20 January 2011

So side note folks.

While in Ireland I found a post on Craigslist for what sounded like the perfect job for me. After much work and help from my fabulous Dad and our wonderful friends at Manager Tools on my résumé, I was given a phone interview. I prepped my behind off in Florence and had the interview immediately upon my arrival in Nice. I was fortunate enough to land an in-person interview, but had to end my trip a few days early. Once again, prepping with the help of Dad and the guidelines from Manager Tools I headed out to Cambridge to interview. Driving back to NY (thinking I had blown it) I received a call and an offer! It was fabulous.

Due to the amount of prep work I did and how short on time I was to see the sights, my blog obviously fell off a bit. Now that I am settled (ok, six months later) in Boston, I will be completing the blog and continuing to post my pictures for all of you. I apologize for the delay and I hope you enjoy the rest!

Best,

ElizaBeth

18 June 2010 – Day 18

More errands today, but it was also very chilly and looked like it was going to rain a bit. Towards the end of the afternoon, however, I told myself that I must go adventuring, so adventuring I went.

I hadn’t made it to Ross Castle on the bike because I felt as though my entire lower body was about to fall off, so I decided I could make it on foot. A quick look at google maps confirmed my theory. I should have, however, brought a sweater.

I made my way down to the Castle, about a mile and a half away, feeling pretty good, taking lots of beautiful landscape pictures. I ran into a herd of deer and took a TON of photos because they just looked a bit different than our deer back home. I found out later that they are red deer, and very overpopulated in the park due to lack of predators and the hunting ban.

I made it to the castle at just about 5 where I discovered that the last tour left at 5. I rushed inside and was lucky enough to grab the last tour of the day. There is no photography allowed in any of the museums in Ireland, but I didn’t know this so you’ll see 2 rather poorly taken shots. The castle was very interesting and had a long history (I did manage to photograph the info boards) that started with the fortress home of a clan chief way back in the day (14? century). The buildings had fallen into disrepair after the army pulled out in the 1800s(?) and remained derelict until the late 1900s when it was decided that it should be restored. To restore the castle (only 2 outer walls remained standing and the roof and all floors had caved in inside) it was decided that only the building techniques the original builders used should be used in the restoration. It was really cool to see the inside restored and it was super cool to see all the furniture the castle had purchased (almost all from the time period of the original owner, including furniture, tapestries, and some serving ware) some of which was the oldest of its kind in all Ireland. I also learned that they think the reason that people died so young was that they often ate off of pewter dishes. These, when polished, looked very much like silver, but were made of lead and tin. Do you see where this is going? Nobility that wanted to look a little richer than they were used pewter instead and got lead poisoning from their dishes. Whoops.

After leaving the castle I decided to take the longer way home because a) I try to avoid taking the same path twice, and b) there were supposed to be more look out points and I owed it to myself (and my loyal blog readers) to find and photograph them. It turned out to be a great idea because on the way I met Patsy and her boxer Mitch.

Patsy and Mitch were lovely to walk with and I had a thouroughly enjoyable conversation about boxers, her dog, and life in general. We parted ways so that I could take the shorter route back to the B&B (and also because I’m really bad at small talk for extended periods of time) and I hit town exactly at the right time for a movie I had been wanting to see. I took this as a sign that I should see the movie and paid an exorbitant amount to be shown ONE PREVIEW. I was very disappointed. The movie was quite enjoyable, however, and I found myself laughing often. If you want a kind of kitchy, romantic comedy, then Killers is a great choice.

After the movie it’s time for bed because of an early day. Last day in Killarney tomorrow and that means my tour of the Ring of Kerry. I want to get up extra early though because I haven’t gotten to walk around Cherry St Gardens. More adventuring….

17 June 2010 – Day 17

Today started with a full Irish breakfast. This included fried egg, toast, soda bread, tomato, sausage, ham (they call it bacon, but it’s really ham), and black and white puddings. I’ve noticed that when people in this part of the world say ‘pudding’ they mean something mixed with oatmeal and cooked in the oven. I only ate about half. I discovered that I DO NOT like fried egg yolks, Irish sausage, or the black pudding. It tasted ok, but I’m pretty sure it was a sort of blood pudding because it made me tummy all funny.

I didn’t do very much exciting today, mostly errands and shopping in town. The one note of interest was probably the candy shop. I stopped in at an old-fashioned candy store, I’m pretty sure the till was older than both my parent’s ages combined. The candy might have been just as old. But it was delicious. I bought some candies, only to discover that while a lot of them looked gummy and delicious, they were mostly hard candies. I didn’t really feel like eating hard candies so I threw most of them out. Maybe tomorrow will be a little more exciting.

