Portrush in Northern Ireland is the
weirdest place we visited, hands down. Along the beachy waterfront is
an amusement park, lightbulbs of Ferris wheels and roller coasters
illuminating the August night. An arcade with pinball and slot
machines makes a din on one of the main avenues, and when we went in
to try to use an ATM to get pounds sterling, we were told that if
that one didn't work, we might have luck at the machine down the
road, not in the next games building, but the one after that.
Seriously, this was pretty much an
inconspicuous Las Vegas along the north coast of Ireland.
In the morning, we left the funhouse
behind, left Aaranmore Lodge and headed along the coast for the short
drive to Northern Ireland's only UNESCO Heritage Site. We passed the quiet
town of Bushmills, famous for its whisky distillery, a rugged landscape that was used in a number of scenes from HBO's Game of Thrones (including Dragonstone and Iron Islands), as well as the
ruins of Dunluce Castle on the edge of the cliff-face, but the real
destination was the Giant's Causeway.
With its rows and rows of naturally
occurring pillars of stone sticking out into the ocean, the Causeway
is a strange phenominom. The story goes that an Irish giant, Finn
MacCool, was challenging a Scottish giant, Benandonner, to a fight.
The only way to allow the two to meet was to construct a causeway
from the north of Ireland to southern Scotland. This was what he did,
but when Finn got there, he had a stark realization: Benandonner was
totally bigger and stronger than he was. So he ran back to Ireland,
but the bad news was Benandonner followed in hot pursuit.
Inside the Visitor's Centre, in addition to some really nice, family-friendly
displays, there's a looping 3D video of the legend
When Finn got back, his wife had a
plan, and dressed him up as a baby. Benandonner pounded on the door
and barged in, but when he saw Finn dressed as a baby, rather than
think it weird than a baby would have a beard, he thought that if
this was the baby, what must the father look like?
So this time he ran away, but being massive he completed wrecked the
Giant's Causeway.
I mean, the real
story probably has to do with volcanoes, but looking out at the
bizarre rows and rows of hexagonal stones abruptly plunging into the
ocean, it's not that hard to believe after all.
The Giant's Causeway that is accessible to the public is essentially three inlets, with a walking trail along the edge. It took a couple of hours to wander through, listening to an audio guide about the geological history merged with the folklore of the place. Guides have been taking people along this route for the past few hundred years, and on a sunny morning in August, it wasn't hard to see why. You could spend days here, baffled at the symmetry of nature and the perfect beauty of random nature.
Unfortunately, we had ran out of days, and could only walk in the footsteps of the ancient past and the giants until lunchtime.
The highways in Northern Ireland are much closer to what we're used to then, say, the Hook Peninsula or along the Sky Road. As in, if the signs say 60 miles an hour, you don't feel like going half of that will totally kill you. We left the coast and drove along to Belfast, getting in the capital city in the early afternoon via the M2, where three or four lanes of highway traffic were guided by big blue signs mounted above the road. Thankfully we stayed out of the city centre and the whir of traffic, exiting at the Titanic Quarter as soon as we crossed over the River Lagan.
Ask someone from Belfast what they think of the R.M.S. Titanic, and it's something they seem pretty proud about. The ship was, after all, fine when it left here. Back in 1912, the Titanic was a marvel of luxury and engineering—I'm not breaking any new ground here by writing that. But what Leo and the rest of the spectacle associated with the doomed ocean liner never really focus on are what happened before the Titanic left Southampton bound for New York City.
In particular, the shipyard in Belfast where she was launched in 1911 and dry docked to completion are never really part of the story I've heard, but it was, naturally, a huge and amazing undertaking in this city over a hundred years ago.
