Jeanne and I made it safely into Dublin yesterday and we met Danny at the airport this morning. He’ll be staying with us for the next 5 days, so I’m glad about that. Today, however, has been bitter sweet… My email is not working and for some reason my computer has died. It will turn on but nothing comes up. I’m kind of upset. I wont be making any more updates on the blog… and I’m really scared that i’ll loose all of the pictures from my trip… I’m going to try and just not worry about it for the next 8 days and hopefully figure something out back in the states. I miss you and I’ll see you in a little over a week.

Love,

-Trevor

Hello. This has been the last week or so.

The Arrival in Florence, The First Encounter with Giuseppe.

            As the train pulled into St. Maria Station Jeanne and I had a good feeling about the place. We were looking forward to all of the things Florence/Tuscany had to offer and things started out on a good note; we found our way to the hostel from the train station in record time.  However, it seemed that we were locked out. A sign on the door had a phone number on it for us to call. There was no answer.  We waited around for about 10 minutes or so before another group of travelers came to the locked door of The International Student Hostel.  We watched the three girls go through the same process that we had gone through.  They made the phone call and someone had answered. They looked at us, “ten minutes” they said.

            The wait didn’t last long. The three girls were tired from traveling and short on conversation—all we really got out of them were the places they called home: Awkland, New Zealand for one, Toronto, Canada for another, and Michigan, USA for the third.  Before we knew it a short, round man wheeling two striped bags had approached us. “Eccusse me,” he said with a sharp tone. We moved out of his way while he opened the door and followed him up a set of stairs. 

            When we were inside he asked for our passports—all 5 of us—and began to check us all in at the same time. This prolonged the process for all of us because his interesting form of task management had him asking us the same question twice, even three times before he got the answer he was looking for. I found it odd that he had the most trouble pronouncing my name. “Broon” he would say. “Mr. Broon.” Correcting him wasn’t going to speed things up so I just stopped trying. After a while he had checked the three girls in and was now trying to figure out something dealing with the room Jean and I had reserved. He was on the phone speaking a weird dialect of Italian. All I could really recognize was “Broon, Broon, Broon.” I finally asked him what was wrong. He didn’t understand. I asked him what was the matter. He still didn’t understand. “What’s the problem” I said. He assured me that there was no problem and that I was staying here tonight. Then he came clean. He stumbled through a few sentences and made it clear to me. Here is what he told me: “My name is Giuseppe, and you see, I’m originally from Brazil, so I speak Portuguese and Spanish.  Then I moved to Italy, so now I speak Italian. Then I opened up a hostel, so now I speak English and Chinese…” Now, you wouldn’t think that it would be that hard to understand someone telling you this, but when Giuseppe told me this, he spoke it to me in 5 languages all at once—an international Giuseppe dialect.  Once we were on the same page we laughed, shook hands and he showed us to our room. 

            I suspected it from the moment I walked into the hostel, but being shown into our room made it clear… this was most likely Giuseppe’s house. Drawers and cabinets were all labeled “Privato, No Open,” and Giuseppe made it a point to continuously draw our attention to the fact that there was a television in the room. We thanked Giuseppe for the room and the TV and left to go and explore Florence.

Day 1 in Florence: The Cathedral and The City

            The first day in Florence continued to be a great one. As soon as we left Giuseppe’s place we went to a small restaurant near the center of town and sat down for some food.

The rumors are true… the food in Florence is un-real.  I had some really thick spaghetti with some intense meat sauce—not tomato based meat sauce, the meat based tomato sauce. It was delicious. Jeanne had a really great dish of squash, red peppers and cheese. We ordered second dishes after we finished. I had fried potatoes and Jeanne had white beans (which she has now developed an obsession for).

            Next we began walking around the center of the city.  There are extensive markets that crowd most of the streets and make up a large area of the city’s center. They sold things like leather jackets, bags, belts, bags and leather jackets.  In the center of the city—usually the case with the majority of Italian cities we’ve been to—there was a massive cathedral.  This one looked significantly different than the rest of the ones we’ve seen. It sets itself apart with its color scheme.  The sea-foam greens and peach colors of the building unusual, but I liked the change from the typical plain colors of the others we’d seen. 

            From there we continued walking around. There  are the same types of people that we’ve been seeing in a lot of cities we’ve been visiting. You have the beggars who ask for some money and then you have the beggars who demand for your money.  This lady was yelling at me and rapidly approaching… I had no choice, I pulled out my camera and open fired. Here is the result.