16 June 2010 – Day 16

National Park DAY!!!!

So I got up, lovely breakfast, and headed out to the town. I had an errand or two to look after and then promptly got lost on the outskirts/suburbs of Killarney. Whoops. They have very interesting houses here. Almost all of them are duplexes with a wall or hedge down the middle of the lawn dividing the property. Strange.

Anyways, finally found myself in exactly the right spot where I rented a bike at a discount no less because I had stayed at the railway hostel. I had to bike through the town and as bikes aren’t allowed on the sidewalk, that meant street biking. I was slightly terrified. I finally was on the right track, however, and started towards the park. It turns out, the park entrance is actually more like 2 miles outside of town. It was lovely getting there because it was all downhill, but I dreaded coming back. It was definitely and effort coming back into town. At the entrance, I was really excited, it was cool and wooded. Much better than the stuffy town centre.

I began biking but had to pull over so much to take shots that I ended up just leaving my camera around my neck, promising myself that I would not fall under any circumstances.

This lead to me dismounting often and eventually, whenever there was a ‘touristy’ shot I learned to shoot while I was riding. I think I got quite good at it. Other shots I put into shutter focus and ‘artfully’ framed. I started with the Muckross (pig lake) abbey, which is in the process of being restored. It was a ton of fun because you could clamber all over the abbey and even run up into the highest part – the bell tower. There were also several lower rooms to explore and of course the cemetery.

My next stop was Muckross House. I decided not to spend the extra money to go in, but the gardens were absolutely beautiful and I even got to chat up some French couples who were visiting. They were so nice but I fear that I offended them because I kind of just walked away, not knowing how to end small talk in French. I tried to stop for some water, but there were about 300 school kids there so that didn’t happen.

I continued my journey, knowing that I wanted to make it all the way around the lake (12 km). There were some beautiful views and I met a fellow biker who frequented the park and usually walked his bike up the hills so that he could ride the really fast bits down. Those sections were very fast and windy. I finally hit the meeting of the waters where there was a small snack shop. I dined on a bottle of water and a piece of watermelon the size of my head. The perfect snack. I took some more photos and then it was off to finish the last bit.

Ah, the last bit. There is a part of the trail that must be completed on the road for bikers. I, forgetting that everything roadwise is backwards, followed the signs to get out of the parking lot the bike path ended in. This turned out to be the wrong direction as a local pointed out to me about a mile down the road. Great. I asked if I could keep going, would the road take me back to Killarney (maybe I don’t really need to see that waterfall, I can’t really feel my bum) and he said that it would take me back, in about 30 more miles. Back up the hill I biked. I passed the parking lot I had turned the wrong way out of and continued up the road, thinking ‘hmm, there’s a path there. Wonder if that’s how I get to the waterfall’. At the next parking area, still trying to understand my map, a couple tells me that I have a lovely camera (they owned the G10) and that it WAS in fact the way to the waterfall, but if I didn’t want to bike back, I could go in the out right there. So I chained my bike, started hiking up this hill. I get all the way back to that stupid parking pad and NO WATERFALL. At this point, I’ve been looking for this thing for 45 minutes. And there’s the parking pad. Beginning to feel like I’m starring in a re-make of Groundhog’s Day, I walk up the road and get my bike.

I hop on and continue down the road. Wouldn’t you know it, less than 2 minutes later I’m at the parking pad for the waterfall. I seriously debate continuing on without seeing the falls. I’ve been hiking/biking for roughly 6 hours and I am TIRED. But I’ve been looking for this thing for some time now and I decide that hell or high water, I’m seeing it. So I take a short hike into the woods. It’s lovely, but I’m a little underwhelmed, frankly. Getting back to the bike, I look at the map.

It seems I have the option of either following the road or I can take a path through the park. Not only will this be shaded, but I also see it is shorter. I like shorter. The catch is that I can’t SEE the entrance to this path and the horse jaunty drivers are looking at me kind of sideways, so I decided to take a quick little shortcut through the woods and hit the path. Things are going swimmingly; I am on my way back, it’s lovely, there’s a path, there’s no path….

That was when the path stopped and joined the road again. I think to myself, wait, there wasn’t supposed to be more road, why is there a road?! I see a small path off to the side and decide that’s what I’m supposed to be on. As it narrows to a footpath and starts leading around blind curves, I begin to think that maybe it is not the path I’m supposed to be on. Thankfully, it widens out. Sadly, it’s covered in big rocks that make my bum hurt more. And then we’re back to skinny, and wait there’s the road, why is the road there? Did I take another wrong turn? The road isn’t supposed to be there! On the bright side, all this adrenalin and fear are making the bumps hurt less. Or it could be the Tylenol I took 30 minutes ago.

