Days 8-10: Armagh? My Sweet Hill? I guess St. Patrick was in better shape than we are.

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While packing for the next leg of our trip, we put on some music using the trusty iPod and let loose with some singing. Suddenly, there was a knock at the door, which Jenn answered. A guy about our age stood there and said, “Oh, hi, I just HAD to come over and see who was holding that note!” Jenn laughed and closed the door. Very random. Apparently, our karaoke practices had been paying off. We bid farewell to the hostel with another tasty meal at the Causeway Café and lugged our bags up Great Victoria Street to the bus station. A little note here - the men in Belfast seem to enjoy hitting on women from their cars. Elderly women, women with strollers, women with tons of luggage, doesn’t matter to them - you need an ego boost? Walk down Great Victoria Street.

Again, we boarded the bus to Armagh without any problems and enjoyed the short ride there. Armagh doesn’t seem to be on a lot of radar screens when it comes to trip planning, but it seemed like a nice enough small city when I was doing my research, and it was a short distance from Belfast, so we made the decision to check it out. Upon arriving at the bus station in Armagh, we unwittingly stole a taxi from a lady who had called it (hey, we didn’t realize it til afterwards, does that mean we’re still going to hell?) and arrived at our Bed & Breakfast - Ni Eoghain Lodge, which was a few kilometres out of town. I had booked accommodation in March for September, but the Ulster Rally was taking place in Armagh the weekend we were there, so almost everything was already booked for that weekend, even in March. This turned out to be a blessing in disguise though, as Ni Eoghain Lodge was fabulous. Our hostess, Kathleen McGeown, greeted us warmly and presented us with tea and scones after showing us to our room. The only room available had been one with a double bed, so Jenn and I were bedmates for two nights. This is where I maintain she gave me her darn cold and nasty cough, which was getting worse for her by this point and which started for me partway through the Armagh leg of our trip.

The McGeown’s have a beautiful home, and acres of orchards and spectacular gardens. We walked around the grounds, admiring them, and met their Irish Wolfhound ‘Wolfie’ and their Spaniel ‘Lightning’. We did, in fact, scream when Wolfie came bounding through some shrubs at us, but he only wanted to shower us with affection. We loved Wolfie.

Kathleen’s husband Noel told us he was going into town and offered us a ride, which we readily accepted. Okay, so apparently St. Patrick founded his first church in Armagh, and called the city ‘My Sweet Hill’. That St. Patrick must have been in shape, because we didn’t find the hills of Armagh so sweet. Sure, they were pretty to look at, but not so fun to climb. Aww, I’m exaggerating, they weren’t really that bad at all. We enjoyed walking around the city, especially after being in bigger cities for the first part of our trip, and I loved a particular curvy street, filled with little stone houses. This was the only part of the trip where I wished we had a car, since we had to cab back and forth a bunch of times between our lodging and the city, for about 5 pounds each time. On the bright side, the cab drivers were quite entertaining. Driving through a country lane, we saw a little old man in a tweed cap sitting by the side of the road, almost hidden by some hedges. Jenn said, “What the heck?” and our cab driver, without missing a beat, said “Aye, you’ve spotted yer first leprechaun.” Haha.

After taking our regular afternoon nap, we got ready for an evening out and headed into town for dinner at an Italian restaurant called Zio’s, on the recommendation of our cab driver. Our goat cheese salads were fabulous, and we each downed a couple of stronger-than-average Screwdrivers. My phone wasn’t working well at all in Northern Ireland, so we were having a tough time calling a cab, but Kathleen graciously called for us each time (even when we woke her from a nap once - woops!). After wandering around the city for a while and being asked by an Englishmen where the nearest ‘chippy’ was, we decided on a pub called the Shambles. While we sat and sipped our Screwdrivers, we enjoyed the banter between the locals and the bartender, who seemed to enjoy calling everyone ‘fatty’ even if they were noticeably skinnier than he was. The “Can I ask you one question?” question of the night was “Can you say ‘One time, at band camp’ for me?” Since we’re good sports, we recited a whole line for them: “One time at band camp, we all played our instruments backwards. It was SO funny.”

Let me just say that the Irish people we met can do Canadian accents about as well as we can do Irish accents, which is really, really badly. We eventually headed down to the Armagh City Hotel. Since the Rally was on that weekend and the hotel was designated as Rally headquarters, that was the place to be. The rest of the evening is kind of a blur, but we enjoyed some free drinks from one of the organizers of the Rally (we declined originally, but someone told us he was a multimillionaire and to accept, so who were we to argue?) and saw the tail end of some Irish dancing which was done to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the hunger strikes.

