Black Gold

An Englishman, Australian and Irishman walk in to a bar. They order three pints of Guinness. The barmen gives them the three pints. Just at that moment three flies land in each of the three glasses.

The Englishman pushes the glass away.

The Australian drinks the Guinness and leaves the fly.

The Irishman picks the fly out of his pint and thumps the fly on the bar yelling “spititout ya bastard, will ya spitit out.!”

It is well known that the Irish are religious and I am not only referring to their devotion to Christianity. It is the local black nectar that defines Ireland. We visited the Guinness factory in Dublin which pumps out 4 million pints per day. I reccon most of it must go to a bloke in Kilkenny who holds the world record for downing 4 pints of the stuff in 7 seconds. Many say that it is an acquired taste. I suppose it is like vegemite to us Ozis. It is either bloody awful or mothers milk and little in between. It also seems that my dad has been moonlighting as the head brewer at Guinness who is a Mr J.A. Carey. Now I know why I like drinking the stuff so much.

(a photo of their two strongest religious building - church and brewery)

Many say that Dublin isn’t a beautiful City and I would have to agree. There is not the great monuments, world class museums or great buildings. Although there is 3,545 pubs. We did walk past the Dublin Post Office which was the site of the Easter uprising in 1916. I did try to unravel the history of this place but it was more complicated than unpicking a knotted fishing line. As far back as 1366 it seems Catholic repression and rebellions was a yearly occurrence. I did discover a little known fact that as well as the Post Office they also took over a brewery, lunatic asylum and bakery. I guess they were planning for a good feed, drink and some rehab afterwards.

The week was over and it was time to return home. You would think that our defining memory of Oierland was rolling green hills, Guinness, pubs, or brightly painted towns – but actually it was housing development. Every town we drove into had large areas of new housing being built. Every road and town had some form of improvement going on. The €184 billion National Development Program is Irelands huge plan to transform the Country and judging by the growth it seems to be working.

But the lasting memory will always be the accent. Most of the time I bought anything that had a three in the cost just so I could hear the shop assistant say “that ill be tirty tree cents tanks”. As we got back on the plane the announcement came over the speaker: “How are youse? Thanks for joinin us and wes hope you enjoyedya stay in Oierland. Tis rainin in England but we alls hope yu enjoys yas flight”.

Irish Stew

We woke early after an overnight stop on the shore of Kenmare River. The morning began with a lovely drive through Killarney National Park and our hopes were rising. The road to Dingle was definitely one less travelled. I was beginning to think how unfortunate all those tourist were not seeing this beautiful part of Ireland. I do wonder if the locals want to keep this place for themselves.

The town of Dingle is the most Westerly town in Europe and the largest Gaeltacht (Irish speaking) region. The town was cute with buildings painted in a rainbow of different colours. We parked near the docks where the fishing boats were tied up unloading their catch from somewhere out in the deep Atlantic. Opposite the docks, a long line of pubs welcomes fisherman and locals. It seems that Oierland is one long bar. I even heard that Dingle has more pubs per head of population than any other town in Ireland – but I guess they assume that you can get a Guinness even in the Doctors surgery.

We only had one choice and that was to make ourselves at home with a pint and order an Irish Stew for dinner. As the night rolled on, the Irish music and singing started up and I knew that finally we were experiencing true Ireland.

The next day we drove beyond Dingle along a road hacked out of the cliff side with green fields on one side and the sheer cliffs disappearing into the Atlantic on the other. Some say the locals drive at night with their hand out the window feeling the rocks so they don’t drive off the edge. We travelled past old beehive huts reputed to be 3000 years old and stared in awe at the dramatic mountains looming out of the slight drizzle. From here the drive took us back towards Dublin but we had one more stop to make. Clonmacnoise is an impressive monastic remains, and one of the most important religious sites of its time, balanced on the shore of the Shannon River. As the few travellers present left for the evening we set up camp and watched as the stillness of dusk lit up the stone ruins. A fitting finish to our journey before our last stop in Dublin.

Welcom to Oierland

You know you are in Oierland the minute you step on Ryan Air with the announcement “How are youse? Thanks for joinin us on our jaunt to Oierland. Tis a glorius day in Dubln and we alls hope yu enjoys yas flight”. With no seating allocation we were lucky that the flight was not full otherwise I could see the twins sitting no where near us…not that that would be a bad thing! It did make me wonder if you got on first if you could sit in the pilot seat? Ryan Air is Europe’s larges low cost airline, criticised by many for contributing to global warming and unfair practices. But for £30 return for all 5 of us, I ignored my ethical stance to spend the week travelling in a campervan around the isle.

Our main destination was the south west coast. We made our way first through Kilkenny then a quick stop at the Rock of Cashel. Over 200 feet high, this limestone outcrop rises out of the rolling hills, and perched on top are the imposing remains of a cathedral dating back to 12th Century. There is folklore that this is where St Patrick established the shamrock as the symbol of Ireland and used it to teach people about Christianity as he travelled around Ireland.

From here we drove on through Cork to Kinsale where we camped by the Atlantic Ocean. Little did we realise before we left that as it was low season and none of the camp sites were open. Luckily the campervan was pretty self sufficient except for the need to sneak into a public toilet ever now and again to empty the loo (NOT a pleasant tasks!).

Next stop was Killarney. Some say it is too touristy full of nothing but leprechaun tea towels, jaunting cars and the never ending stream of coach tours. I think I agree. Unfortunately those same tourist coaches all had one destination in mind. The Ring of Kerry. We knew that it was a popular route when we were told that we needed to drive in a clockwise direction otherwise we wouldn’t be able to get past the parade of coaches that travel the ring along the narrow road.

The road twists and turns along the coast but for us, it was somewhat disappointing. Despite the tourist brochures, the scenery was nice but not as dramatic as Scotland. Many of the tourist books say that Ireland is all about the people. I think this is another way of saying that the scenery is not that impressive and you can find better history elsewhere. While we were planning to stay the night here we decided to push on and drive into the night in the hope that our next stop Dingle Peninsular would be better.

Technical difficulties from Oireland

Due to technical difficulties, James is not available to write his journal entry from Ireland........... well, technical difficulties is not entirely accurate. James is currently recovering from a week in a campervan with three children as well as suffering from a Guinness induced hangover.

Unfortunately he has to return to work tomorrow and will not be in a fit state of mind to recall the trials and tribulations of the last week for a few days. Normal programming will continue this weekend once he has had a chance to detox and the valium takes effect.


For those interested, attached is a map of the trip undertaken with the pubs visited clearly marked.