I'm guessing that this was just an Irish bogan, and unless the immigrant had pushed in front of him in line at the dole office that he probably hadn't effected him in the slightest. The other one I heard was a massive domestic in the middle of the main street, which ended with the guy screaming at his now storming off girlfriend 'GO FECK YOURSELF............YOU FECKIN BITCH'. The whole street turned and then started laughing. But it was also their graffiti that I quite liked. From the intense but quite poetic...
To the hilarious...
After this I headed to Scotland. I had originally planned to travel to Scotland a few days earlier so I could trek up to the highlands and try and find Nessie. Unfortunately the weather up there was so abysmal that I ended up staying a few extra days in Belfast and arrived a little earlier in Edinburgh. Edinburgh was a really beautiful city, although sadly the Scottish brogue was so soft down here I could understand everyone perfectly, which was a tad disappointing. My bus ride across from the west coast of Scotland was actually quite a highlight as well. Again the sun had peaked through the clouds and the green of the countryside just popped into life with the unexpected rays. It definitely has made me want to return one day and explore the north a bit more.
I couchsurfed with a lovely Irish girl, Sinead. She was a really smart and funny girl, and she had some jokes that even most dads would roll their eyes at. But my favourite moment of my stay with Sinead was when we were out at her local with a few of her friends and she was talking with some English guy. The English lad was a tad dim, but fancied himself a bit of a wit, and wasn't quite understanding that Sinead was joking about a few things that he was taking serious. Unfortunately for the poor English lad he made some comment regarding Irish people not understanding when they've been beaten, a thinly veiled reference to the English occupation of Ireland. Here's a hint for English people thinking of conversing with Irish people. Irish people are very friendly people, and don't particularly hold any grudges over English people that would prevent them from being friends. Unfortunately they (understandably) still have some beefs regarding the whole English occupation thing, and so Sinead's reaction was priceless.
''You are a feckin Coont'' she said, and stormed out. This, mind you, was my first night staying with her, and so I hastily said my goodbyes to my new friends and ran after her. The walk home was hilarious as Sinead alternated between apologising for getting angry and storming out, rationalising that maybe he wasn't actually referring to what she thought, and then getting angry again and saying things like ''No, feck him, he is a coont''. This process was repeated about 20 times but I think we settled on him being a prick, and that Sinead acted awesomely.
But I don't want to paint her as some sort of crazy lady. I mean she was a little crazy, but in a sweet funny way. It'd be like judging a mother after you tried to abduct her children. Sinead also took me on an amazing culinary tour of Edinburgh. I ate fried pizza (yep, just cheese pizza, battered and fried), Scotch eggs, and my favourite, Haggis. Haggis was absolutely delicious, and Sinead paired it with Broccoli and Tatties (mashed potatoes), and I think my body, clearly craving vegetable matter after the fried pizza incident, was very thankful for a normal meal. We also invented environmentally friendly shot glasses, shooting rum out of raspberries.
I also ventured to the top of the mountain that overlooks the town, saw the castle, and generally wandered the streets. Sinead and I also went on a pretty ordinary ghost tour through the underground vaults where the poor people used to live back in ye olde days. It was a shame because the actual places we toured were really cool, but the stories and unfortunately the tour guide kinda sucked. There's a business opportunity there somewhere I'm sure. Edinburgh is definitely a beautiful city, and it'd be great to go there again one day for the Fringe festival, or just for the hell of it really.
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| It was so windy during this photo, the guy taking it almost fell over. |
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| Seriously pretty city, gives Stockholm a real run for it's money. |
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| Castle peeking through the deluge. |
So that was my UK and Ireland trip. From Edinburgh I headed down south to meet Miss Goodrick and her lovely family, but you know all about that, so I won't bore you again. Next stories will be from San Fermin!!! It'll be a big one. Till next time.....
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