Harland and Wolff, the shipbuilders, had never undertaken anything of this magnitude—no one on earth had, and the planning and accommodation started in the early 1900s just to accommodate the ship. After the Titanic was constructed at the Arrol Gantry, a seriously huge piece of scaffolding, it took 22 tonnes of soap and tallow to get the beast off the land and into the river on May 31, 1911, with 100,000 people coming out to watch. This was Rolling Stones huge, and on the area outside the massive Titanic museum in Belfast where the actual slipway once stood, a lawn remains where the massive giant was constructed. Everything here is symbolic—the grass represented people who died from each class (the first chunk is the crew), while the paving stones are the survivors. Pretty chilling, even on a warm day, to walk back over this spot.
Even the design room remains intact, a hallowed spot where designers and engineers huddled over massive drawings, sketching out what was to be the Titanic.
We went first to the dry docks and pump house. Once the Titanic was launched, she was empty. It took close to a year to fit out the inside and add the engines and whatnot. The final fittings took place, maybe a bit surprisingly, on dry land. Now, when you go to the cabin on a canoe, it's typical to haul it up out of the water when you get there. It's not that big an ordeal. The Titanic was bigger than a canoe, bigger even than a handful of canoes. To get this ship from the river to dry land wasn't exactly as easy as getting two dudes on either end to lift it up—imagine though the feat of engineering that built the pump house alongside the Thompson Dry Dock, a system of hydraulic pumps to flush out the water from a carved out section that was bound to house a giant. This is, aside from the spot on the ocean floor off the coast of Cape Race, the last piece of earth the Titanic ever touched.
The Titanic Belfast is a nine-galey, self-guided experience in a beautiful new facility on the former shipyard. Flashy exhibitions are something I look at with a certain degree of suspicion, but for anyone with even a peripheral interest in the Titanic, this stop is a must in Belfast. The sheer scope of it was more than could fit into a single day, going right from the construction to lavish exhibits on the ship's conditions, to the search to find the wreckage (originally, the wealthy survivors proposed literally raising the Titanic) and the current state of underwater exploration.
The coolest exhibits amongst many relics were a complete database of everyone on the Titanic (where they were from, what class a passenger they were, and whether they lived or died. Two Ryans from Ireland, Mom's possible ancestors, were onboard, incidentally); a 3D simulated tour of the main parts of the ship, which I swear felt real if you stood in the middle of the three video screens; and an actual menu from the literal last supper on April 14, 1912, that survived because it was put into a survivor's purse (that this little glimpse into life on the Titanic actually survived for a hundred years is nothing short of amazing, even after having been to a thousand-year-old monastery in Glendalough).
We had what can only be called the luck of the Irish. At the Giant's Caseway, the parks officer gave us a family discount. At the Titanic exhibition, Mom and Dad got a seniors' discount they weren't entitled to. Even our B&B hosts seemed friendlier and a cut above the rest. “Imagine,” I said as we walked back to the car park, “if the gate somehow got left open and we got our parking for free?”
Ask someone from Belfast what they think of the R.M.S. Titanic, and it's something they seem pretty proud about. The ship was, after all, fine when it left here. Back in 1912, the Titanic was a marvel of luxury and engineering—I'm not breaking any new ground here by writing that. But what Leo and the rest of the spectacle associated with the doomed ocean liner never really focus on are what happened before the Titanic left Southampton bound for New York City.
In particular, the shipyard in Belfast where she was launched in 1911 and dry docked to completion are never really part of the story I've heard, but it was, naturally, a huge and amazing undertaking in this city over a hundred years ago.
Harland and Wolff, the shipbuilders, had never undertaken anything of this magnitude—no one on earth had, and the planning and accommodation started in the early 1900s just to accommodate the ship. After the Titanic was constructed at the Arrol Gantry, a seriously huge piece of scaffolding, it took 22 tonnes of soap and tallow to get the beast off the land and into the river on May 31, 1911, with 100,000 people coming out to watch. This was Rolling Stones huge, and on the area outside the massive Titanic museum in Belfast where the actual slipway once stood, a lawn remains where the massive giant was constructed. Everything here is symbolic—the grass represented people who died from each class (the first chunk is the crew), while the paving stones are the survivors. Pretty chilling, even on a warm day, to walk back over this spot.