Still on this tiny little path, I meet a hiker who tells me I am going in the right direction. I finally reach the main path again and start heading home. I turned the bike back in on time and walking on legs full of jelly I started to look for a grocery.

I finally found a Tesco’s after much meandering and bought myself some lunch making devices (I was very tired of paying for wickedly overpriced food). I also bought a bunch of candy and had a long discussion with the sales girls about what kind of candies the Irish typically eat.

I finally made it home, munching on some pasteries, talked to Thom, and watched The Blind Side. It was quite good and I enjoyed it thoroughly. And now, it is time for bed because I am very, very tired. Tomorrow will have to be an easy day I think.

15 June 2010 – Day 15

Last night. Holy cow, last night. I ended up going to bed around 11 or 12, a fairly reasonable hour. At 4am, a group of Americans from Kansas came back from the bars. I know this because not only did they wake us up, but Heidi was practically shouting into her phone and she mentioned that it was 4am. She didn’t stop talking after 3 different people all asked her to be quiet several times. She didn’t stop talking when her friends told her to go to sleep. I had to get down off my bunk, stick my head into hers, and tell her to go to sleep before she turned off the phone and went to bed. The next morning she didn’t remember any of it.

Check out of the hostel was at 10:30, but I couldn’t check in at the B&B until 2, so I hung out at the hostel, watched Finding Neverland (excellent film), and talked with the fam on Skype. Around 2 I headed down to my new digs, a cute little B&B. Google maps steered me wrong however, and not only did I pass my B&B (thinking to myself, my that looks like my B&B) but walked and walked and PASSED my guest house. I finally called the woman and she was like “you passed it” and I hiked back into town.

My room is really quite big with a great bay window and best of all, it’s all mine! With a bathroom! I was so hungry I snarfed the shortbread cookies they left out for me and promptly changed my clothes (it was hot and I was sweaty).

After I called Thom to tell him about the sweet new room, I headed off to explore the town. I was very hungry and pub food had been recommended, but I was so overwhelmed with choices that I did the only sensible thing and went shopping. I found a store that the drunk girls from last night recommended – called ironically enough, Penny’s. I bought the prettiest pair of heels and a very cute dress that I am pretty sure I’ll wear when Thom and I go out for a special dinner or something. Now I just need some accessories….

I found a place to get Thom’s present but they said it was going to take some thinking about and such, which I thought was fine – I’ll be here til Sunday. By this point I was ridiculously hungry, so I went to a nice looking pub. Big mistake. It was 20 euros for a drink and my dinner. It was, however, the very best lamb stew I have ever had and there was a TON of it. I of course, ate it all.

I meandered back to the room and did a little reading and talked to the bear extensively. It’s nice when you don’t have to shout over everyone to be heard and the internet connection is decent so you actually get a clear video of the person you’re talking to. It’s also nice to not have to sleep with your valuable underneath you.

Well anyways. Tomorrow should be a grand adventure; I’m renting a bike to cover the national park. Yay!

14 June 2010 - Day 14

This was a morning of misadventures. I was supposed to get up for church at like, 7. But the damn birds outside and the snoring woke me up at 5 and it was really hard to sleep. So I missed church but still popped in, you know, thanks God, before withdrawing money to pay for my 3.50 ticket on the bus. Since I didn’t want to have to pay 2 atm fees, I just took out a bunch of money and was going to trade it later. JoHanna had told me to go to the Post and get it exchanged. This was not a favorable rate. This was very upsetting. Then there was RyanAir.

I really really really don’t like RyanAir. I went to print off my pass (had to be done at least 4 hours early, but I missed it by 15 minutes. So when I got to the airport and asked to have my ticket printed, they charged me 60 DOLLARS. To PRINT a TICKET. Additionally, they are super strict about weight limits, so earlier at the hostel I’d had to move all sorts of things around in my bags. Jerks. My ticket for a one hour flight from Scotland to Ireland ended up costing me 190 bucks. Never again.

The flight was jam packed but pretty uneventful. I got some nice shots of the city and Arthur’s Seat from the window and before you know it we’d touched down and I was through customs without a hitch.