            Next are the dressers. The dressers are a people who a lot of times make a decent amount of money from dressing and making themselves up into actual pieces of art.  A lot of people do things like paint themselves extravagantly, wear incredible costumes and and pose for hour upon hour in the streets looking as authentic as possible.  These types of dressers deserve the income in my opinion. Then you have people who just want the money without really going through the artistic part of it.  Some people just put a sheet of gold spandex over them and wear a mask. This is one of those acts in rigorous preparation.  Does this guy look guilty or am I just being to harsh?

            The city itself is beautiful though. Florence is a very old city and its streets wind in and out of each other but somehow its not difficult to find your way through them.  We spent the whole day just wandering around through the streets and piazzas of the city.

The Friendship of Giuseppe, a Night in Florence and the Gelato Secret

            That evening I went to the supermarket to pick up a bottle of wine. After paying for it I asked if I could use the corkscrew to open the bottle. The clerk insisted on doing it herself which was fine with me, but when she uncorked the bottle she spilt wine on my shirt. I wasn’t too insulted or anything—I laughed it off. But the poor lady felt horrible and gave me another bottle of wine for free. I thanked her, assured her that there were no hard feelings and ventured back to Giuseppe’s with the two bottles.

            When I walked in, Jeanne had become more acquainted with the three girls we had met earlier. We also met another fellow, Eric, a student of the arts at an Indiana University. He had come to Florence to study one of the city’s most renown artists, Michelangelo.  The girls were already drinking white wine out of teacups and there were no glasses in the cupboard so I just decided to use the bottle for a few sips.  Then, like he had heard a scream for help, Giuseppe burst into the room.  “I’m just checking on you, I’m just checking.” he said and began to relax a bit. Relax, that is, until he saw the wine and teacup situation. He seemed appalled that people would actually do this and explained to us: “here, we are friends now” as he opened up his private cupboard door and dealt out wine glasses for everyone.  We all thanked Giuseppe for the glasses and for his friendship. “You’re welcome,” he said. “I’ll be back in 30 minute to check on you again.”

            That night all six of us walked around until we came to a big piazza where there was a large gathering of people. A free opera was going on so we stopped to watch for a bit. It was pretty cool. I had never seen an opera performed before and I found it interesting to watch… especially in a Florentine square.  When we were about to leave Jeanne spotted a Gelatoria and before I could turn around to find where she had went off to she already had a giant ice-cream in her hand.  I had some of it so I can vouch for its amazing taste.  I was in conversation with someone else at the time, but when I turned around a second time the ice-cream had been magically replenished. I tried again to help with the consumption of it, but I barely did any damage… I’m apparently not allowed to tell that story… but the cats out of the bag.

Day 2 in Florence: Michelangelo’s Plaza and The Countryside

            The next morning we woke up and began walking around the city once again. Accompanying us was Eric, the art student from Indiana.  He had suggested that we walk to Michelangelo’s Plaza and we weren’t opposed as soon as we heard that it looks over the entire city.  It was a long climb up several hundred stairs to the place where the plaza opens up.  From there we got some amazing views of the city as well as the Tuscan countryside. 

In the center of the plaza is a tribute to Michelangelo with an exact replica of his infamous David statue, hailed by some as the most perfect piece of sculpture in the entire world. It was very impressive to see in person, and thus hard to photograph… so I didn’t even really try. 

            We continued further out of town to an old Byzantine church on the top of a hill. The church was probably one of the oldest buildings I’d ever seen and also had the best view of the city. 

            From there we continued walking on the outskirts of the city, up in the hills.  We took a route back into the heart of the city on Via Leonardo.

The road was so narrow… at times we had to put our backs to the walls in order for a car to pass by without hitting us. The road, as treacherous as it may seem, provided us with some amazing views.

The bridge we crossed at the end is called Ponte Vecchio, or Old Bridge, it was the only bridge to survive the bombing of Florence back during WWII.  It was also the bridge that the Medici family would cross to get into town.  The Medici were kind of like the royal family of Florence, but also kind of like the mob of Florence. They got a lot of their wealth by trading art and taking part in questionable business ventures. The Old Bridge used to be a market place with food stands lining the bridge. This changed when the Medici’s became sick of seeing lower class people while crossing the bridge so they ordered that all of the butcher shops and fruit stands be turned into gold dealers.