Even the design room remains intact, a hallowed spot where designers and engineers huddled over massive drawings, sketching out what was to be the Titanic.
We went first to the dry docks and pump house. Once the Titanic was launched, she was empty. It took close to a year to fit out the inside and add the engines and whatnot. The final fittings took place, maybe a bit surprisingly, on dry land. Now, when you go to the cabin on a canoe, it's typical to haul it up out of the water when you get there. It's not that big an ordeal. The Titanic was bigger than a canoe, bigger even than a handful of canoes. To get this ship from the river to dry land wasn't exactly as easy as getting two dudes on either end to lift it up—imagine though the feat of engineering that built the pump house alongside the Thompson Dry Dock, a system of hydraulic pumps to flush out the water from a carved out section that was bound to house a giant. This is, aside from the spot on the ocean floor off the coast of Cape Race, the last piece of earth the Titanic ever touched.
The Titanic Belfast is a nine-galey, self-guided experience in a beautiful new facility on the former shipyard. Flashy exhibitions are something I look at with a certain degree of suspicion, but for anyone with even a peripheral interest in the Titanic, this stop is a must in Belfast. The sheer scope of it was more than could fit into a single day, going right from the construction to lavish exhibits on the ship's conditions, to the search to find the wreckage (originally, the wealthy survivors proposed literally raising the Titanic) and the current state of underwater exploration.
The coolest exhibits amongst many relics were a complete database of everyone on the Titanic (where they were from, what class a passenger they were, and whether they lived or died. Two Ryans from Ireland, Mom's possible ancestors, were onboard, incidentally); a 3D simulated tour of the main parts of the ship, which I swear felt real if you stood in the middle of the three video screens; and an actual menu from the literal last supper on April 14, 1912, that survived because it was put into a survivor's purse (that this little glimpse into life on the Titanic actually survived for a hundred years is nothing short of amazing, even after having been to a thousand-year-old monastery in Glendalough).
We had what can only be called the luck of the Irish. At the Giant's Caseway, the parks officer gave us a family discount. At the Titanic exhibition, Mom and Dad got a seniors' discount they weren't entitled to. Even our B&B hosts seemed friendlier and a cut above the rest. “Imagine,” I said as we walked back to the car park, “if the gate somehow got left open and we got our parking for free?”
I swear to God I said that. It was with
such an attitude that we rounded the corner at promptly 6:45 pm. For
those unacquainted with military time, that would be 18:45.
If ever there was such a thing as the
exact opposite, a locked gate would be it. Apparently the hapless crowd in this silver car missed that memo.
It goes straight to voicemail. This
isn't looking good, and I'm wishing I didn't give my credit card
number to a B&B moments earlier with a no-cancellation policy.
I ran around the massive building
looking for a way in, looking for a nightwatchman or someone. The
guys who review the security footage from the night before will
surely have a good laugh, watching me cycle the building, pound on
the glass doors, and wave frantically at the bulb of the security
camera. All to no avail of course, and even the Harbour Police, who
have handled locked car parks before, can't get a hold of this guy
with the keys.
In the end, neither myself, the guy at
the Titanic exhibit who tried to help us, the Harbour Police, nor the
hosts at our B&B who I managed to explain the situation to via a
sketchy wifi connection were able to get a hold of someone with the
authority to get our car our. With the sun going down and our shorts
and t-shirts no longer appropriate, we didn't have many options other
than to go to the Premier Inn down the street.
At least there was a room for us and we
had our wallets. That came doubly in handy, since there was a bar in
the lobby and we needed a good laugh after that day. As if we didn't already look sketchy, coming in off the street with nothing but the clothes on our back, we had a bundle of coins accumulated from various trips to the UK over the years, and this seemed like the appropriate time to try to get rid of what we had in a slot machine in the hotel bar.
