Advertisement
Published: September 23rd 2009
Shooting the proverbial
Irish cousins with Marian enjoying the "craic"I have booked a round trip flight from Leeds/Bradford to Dublin for 2 pounds and then a flight from Cork to Dublin for six pounds. All by booking months ahead on super cheap airline - Ryan Air.
Anyway, on Saturday, 6 Sept, I boarded the flying bus and was met at Dublin Airport by Ann Nolan, one of my Irish cousins. She had arranged a party for me to say "hello" to her dad, and many brothers and sisters. I had met a couple of them over the years, however this was a full clan gathering, including several from the next generation. The patriarch, Jim Nolan, has 12 children, 6 boys and 6 girls, and the only one missing at the get-together was Mary, who is in the NYC Police Dept. My own sister, Marian, and her husband Tadgh were also in attendance. A great evening, however I would be hard pressed to name everyone I was introduced to. One very memorable conversation was with a very bright seven year old on the geographical location of New Zealand. Maybe he'll come see me one day!!
Sunday, after breakfast, I left my cousin's
Memorial
Memorial, at the spot where Michael Collins was gunned down. Note the wilting flowers and it is almost 90 years since this happened. house with my sister and her husband. I am very smug about my alcohol consumption from the previous night. I only drank three bottles of beer the whole evening ,even though the party didn't wind-up until around 1.30am. Bandon in West Cork is approximately 2 1/2 hours drive and through pouring rain. The remainder of the day brings rain, rain and more rain and so we sat around watching the "All Ireland Hurling Final" between Tipperary and Kilkenny; a cross between Aussie Rules and hockey on steroids.
The Monday weather forecast is for showers. My sister Marian and I spend a day in Killarney doing all of the things that tourists do, including a rather large lunch (that I really didn't need). I'm happy to say that we weren't complete slugs and did walk about 6km in the national park; unfortunately it was before lunch. Killarney is a tourist trap with the ever present jaunty carts, but is a must see for visitors to the Emerald Isle.
Tuesday morning and it's raining again. I wake-up at 5.30 and my sister takes me to the airport in plenty of time to catch the flight from Cork to Dublin.
Sign Post
It might be Welsh!!!! It is a timed to get me in to Dublin approximately 45 minutes before I leave for Leeds/Bradford. Tight, but do-able, only nothing goes right and I miss my connection. Ryan Air is a point-to-point airline and connections mean nothing. I have to purchase another ticket from Dublin to Leeds. A golden opportunity to spend 2 days in Dublin before heading back to my mother's home in Yorkshire. Rain continues during the day and the only option I see of seeing the city is to take a big, red, tourist bus. The Irish love their statues and the city is littered with them, from patriots to poets, and even poor Molly Malone. In the evening, I find a tourist pub for dinner and get my fix of Irish music; a little factoid I pick up is "Dirty Ole Town" is not about Dublin, but Salford, Lancashire. The evening is spent chatting with locals and I get my fill of blarney until I visit again. Guinness is 5.5 Euro per pint; tourist prices in a tourist pub.
Wednesday, the sun is shining, and it's a summer day. I am up early and walk the streets, camera in-hand, click-click-click. I take
lots of photo's from the central post office where the 1916 up-rising started, to a pint of Guinness at the Guinness brewery. My feet are hurting by the time I finally reach Dublin airport and get my flight back to the UK.
Observation - Ryan Air is great, providing all goes to plan and you are traveling alone. They are inexpensive, have a 25 minute turn-around and over 90% of their planes are on-time. I'm told that they keep the planes in the air 18 hours a day. On the negative side : no seat allocation; pay for extra luggage; pay for everything; no leg-room; queue early to get on the plane; leave lots of time for connecting flights.
However, they do make a profit......
I give a big thumbs up to Dublin.
Ireland, very green and very wet!!!!!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.067s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 10; qc: 26; dbt: 0.0375s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Richard Winch
non-member comment
Dirty Ole Town
Hi Kevin, Yes indeed the song is about Salford, I guess people think it is Irish becuase it was made popular by the Pogues. Interestingly it was written by Euan MacColl whas the father of Kirsty MacColl. Kirsty was the female voice on the Pogues song "Faireytale of New York" and she died tragically in Mexico when hit by a speed boat when swimming Probably more factoids than you need - take care Richard