            So that night was the Finale, a huge club soccer tournament that was taking place in Rome.  The bars were sure to be packed out with fans. We got to a place early and watched Barcelona triumph over Renaldo and the rest of Manchester United 2-0.  The fans in Florence were happy to see this as it seems that Manchester United has a bad reputation for being along the lines of what we would call “preppy” or “pretty boys.” I kind of agree when I look at the way Renaldo looks these days as well as the way he complains about things. But all in all it was a fair match and a great match to watch.  Watching the game made me think of some of the people we had met along the trip. A few Canadians we had met in the tour of the Vatican City were still in Rome that night watching the game. I wondered how that was going for them.

The Unplanned Train to the French Rivera, The Chance Encounter, The Beaches of Nice

            So Jeanne and I, on a whim, decided to take a train to Nice from Florence. It was pretty exciting for us… Jeanne didn’t know what to expect, and I had a pretty good idea of what to expect. Nice is on the French Rivera right next to Monaco and its supposed to be one of the most beautiful places in the south of France.  We had put in a long day of traveling and had squeezed onto the final train into the city—only about a 45 minute trip—and what do you know, but the three Canadians that we had met in the Vatican sat down right next to us! We were all in shock and thought it was hilarious what a slim chance we had of ever seeing each other again.  We didn’t know that they were going to Nice, hell, we didn’t even know we were going. And it turns out that the only reason why they had gotten onto our train is because of a random strike that their train went on, forcing them to switch onto our train at the station we happened to be at. It was pretty incredible and sparked up some lively conversation for the 45-minute trip. We said goodbyes, exchanged information and vowed to get up with each other while in Nice.

            Our hostel was easy to find and it was very comfortable to get settled in to a place just a block from the beach. We decided to go grab a bite to eat and walk along the water.  The cool thing about the beaches of Nice is that they aren’t sandy like most I’ve been to. Instead, the beaches are more like a river bed with smooth, round rocks and very little sand.  The rocks were ideal for skipping and I send several skipping across the Mediterranean towards Africa… I suspect they’ve all made it their by now. We sat down and watched people drink and fish up and down the beach as the sunset over Monaco.

The Wrong Way, The Right Way, and A View from the Top

            The next day Jeanne and I got up and began walking towards what we thought was the old part of Nice. Strange enough though, it seemed that the further we walked the newer things looked. After a good two miles I began questioning my sense of direction. It turned out, of course, we had gone the complete opposite direction that we should have gone from where we were staying. It was so strange how much I was thrown off—it felt as if the needle of my internal compass was sent spinning in circles. Things were fine when it finally figured itself out and I fully understood the fact that the beach was not to the east, but to the south. On the walk back in the right direction, I saw the mountains in the distance and I took this picture.

            After the navigational mishap we decided to give ourselves a much-needed vacation so we grabbed towels from the hotel and spent a few hours laying out on the rocky beach. For the first and possibly the only time during the trip we went swimming.  The Mediterranean was bright blue but not as clear as I thought it was. It wasn’t dirty, and it wasn’t murky, but for some reason it definitely wasn’t clear.  Jeanne and I came up with a couple of ideas about it… maybe it was the salinity of the water that made it harder to look through.  I wasn’t sure but I had heard somewhere that the Mediterranean was saltier. The other idea was that because there was no white sand on the bottom of the ocean, that it didn’t kick as much light back up… Neither of us felt strong enough about either theory to make judgment so we just enjoyed the paradise that we were in.

            When walking in the right direction, Nice only becomes more and more captivating.  The roads soon terminate and change into wide pedestrian walkways.  These walkways are lined with café’s, bistros, markets, and shops of all kinds. There were fountains, palm trees and all kinds of people enjoying the beautiful weather.

            Again, by chance, we met up with our Canadian friends in the streets at the base of a hill. I asked them how the Finale was. They told me that the day of the Finale, all of Rome was on prohibition. Thats right, the biggest tournament to come through the city in a while was not to be enjoyed along with alcohol.  None of the bars were selling it, none of the stores were selling it, and if you were seen with it you would be dealt with while the booze was disposed of. I wonder how the bar owners, venders, and fans accepted this.  Anyways, we all walked up countless amounts of stairs to a waterfall at the top of the hill.  From there we had an incredible view of the city and the beach as well as the not-so-distant snow capped mountains.