First thing in the morning, after guzzling an instant coffee and collecting our non-existent bags, we were back at the car park for when they opened at 8:00 am. By 8:10 am, we were on the motorway, getting the hell out of Belfast.
First thing in the morning, after guzzling an instant coffee and collecting our non-existent bags, we were back at the car park for when they opened at 8:00 am. By 8:10 am, we were on the motorway, getting the hell out of Belfast.
One last day abroad, just before we left Northern Ireland and re-entered the Republic and Dublin, we stopped off the main highway in the small city of Newry. In the list of big sites to see, I don't think Newry makes it, but musician Tommy Sands was born in Mayobridge, not far from this town. Significantly, during the Troubles, he was part of a friends group that included Protestants and Catholics, the two waring factions. For socially conscious young people, this was never particularly troubling.
However, as the song he would eventually write makes very clear, centuries of hatred have ears that cannot hear. Isaac Scott from Armagh was leaving Tully's Pub in Belleek on July 9, 1973. He was a protestant, and as he was starting his car a gunman came to the window and shot him. In retaliation, masked gunmen came to the Catholic home of Charles McDonnell on August 22, taking him away into the back of a car and murdering him. He had been making wedding plans with his fiancé moments before.
The tragic irony of all this is that the two men were good friends. "There Were Roses" is the beautiful song that took a stricken Tommy Sands some 10 years to finally write, but it now stands as a chilling testament to that terrible time in Northern Ireland's history. We found the Ryan's Road mentioned in the song and played the song along the still farming avenue, went through the streets of Mayobridge, and passed Tully's on our eventual way to Dublin. It's all quiet and nondescript now, and hard to picture the sounds of guns being a constant part of the environment, but it made a fitting last stop through Northern Ireland. A country with a troubled past and with reminders impossible to ignore (newspapers we saw during our brief stay could not get around that there was still violent acts back by one religious group against the other), but which is somehow managing to forge on despite the overwhelming and tragic weight.
Once in Dublin, taking a stroll down O'Connell Street on a day-ai-ay-ai-ay, I passed a long-haired streel and had to do a double take. I fully admit that, on our first night in Temple Bar, I'm pretty sure Jack Gleeson, the actor who plays Joffrey in Game of Thrones, was out having a pint in the beer garden, and I didn't say anything to him. I wasn't missing this chance.
“I'm not going to
bother you,” I said as I ran back, “but are you Steve Earle?”
He stopped for a
second as if thinking about it. “I am,” he said.
“Ah. Cool. Can I
shake your hand?”
So he adjusted his
Starbucks coffee cup, shook my hand, and I let him be. Well, I might have said something star stricken and stupid, but I'll let this illusion of nonchalance linger.
To finish off a rainy evening in Dublin, after we visited the massive gift store at Carroll's, we went on a whiskey and beer tour organized by the same guys who organized the Free Walking Tour that started our Ireland escapade. We went to four different pubs in a small group of about half a dozen besides ourselves, our bearded guide, Paul, explaining the craft of brewing beer and distilling whiskey, and offering us a sample of stout, ale, and IPA at the first craft brewery; Guinness at another (and supplementing what I already learned at the Storehouse—the reason Guinness allegedly tastes different at bars in North America, even though it's brewed at St. James Gate here in Dublin, is that the brew requires a warmer temperature, and bars often aren't as willing to build a separate room to house the keg like they do here; and because a keg is only fresh for around 5 days, and other than St. Patrick's Day when was the last time you went to a bar in Canada and saw wall-to-wall drinkers of Guinness?), and finally a sit-down meal (vegetable curry and Irish stew) and whiskey sampling (the real taste of whiskey comes from sitting in a cask, for what could be decades—it would suck to put all your money on this one batch of whiskey, only to come back in 21 years and find out you used the wrong barrel and had to start over) at a third.
