Eire We Are!

Awesome flights and connections with Air Canada!  The landings and takeoffs were perfect and there was no turbulence on any of the legs – smooth sailing to Eire!  So smooth in fact that we could see the Emerald Isle from the air as we flew over on our way to Frankfurt before catching another flight to Dublin.  No complaining though.  We had frankfurters and beer in the German airport!  And the flights were “free” with Aeroplan!

The friendliness of the Irish (if we may stereotype) began on the flight from Frankfurt to here.  The young man (our kids age) sharing our aisle chattered about and responded to our queries about his country.  He gave some insight into schooling and marvelled over some of the sights we are about to see.  He was quite interested in geocaching, even mentioning that he would have to look it up when the weekend was over and he was back at work!  Seems he works with computers.   His children, a bit older than our grandkids go to private Irish school where they learn Gaelic and develop skills that make them desirable for government employment.  (French immersion?)   He told us we would see some of these when we make our way around on the tour – we would hear the language.  He was a bit of a joker and very friendly.  When we parted at the airport he even mentioned giving us his phone number in case we had any trouble.  We assured him we would be just fine!

Options to get down to our hotel from the airport included cab or Blue Bus:  Blue Bus was very easy to use and a quarter of the cost of a cab, plus another fun experience.  We had only been up for 30 hours at that time so did pretty good.  No meltdowns!

The hotel is nice.  Surrounded by amazing oak trees and other species we don’t know the names of.  All of the yards are fenced with black wrought iron or mossy stone structures, either choice festooned with ivy.  Ivy is everywhere.  Looks to be a pest. What a great pest to have!

Day 1: We slept till 10 and missed the “free” breakfast in the hotel so we headed out the front door at the same time as an older man (older than us even – maybe 75.)  He said good morning and when we replied he realized we weren’t from here, he asked what we were looking for.  As he listed off the choices we may make another gentleman overheard the conversation and advised us of a place called Roly’s “just a five minute walk.”  The older man offered to “drop” us, but we declined his gracious and sincere offer and wandered off.  It seems everyone we meet tries to find a Canadian connection – this gentleman’s was that his daughter was a barrister in Toronto.  We met this guy later in the midafternoon.  He was just leaving his home with his daughter and we recognized each other!  He exclaimed loudly to his daughter as he introduced us as, “The CANADIANS!!”

Breakfast at Roly’s was great although once you have had a full Irish Breakfast – you needn’t eat again until your next life!

Roly’s Full Irish Breakfast

2 big slices of bacon (looks like back bacon – no fat tastes great)

1 slice white haggis – 1 slice brown haggis (Murray – fry it in something like bacon fat then put seasoning on it)

1 large pork sausage (the size of our beef sausage) tasty!

1 large mushroom with a whole baked mid sized tomato atop (weird but good)

1 large fried egg ( a cheery dot of yellow in the sea of breakfast meat!)

1 triangle shaped hash brown to complete the circle of food on the very large plate.

A full basket of dry toast to the side washed down with coffee that I considered to be very strong – and we were set for the week.  Weird and interesting side note is that tourists must be eating all the Irish folks breakfast for we have only seen about 2 (yes two) people on the heavy side.

We had the GPSr with us so we carried on in an attempt to burn off breakfast, find some interesting geocaches and look for birds (come on some of you – if you made it this far – have been wondering when birds would come up (no joshing).  We managed to find 5 caches as we made our way on a 7 kilometer stroll around this part of the city.  Caching sure is a great tour guide!

So the tally for day 1 was Blackbird (really great singers), goldfinch, great cormorant, grey heron, mistle thrush, irish robin and BLUE  TITS!!! Along with crows, pigeons, ducks, swans, magpies and a myriad of other birds that were too high up in the tree tops to identify; 40 thousand Guinness signs; coloured doors, rock fences; heaps and heaps of fancy cars but NOT one pickup truck!

Day 2:  We had a manageable “free” breakfast this morning before heading off for a geo-stroll.    We found 2 more today in spite of a bit of circling and having downloaded a couple that are missing in action.  We have had the weather described to us several times now as four seasons in an hour: sun, rain, hail, snow then sun again.  Well no snow but it’s been several moments of hail, a minute or two of rain followed by an hour or more of sun – the mist comes and goes from out of nowhere.  And yes it is very, very green!

Not sure how much blogging will take place – internet is not free here and time might be premium.  Gotta go log the caches and make some pdf maps for the pc all the “free” maps end at the edge of town we are in.