The Escape from Paradise, The Journey to Lyon

            The next morning we woke up, moved our bags to a new hotel, and went out to the beach. It was windy and kind of chilly out so we decided to go ahead and go to the train station to make reservations for a train to Lyon the next morning.

            When we got to the train station, we waited in one of the longest lines I’ve probably ever waited in… almost as long as waiting for Space Mountain—no payoff though.  When we got to the front of the line we were informed that there were no available trains to Lyon the next day, or the next day, or the next day… We would be stuck.  We were told that our only option was to catch the train leaving in 30 minutes—only option.  Jeanne stayed behind and made the reservations while I ran all the way to the hotel, grabbed our bags and ran all the way back. We made it on the train just in time.

            When we finally arrived in Lyon it was getting late.  The person who had helped us with the train from Nice had also gotten us a pretty good deal on a hotel in Lyon. She had said that it was only 5 minutes from the train station but we were soon to learn otherwise.  We were told to take a bus out of the main part of the city and get off at a certain stop. We took the bus and when I saw the name of the stop in lights at the front of the bus I thought that it was our stop. Jeanne and I got off the bus only to realize we had gotten off a stop or two early.  We had to cross a big bridge. The bridge was home to the most ridiculous amount of flies Jeanne or I had ever dealt with. From the bridge we found the stop we were supposed to have gotten off, but from there we had no idea where to go. We asked directions from a nearby hotel and were directed down a narrow stairway and narrow, shady, and overgrown path. Just around the corner was our hotel. What a long day of traveling.

A Quiet Sunday in Lyon

            When we awoke the next morning we took a bus into the main part of Lyon.  We had some food to eat at one of the few restaurants that was open. From there we could see a big church on top of a hill and declared that our destination. We crossed a bridge.  On the other side of the river was the old part of town.  

The old part is divided into three parts, St. George, St. Paul and St. Jean, all named after the churches in each part.  The old part of town was beautiful with cobbled and narrow streets.

When we made it to the top of the mountain Jeanne pointed out that we were once again at a view from the top.  We had done this in Dublin, Barcelona, Florence, Nice, and now Lyon.  The view was great and I took a couple of pictures. From there we went inside the church.

            It might just be me, but it now seems like most of the churches are starting to blend into one—we’ve been to so many.  Don’t get me wrong, they’re all magnificent and unique in their own way… its just that I find my self struggling to keep from saying “welp, seen one, you’ve seen them all.” Its not true though.

            The rest of the day we just walked around and enjoyed the weather and the quiet city.  I liked the way the place was. It was peaceful, clean, and easy. We stopped by a fountain constructed by the same person who did the statue of liberty.

An Early Morning, A Day Off, and The City of Strasbourg

            Jeanne and I woke before 6 the next morning with hopes of catching a 7:50 train to Strasbourg.  For some reason it seemed like things were even quieter than the day before. It was early, but the streets were practically empty and when Jeanne and I made it to the train station, we were told that it was “a day off”.  It must be a annual thing for France and I still haven’t been able to figure it out, but as a result of it, there was no early train so we were forced to wait in the train station for a couple of hours.  2 hours and two sessions of intense and random questioning from the French police and we were on the train to Strasbourg. 

            From the train station in Strasbourg we took a tram to a stop near our hostel where we checked in and dropped off our things. Because of the day off, the city of Strasbourg was also pretty quiet, but it was still enjoyable. Jeanne and I took our time walking the streets.  We really liked this place. The way the city was laid out was really neat. Nothing particularly about its design, just how pleasant everything looked from the wide streets and colorful buildings near the cathedral to the narrow streets and tidy homes of the old part of town, the town had a pleasant atmosphere complete with accordion and a cool breeze.  Here are some photos of the city.

            Strasbourg was great that day, but the best part was Jeanne’s dinner that night—her own rendition of Ratatouille

            The second day we went to a giant park near the European Institutions and north of the city’s center. The park was called l’Orangerie.

It was free and well maintained; it even had a small zoo in it. The zoo had things like goats, various birds, some prairie dogs, even some lemurs and monkeys.  It was really cool, but reminded me of how I don’t really like zoos that much.

Next we walked by the European Institutions, it wasn’t too much to see. Things like the European Council and Parliament weren’t anything fancy but it was still good that we got to see them. For the rest of the day we simply relaxed and enjoyed ourselves, the next day we would be crossing the Rhine and on our way to Bavaria to see Munich.