As an aside, the Guinness we had, huddled around a wooden table in the back room of that Dublin pub was to be my final draught while here in Ireland. All good things must end, I guess.
This guy knew his alcohol, but it wasn't a sloppy night by any means. When we finished at the fourth pub, a packed mass with a session busily underway in the corner, the last buses were starting to run, and it was time for us to slip off into the evening.
Ireland in two weeks is amazing but exhausting—yet we only had the luxury of a few short hours sleep at our hotel, because we had to get to the airport and return our rental car to Budget and get through security for an international flight, all before 8:00 am. Thankfully, everything went as it should, and after a light breakfast in the terminal of Dublin Airport, we found our seats and started to doze before the plane even left the tarmac.
She was a rare thing, fine as a bee's wing
I miss her more than ever, words can say
If I could just taste all of her wildness now
If I could hold her in my arms today
I wouldn't want her any other way
To finish off a rainy evening in Dublin, after we visited the massive gift store at Carroll's, we went on a whiskey and beer tour organized by the same guys who organized the Free Walking Tour that started our Ireland escapade. We went to four different pubs in a small group of about half a dozen besides ourselves, our bearded guide, Paul, explaining the craft of brewing beer and distilling whiskey, and offering us a sample of stout, ale, and IPA at the first craft brewery; Guinness at another (and supplementing what I already learned at the Storehouse—the reason Guinness allegedly tastes different at bars in North America, even though it's brewed at St. James Gate here in Dublin, is that the brew requires a warmer temperature, and bars often aren't as willing to build a separate room to house the keg like they do here; and because a keg is only fresh for around 5 days, and other than St. Patrick's Day when was the last time you went to a bar in Canada and saw wall-to-wall drinkers of Guinness?), and finally a sit-down meal (vegetable curry and Irish stew) and whiskey sampling (the real taste of whiskey comes from sitting in a cask, for what could be decades—it would suck to put all your money on this one batch of whiskey, only to come back in 21 years and find out you used the wrong barrel and had to start over) at a third.
As an aside, the Guinness we had, huddled around a wooden table in the back room of that Dublin pub was to be my final draught while here in Ireland. All good things must end, I guess.
This guy knew his alcohol, but it wasn't a sloppy night by any means. When we finished at the fourth pub, a packed mass with a session busily underway in the corner, the last buses were starting to run, and it was time for us to slip off into the evening.
Ireland in two weeks is amazing but exhausting—yet we only had the luxury of a few short hours sleep at our hotel, because we had to get to the airport and return our rental car to Budget and get through security for an international flight, all before 8:00 am. Thankfully, everything went as it should, and after a light breakfast in the terminal of Dublin Airport, we found our seats and started to doze before the plane even left the tarmac.
In two weeks, we saw the bulk of the island of Ireland. Surely you could spend a year and want more time, but to get a car and go for a couple thousand kilometres, along the coasts and the green, green fields, we did more than alright.
Travel is a cool luxury that some of us get. It really is something that we should never take for granted—how privileged we are that we once we get a bit tired of our own familiar surroundings, we can just uproot, switch our money at the bank and take a stroll through monasteries, pubs, roundabouts, haunted houses and castles. You're really lucky if you can have those experiences with your family too—they're the ones who you'll argue with the quickest (and usually be right, but that's another story), but who will genuinely be interested in making the most of the time together.
Thus it is, the trip is over, and I guess the summer is too. Holy frig, I have to go back to school in, like, three days. I won't forget this summer or this time, though—I never heard the song "Beeswing" until I sat in an Irish pub in Doolin, but the words resonate now, giving some sense of what the past four months have been:
I miss her more than ever, words can say
If I could just taste all of her wildness now
If I could hold her in my arms today
I wouldn't want her any other way
If you come out of something and literally could not want it any other way, I think you've done something right. Until next time we're lucky enough to be in the same place at the same time, may the road rise up to meet you, and may the wind be always at your back.
Cheers,
rb
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