Waiting for the bus was made quite pleasant by the bus security(?) officer I met. His name was Liam and we chatted for quite a bit – we were both born in October, I’m moving to Boston, his team (I have no idea what sport) play firefighters and police in cities like New York but this October they’re coming to Boston. He was exceptionally kind, and when he found out that I wasn’t really sure of what there was to do or what tourist things I could do in Killarney he ran inside and brought out a very nice guidebook complete with lovely map and not only pointed out where I could get tours to, but also just let me keep it. He made sure I got on the right bus and knew which stop was mine. It was a lovely welcome into Ireland.

The train station was lovely, but I had a bit of a problem getting my tickets. I asked for a ticket at the counter and the woman said it would be 68 euro. I was shocked because online I could have gotten it for less than half that. When I said as much, she informed me that online was cheaper and there were internet kiosks in the station. I went to one and it promptly ate my euro coin. I found a fast-food place with WiFi and bought some food and tried to get on only to discover that the WiFi was down. I went over to another kiosk that, fortunately, worked just fine, but it ended up taking me 2 more euro to make my booking. And then because it was a credit card, I ended up paying a fee for that. All in all though, it was much cheaper than the ticket counter, especially when I decided that I could hang out in the station for another couple of hours to get a later and even cheaper fare.

I boarded the train (which had WiFi) without incident and spent a pleasant hour chatting with Thom while the countryside passed outside the windows. I had to make a quick switch in the middle of the trip and the new train didn’t have internet but it was only a little while more til we got to Killarney. Once there I had to ask for directions 3 times because I got myself very lost but finally checked into the hostel, settled in, and relaxed. Tomorrow I move into the B&B I’ll be staying at for the rest of my trip. It will probably be a relaxed day, but I’m ready for a few of those.

13 June 2010 - Day 13

Today was the start of our return to Edinburgh and the prospect of leaving the Highlands and then Scotland altogether was extremely upsetting. I really have fallen in love with the land. Our day started with a scenic overlook of the lake that looks exactly like the map of Scotland and some group pictures. Unfortunately it was ninja midgee death and when we all hopped back on the bus the midgees came with us. It was uncomfortable to say the least. On our ride down the coast, we were told about the 5 mountains, thought to be created by a wizard out of the five daughters of a man who had broken tradition and married his youngest daughter before his eldest. The five women will remain as mountains until the descendants of the 5 princes they were supposed to be wed to come and kiss the tops of the mountains.

On the way down, we made a quick bathroom break near Hamish, the Scottish bull and his lady friend, Moerash. They are exceptionally hairy and really very cute.

We continued down the coast until we reached the William Wallace monument. Braveheart is ridiculously incorrect, but I’ll leave you to the history books. Suffice it to say that William Wallace did great things, but ended up captured, disemboweled, quartered, and dragged through the countryside. Robert the Bruce, originally a supporter of the King of England, finished what Wallace started and emancipated the Scots from English rule. However, during this process (which took quite some time) Robert the Bruce was ex-communicated. This was a very big deal. While he did become King of the Scots, he wouldn’t be formally recognized because of his ex-communication. His greatest desire therefore was to join in the Crusades and prove to the Church and his people that he truly was King and should not have been ex-communicated. Sadly, he died before he ever made it on a crusade. He asked that his heart be cut from his chest and taken into battle, proving even in death that he was a follower of the Church, but this was not to be as on the way to the Crusades, the group carrying his heart was set upon by the Moors and everyone killed. Before dying, it is said that his second in command, the man carrying his heart in a wooden box, took the box and threw it into a field uttering the words “I’ll follow after you, my Braveheart.” Thus Robert the Bruce was the Braveheart, not Mel Gibson.

We arrived back in Edinburgh around 5 or so and I checked back into the hostel and went and grabbed some pub food with some of the other people on the tour. I had some delicious tomato chutney on a sandwich and a fantastic dessert made with raspberries steeped in honey and scotch whisky (known everywhere else in the world as scotch) and covered with toasted oats and a heavy whipping cream. It was served with shortbread cookies and absolutely amazing. When I got back to the hostel, who should I see but JoHanna!

She had just returned from her own trip around Scotland. I was terrifically excited because neither of us thought that we would see each other again, as she lives in Australia and goes back home in a month or so. It was great fun seeing her and getting caught up during the world cup game that I had been invited to by Paul and some of the other guys at the hostel. After the game, JoHanna and I met some of her friends at a local pub and had a quick drink. I had a ton of stuff to do back at the hostel though, so I made it an early night and sat down to do a little planning. I saw JoHanna one more time before bed and then it was off to sleep because of an early day filled with tons of travel coming up tomorrow. I hop on a plane to Ireland early tomorrow afternoon and then catch a train down to Killarney. I’m terribly sad to be leaving Scotland, but there is just so much more to see. I hope I like it as much as I’ve enjoyed my stay here.