The past several days have been amazing… not that its been any different than the rest of the two weeks spent in Europe, but the last two cities that Jeanne and I visited were incredible.  5 days ago we rolled into Venice.  There are now two parts of Venice, the old city and the new city. The new city sits right on Italy’s coastline. It is what is now called Venice.  The old Venice sits on about 117 islands just off Italy’s coast. It is called Venezia.  The train we took from Milan that morning went all the way to Venezia but the hostel we were staying at wasn’t on the islands. We had gone too far.  It didn’t take long to figure out that we could hop on just about any train and it would stop at the train station we wanted to get off at—the next stop, only 10 minutes down the line.  So we hopped the train without buying a ticket and we made it just fine.  But it was great to get a glimpse of the Grand Canal before we checked into our hostel.

            Our hostel was right next to the train station and it wasn’t hard to find, in fact, it was the easiest to find out of all the hostels we had stayed at—we had just gotten off at the wrong stop first.  The man at reception was very helpful and helped us into our room, gave us a map and drew all over it telling us the things we needed to see, a good rout to walk the streets and also a cheap restaurant on the island (which was very hard to find).  After this he told us that it was 16 euro per day for a bus or a boat to Venezia or back at any time during the day.  We said we’d pass, as we’d found our own rout of travel to and from the island: train hopping.  The two stations—the one we’re staying near and the one that ends up on the island—are so close together that the tickets aren’t checked during that time. The whole entire time we stayed in Venice, we didn’t end up paying for any transportation because we just hopped the trains. It worked like a charm.

            What can you say about a city like Venice except that it must be the most picturesque city ever.  I wasn’t able to turn a corner without wanting to take a picture and I couldn’t take a picture that I wanted to delete. Everything was beautiful.  From the winding rivers, to the arcing bridges that cross them; from the narrow streets to the aged but colorful houses that line them, Venice was breathtaking. It was really no problem becoming lost in the maze of streets and straying from the route we had mapped out, because everything was so cool looking.  Jeanne wondered what it would be like to grow up in a place like Venice—what it would be like going to another city for the first time. Would everything else just be a let down?

            The Grand Canal is the main highway for Venetians.  It winds through the islands in a big S shape and is always filled with traffic from taxi barges, stained, wooden motorboats, gondolas and more. It by far the largest body of water that runs through the islands and by far the busiest. But despite the rivers bustling importance, there are actually only three bridges that cross it.  I suppose it is either because of the size of the canal, or just to funnel people through certain streets (which is just as probable).  The city’s heart is at Ponte di Rialto, one of the three bridges that crosses the canal.

            We spent the whole first day just walking around, and for dinner that night we went back to the same place we’d been for lunch. It was the cheap restaurant that had been pointed out to us at the beginning of the day, Restaurante Brek.  This restaurant was really cool, but also really weird. In the front was a coffee bar with sandwiches and burgers, and in the back was a pasta and salad bar with drinks and seating.  The food was well priced and you could get a big bowl of spaghetti for a little over 3 euro.  The music they played in there was pretty funny though. It was almost all American music, but Italian covers of it. Where the beats and melodies were mimicked and someone with an Italian accent took the place of, say, Celine Dion, or Curt Cobain.  At one point someone did Folsom Prison Blues and I couldn’t contain myself.  The food was amazing though, and the wine was cheap, which is always a plus.  Another weird thing about the place were the bathrooms—specifically the men’s’ bathroom.  The women’s bathroom was normal, but in the men’s room, you had to get a token from the front in order to use the bathroom. So you’d walk in the swinging door, and there’d be a small room with a sink and a hand dryer, but then there’d be two closed doors that seem occupied.  Then there’s a tiny slot where you’ll put a token on the side of the door… very hard to notice and it took knocking on the seemingly occupied door for me to figure out that it wasn’t occupied.  The funny part was sitting down and watching men go into the bathroom without the token and see how long they’ll wait.  Sometimes there would be 5 or 6 men piled in there just waiting for the bathrooms to open. Quite awkward, but quite funny. Here are some more Venice Pictures though…

            On the second day it was hotter and we drank a lot of water.  We did this by filling our empty water bottles at fountains that were located most of Venice’s plazas.  We walked down to the main plaza, Piazza de San Marco, and looked at the massive cathedral.  From there we walked down the side of the island to a park where we took a nap.  