Afterwards, we headed to a pub called Rafferty’s, where we got ‘shut in’ after closing and enjoyed some spirited, impromptu singing by the locals. It was interesting to hear some of the political songs being sung and to really feel ‘part of the group.’ While trying to get a cab back to our B&B, we were fortunate enough to meet Armagh’s own William Wallace. This guy knew entire scenes of Braveheart off by heart, and was wandering the streets of Armagh, bottle of wine in hand, reciting them. Quite entertaining. After he finished with “…they’ll never take my freedom,” I added “or your bottle of wine” which he found quite amusing, judging by his cackling laugh.

The next morning, we enjoyed a delicious breakfast courtesy of Noel and Kathleen, as well as some good conversation with the other guests, and spent the morning relaxing in our cozy room. We were so used to being in cities, that the sounds of the countryside were almost foreign to us. Jenn thought there was a bird by our window, but to me it sounded more like an elephant. Turns out it was a cow. It made us laugh every time, and it almost certainly made Noel laugh when we asked him what was making the noise. We were both really excited to have an actual bath instead of just a stand up shower, so we both made use of it. At different times, of course. Hey, just because we’re sleeping in the same bed…

We were both feeling a little worn out with our colds, so we went into town and walked around a little, enjoying the views of the cathedrals and Armagh’s pretty stone streets and buildings. We decided to take in a screening of ‘Monster House’ at the local cinema with what seemed like every child in Armagh. The kids were quite well behaved though (besides the one who accused me of cutting the line - little brat!), and it was a nice, relaxing way to spend an afternoon. We retired to our B&B after that for a nap. Some Rally drivers were also staying at our B&B, and were eager to show us one of their cars that had flipped and rolled down a 20 foot embankment and was now totalled. At 250,000 Pounds a pop, that hurts! The driver was fine, thankfully.

Since it was Saturday night (and we’d been told the best night to go out in Armagh is Saturday night) we headed out once again, starting at a bar called McKenna’s. We found this to be a really nice place, minus the smoke, which isn’t the bar’s fault. Jenn had a really tough time with the smoking in bars in Northern Ireland, especially since she was getting a nasty cough to go along with her cold. At McKenna’s we were treated to probably the most bizarre “Can I ask you one question?” question. It was, “What’s your favourite horse?” Jenn quickly answered, “Clydesdales” and was rewarded with a “Good answer”. I was thinking more along the lines of an individual horse, such as Pegasus, but whatever. The horse questioners were kind enough to give us a ride over to the hotel for the late bar.

Let me say here that I loved the way the Irish people we came across were so free with their emotions while dancing. They’ll hug each other, grab each other’s behinds and just generally be close to each other without worrying if someone thinks they look ‘gay.’ Jenn even saw one guy lick another one’s finger while they were up at the bar ordering drinks. Fun times.

The next morning, we checked out of Ni Eoghain Lodge and moved to the Armagh City Youth Hostel, which I had reserved back in March. Noel was kind enough to give us a ride to the hostel, which we had almost to ourselves - save for a rather eccentric lady who sat with us in the TV room and gave us advice regarding our illnesses, and the guy who manned the front desk sporadically. He was comically concerned about our reaction to the hostel, explaining that all the linen piled up in the lobby was because a bunch of people who had been for the Rally had just checked out. Apparently, a lady had once complained to the head office about the messiness of the place, and this poor guy was scarred for life. The emptiness of the hostel was a good thing, since we were both feeling pretty sick at this point in the trip.

There were two rooms in the hallway with baths, so we helped ourselves to a relaxing soak. Well, mine was relaxing until I found someone’s stray hair. It wasn’t straight either. First time I’ve ever had a shower right after a bath, I think. Our room also had a TV - score! I enjoyed the Cork vs. Kilkenny Hurling final (Kilkenny was victorious) while Jenn took a much-needed rest. We dragged ourselves out of bed for some nourishment at Zio’s (I opted for the pizza this time - very good), and to take a few pictures of Armagh, then went back to the deserted hostel for more book-reading, TV-watching (you know, one of those interchangeable Harrison Ford/Jack Ryan movies) and rest.

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