Guinness, Guinness, Guinness with a Black and Tan and Smithwicks thrown in..

Day 25, Friday June 16: Dublin to (London)Derry

On Friday, I met up with my new backpacking group and we headed to Northern Ireland, officially part of the UK, not the Republic of Ireland.. This is obviously a tense political subject with the people here and as recently as 1998, there were regular killings and bombing in N.Ireland, until the cease fire agreement.. Quickly it comes down to Protestants vs Catholics, or the British supporters vs the Ireland supporters. Both feel very strongly about who they should be ruled under and show themselves (Derry is divided by the river), British flags wave on one side, Ireland flags on the other.

We received a tour of the city from a Catholic, who believes that he is Irish, not british, and actually holds on to an Irish Passport. He told us about the prisoner hunger strikes of the early 80s, and this is also where Bloody Sunday (think U2 song) happened. It is interesting to see a city function in such a segregated way. As we all might know, Catholic families tend to be bigger than Protestant families (in fact, at the end of a sunday sermen, the Catholics will remind its constituants to Breed them out). Eventually, there will be more Catholics in N.Ireland than Protestants (which has already happened in Derry) and when this happens, they will get to vote to determine if they want to be part of a united Ireland, or stay Britian..

More on this later..

Day 26, Saturday June 17, Derry to Belfast

Today, we headed to Giant's Causeway, a natural rock formation, which is easier to see than to describe. Once I get to London, I will try and D/L pictures again. After this, we headed to a rope bridge that fisherman made to get to the nets where they set up for Salmon fishing.

We got to Belfast in the evening and enjoyed a night out on the town. I guess Black and Tan is an American thing, because I asked 3 different bartenders at three different bars to make me one and they didn't understand, the first two wouldn't even make me one when I explained it. The third one did, but couldn't quite figure out what she was supposed to do, another bartender saw what she was doing, and helped her out.. It was perfect.

Day 27, Sunday June 18, Belfast to Galway

In the morning, we took a "Black Taxi" ride. Belfast is more Protestant than Catholic, so we got the other point of view from the Taxi driver. He took us to some Loyalist (to Britian) murals and explained how they are more British than the Brits themselves. In fact, there is even a wall in the city reminicent of the Berlin wall, and each night, kids throw stones over the wall at each other, although we are told its more fun and games today than in the past.

In the future, the vote to be Irish or Britian is going to be a thing to watch. In fact, it is said that England doesn't even really want N. Ireland because they pour $10 Billion into the country a year, and Ireland doesn't really want it because their economy is finally doing well and they think that N.Ireland will bring them down, in the similar way that when E. Germany and W. Germany brought down their economy. But both countries have agreed to accept the vote, whenever it happens. Both sides think it'll be another 20 years or so, they census says they are 53% Protestant, and 47% Catholic..

After the tour, we spent the whole day on the bus to the West Coast, a town called Galway.
We went to a local pub (surprise surprise) had some dinner and listened to a couple of acoustic guitarists, who were okay. We then went to a pub called King's Head, that had a full band and were really good.. Only 1am, we headed over to a place called the Living Room where they had 80s music going. Needless to say, I don't think I've drank more Guinness in one night.

Day 28, Monday June 19, Galway to Annescaul

Today ended up being a beautiful day, we were really worried about the weather. We stopped off at the Cliffs of Moher, they tower 705 ft over the coast, and there's not much protecting you from the ledge. It got really windy to add to the fear factor a little. We ended up traveling over a river ferry and landed in a little town called Annescaul. Only 300 people, the Paddywagon company decided to build a hostel and bar here, to give the tourists (us) the small town Irish feel. Well, two years later, there is still mixed feelings from the town. The place is painted bright green and called "The Randy Leprechaun". We had a great time here, karaoke until 1am. We tried to get the bar to let us stick around and watch Game 7 of the Stanley Cup, but no go.. So I had to check it out on the internet today. I was rooting for Edmonton, oh well, maybe next year.

Day 29, Tuesday June 20, Annescaul to Killarney

Unfortunately, the weather did not cooperate with us today and we are wandering around in drizzle and fog. So the 2 hour drive along the coast, with beautiful views, ended up being a 40 drive in the fog and drizzle. We are hanging out for a couple of hours in a town called Dingle, finding anyplace to keep warm, so of course I was drawn to the internet cafe. Unfortunately, this would have been a good time to upload some photos, but I left my camera on the bus.. So it'll have to be London.

This afternoon we head into Killarney and then tomorrow back to Dublin. Ireland has been fantastic, even with the weather we've had today.

~Dave

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