The city itself is very safe. It must be, there were children running all over the park and through the streets, playing around by themselves.  When school let out that day, you could tell it was the day where the teacher had given out balloons to the students because kids lined up next to all of the fountains to fill their balloons with water and hurl them all over the place.

            That night, Jeanne and I said goodbye to Venice by sitting at the end of a narrow street that ends at the Grand Canal where a fleet of Gondolas were parked. The Gondolas are what you typically see when you see pictures of Venice. They’re the long narrow boats that are piloted by a driver with a long paddle and a striped shirt.  These guys are hotshots. Seriously, they must make a killing every day.  They charge upwards of 100 euro for each ride… I remember one trying to persuade Jeanne and I—quoted us a “short” ride for 50 euro.  We didn’t do it, but I’m sure it would have been almost worth it. 

Anyways, we sat in front of these guys all calling it a day as the sun went down.  They were talking loud, laughing with each other, exchanging huge wads of cash back and forth while jumping from boat to boat like it was nothing.  It looked like the guys never made mistakes and was really cool to watch.

            The next day our train to Rome had some problems and it took longer than we thought to get into the city.  This in addition to the usual circles we walk between every new train station and hostel made us very tired, so we called it in early that night after a late dinner.

            The next day we woke up and started walking toward the Coliseum.  There was a big soccer tournament in town, The Champions Cup, and it had brought a lot of people to the Coliseum area—it was packed.  We found a good tour for a good price that let us bypass the lines into the Coliseum.

            The Coliseum was huge, and although it was nothing like a football or a baseball stadium in America, it was still far more incredible because of its age, and because of what had gone on in there.  The typical schedule of events for the Coliseum during its 400+ years of commission would have gone something like this:

            In the morning there would be hunting games.  There would be exotic animals like lions, tigers, or hippos.  They would be starved and angry and let loose in the arena with one man to kill.  Some times they would have things like a lion fight a tiger, or 5 hyenas against 2 hippos.  Around mid day they would have public executions. These executions wouldn’t be just an “off with his head” type of deal though—they’d do things like drop people from tremendous heights or put the scent of a female lion on them and release them into the arena with 5 very hungry, male lions.  The end of the day would be the main event. This would be when the gladiators would go on.  The gladiators were usually slaves or prisoners of war and most of the games and battles they did were just outright slaughter.  Things like a man with full armor and a huge sword against a man with no armor and a small sword.  The result would be obvious and then the victor—the one in the armor—would be stripped down, handed a smaller sword and then go up against some one else who had been given his armor.  This would go on all day.  In some of these battles, the underdog would prevail and it would be a big deal.  A gladiator could become a celebrity by being such a good fighter, and could be paid handsomely as well. 

            At the base of the Coliseum there are what looks to be like a lot of walls, like a maze or something. I always wondered why it looked like that, but I found out that that was below the arena. Down there was where the stage director worked. They used lifts to bring more gladiators or animals into the arena, keeping people on their toes at every moment.  A couple of times they even surprised the fans by filling the arena with water and having navel battles.  You’d have 6 boats against 6 boats where you had to destroy the enemy boats. If there were people that refused to fight, they would be shot down with archers—ready at any moment to rain arrows down upon anyone (also on animals that tried to climb into the stands).

            All of this fun came to an end though when the Roman Empire crumbled and the Coliseum began to be neglected.  The top part of the south wall fell during an earthquake, and from there it was all over.  The building became a church at one point, a cemetery at another. At one point the Coliseum was even a condominium! …And a factory!

            Next we went to Palatine hill. Palatine hill is the most important of the 7 hills in Rome. It is where legend says that Rome began in 753BC.  This is where Romulus built his house after being blessed by the gods to start the greatest city in the world.

After that, Emperor Augustus built his palace on the hill to link the empirical family to Romulus.  From then on, the emperors that came after Augustus continued to add onto the palace.  The ruins are extensive and it was hard to see them all so we continued on to the Roman Forum.

            The Roman Forum was once the most important place in Rome. It was the meeting place where all of the important decisions about religion, politics, and the empire’s expansion were made. Now it is tattered and ruined, but still amazing to walk through.

            Next we made our way to the Trevi Fountains.  They say that if you throw a coin into the fountains than someday you will return to them. 

This was the busiest fountain I’d ever seen in my life.  There were people everywhere next to this fountain.  Jeanne and I made our way down to the fountain and threw our coins in. We sat for a while by the fountains until we decided to get out of the crowd and the heat.  We continued walking.

            Next we came to the Pantheon. This enormous building was amazing to view from the outside.  It was like all the pictures I’d seen from it.  But the real beauty was going inside.  The dome of the Pantheon is amazing with a huge hole in the center.  There were a lot of people in there praying, but it seemed like a public park more than a place of worship.

            At the end of the day we walked to the Capitoline Hill. It is a massive building made completely out of white marble.  It was free to go inside and check out the museums they had to offer, but you also get a lot of really good views of the city from up there.

            The next day we got up early and went to the Pope’s country.  Vatican City is the smallest sovereign nation in the world and the Pope definitely makes it his own country.  The Vatican Museums hold over 7 miles worth of galleries and hold some of the worlds most important artwork. Raphael’s Transfiguration of Christ was on display there.  We also got to go inside the Sistine Chapel.

            The Chapel was designed to be in the exact dimensions of Solomon’s Temple from the Old Testament.  The ceiling was of course painted my none other than Michelangelo.  I had no idea what this guy went through to paint that chapel.  First of all, the size of the place is enormous.  The ceiling is 10,000 square feet.  Second of all, the guy was such a perfectionist that it took him 4 years to paint it, and during these four years he lived inside the chapel.  Third of all, the painting was a fresco. Painting a fresco is kind of like tattooing plaster rather than painting on top of it, so that means he had to time the plasterwork and the painting to work out right—adding a whole other dimension on things.  Finally, the guy wasn’t even a painter. No. He was a sculptor and the Pope commissioned him to do it by closing his eyes and picking a name at random—this is like having a plumber do your electric work.  Michelangelo didn’t paint the ceiling lying on his back. That’s just a myth, but it would have been easier I think. Michelangelo stood up straight, looked up and painted—-must have been rough on the neck. 

After he finished, he was sick and tired of painting, and I can imagine. But what’s worse is that he was commissioned again, several years later, to paint the back wall. This is where he painted The Last Judgment and this one took him 5 years! What a guy. I can’t describe the Sistine Chapel to you, It was beyond words, I think.

            Next we walked down some steps and toward St. Peter’s Cathedral.  This has got to be the church of all churches.  It is the biggest, most done up, most epic looking church I’ve ever seen. Duomo’s got nothing on it. Here are some pictures of the place to give you an idea of how big this thing was.

After this we went below the cathedral and saw the catacombs where all of the dead popes were laid to rest. We walked by Pope John Paul II’s tomb where people were on their knees, paying respect to this most recent pope. Some were crying and some were still and silent while guards carefully monitored every bit of movement around the site. From there we turned a corner and came across St. Peter’s Tomb.  The tomb was adorned and almost completely covered in solid gold. Here is are some pictures of St. Peter’s Cathedral,  you can tell that they’d had church the day before.

            For the rest of the day we relaxed in a park next to a Castle on the Tiber River, we were exhausted from a day of looking up at ceilings and intended to get some rest for our trip to Florence the next day.

            The last two days in Barcelona—last two days in Spain, the weather was the same as it’s been since our arrival.  It was three days ago. Jeanne and I put in a good 12-14 miles worth of walking under beautiful blue skies and warm temperatures.  Montjuic, the highest point in Barcelona, overlooks the city.

Atop the mount is a Castle, Castell de Montjic. The walk up was nothing but great views.  There are several ways to get to the top.  There were cable cars and lifts, buses and taxis that all led to the castle.  As for us, we pick and choose the stairs we want to use.  A lot of them were very ancient looking and overgrown with grass and ivy.  It reminded me of King Louis’s place in The Jungle Book, but without the apes. Instead, Montjuic seemed to be the place where most of the feral cats in the city lived.  I can’t really blame them either.  There’s enough plant life to provide decent cover and several of the locals and tourists brought food for the ones we saw along the trail. 

When we reached the top we walked around the castle.  It was not so different from Castello de San Marco in St. Augustine, Florida.  There were big walls, plenty of stone, and cannons.  The cannons on these walls were a bit more serious than the ones in Florida.  They were big, powerful-looking guns that pointed straight out into the Mediterranean Sea.  The museum inside the castle was closed, as were a lot of things that day on account of it being Monday so we walked around the castle grounds for a while.  There were a lot of runners out.  The trails around the castle seemed to be perfect for runners and we saw a good deal of them enjoying the trails as we walked them. 

            After we made our way down Montjuic, we stopped in a café, escaped the sun for a bit, and had a drink.  Then we made our way back to La Rambla.  The street had become a main artery for us and we probably walked it about 20 or so times total.  It seemed to bisect the Gothic Quarter of the city and never failed to be busy and bustling.  It leads from Port Veil at the coast up to the grid area of the main residential and business district near where we stayed our last night in town.  Around this area are a couple more Gaudi buildings that we wanted to checkout before the day was over but while walking La Rambla we detoured into a market place called Mercat de la Boqueria.

            The market was incredibly dense with people and food and we spent a good half hour just looking around—weaving through the crowds and food stands. We made plans to come back to the market the next day and continued along our way.  Here are some photos of the market:

            Jeanne loved this part…

            Not so much this part…

            We continued on our way to see some of Gaudi’s buildings.  The first one was Casa Mila. Gaudi finished this building in 1910 and from then on it has been commended by some and poked fun at by others.  The weird, pulsating shape of the building was really neat to me. I like how he used so many curves and not so many straight lines.  It cost about 20 euro to get in, so with budget and time constraints in mind, we decided to pass and move on to the next building, La Sagrada Familia.

            When I was little and we went to the beach, we would always make castles by digging a hole in the sand until if filled with water. Then we’d take the wet, watered-down sand, clench it in our fists, and let the sand drip out and pile onto itself. The result looked not too far off from what La Sagrada Famillia looked in most the pictures I’ve seen of it.  However, when we got up close to this massive structure, we could tell that there was more advanced architectural skill involved than mere drip castles.  The four main towers twisted and turned all the way up.  Their intricate design, along with the design of the rest of the building was utterly astounding. 

Gaudi set out to build the “greatest cathedral known to man”. The piece itself remains unfinished, for Gaudi died while it was being built—poor guy was hit by a tram one day.  Even though he didn’t finish it, it looks amazing and now after all these years, the city finally begins the completion of Gaudi’s project.

            The next morning we woke up and made reservations for a train to Milan, Italy. It was an overnight train that would leave at 7:35 that evening. It would be a 15-hour journey through Spain, France, and Italy.  The first half of the day we went back to Mercat de la Boqueria and got some really good fruit for really cheap.  We had a fruit feast at Port Veil. Then we walked back up La Rambla, through the entire city and all the way up another mount to get to Parc Guell. 

            This public park is pretty whimsical looking, and although we didn’t walk through all 50 acres of it, it certainly made an impression on us.  The park was originally meant to be a garden city consisting of about 60 houses, but only two houses ended up being built before the dream faded and became public.  The park overlooks the city from the other side (opposite Montjuic) and winds along the mountainside.  Gaudi himself lived in a rose colored house in the park from 1906 until he died 20 years later, this structure is called Casa-Museu Gaudi and now houses a museum dedicated to the guy. 

            Here are some more pictures from different parts of the park.  They really don’t do the design of the place justice; it’d have to be something you saw for yourself.

            All in all, Barcelona did not disappoint.  The weather was wonderful, the city was beautiful, and the experience was pleasant.  The only thing that difficult was the language barrier.  In Barcelona, the locals speak Catalan.  It is what is favored in most of the restaurants as well as what is taught in schools, although they understand Spanish and speak it often too.  The locals who served us in restaurants seemed very impatient and irritated with my Spanish though, and as a result didn’t provide the most comforting and prompt service. It was disheartening sometimes, but I kept trying with broken Spanish and an eager smile but it didn’t seem to be enough.

            When we got on the train that evening we were beat. I was quick to doze off because I was so tired from the walk, but every now and then I would wake up and get some really cool views from the train car.

            After a decent night’s sleep in a reclining seat, a French boarder patrol officer and some police asking for papers woke me up.  They were very intimidating and looked over the car thoroughly and without any hesitation ripped bags from overhead racks and searched all through them.  I looked out the window and took this picture of the French Alps.

            Finally the boarder patrol and police left our car and moved on to the next one. We were allowed to get off the train for a second to walk around.  We were on the French Italian boarder, and the mountains were beautiful and snowcapped.  After we got back on the train and sat down, the officers stormed through our car with a man in front of them.  The man was thin and nervous as they handed him a cup and shoved him into the bathroom.  I sat right next to the bathroom so I couldn’t help but watch as the officers hurried the man up, who either couldn’t or wouldn’t fill the cup.  After about 10 minutes they got it out of him and tested the urine with paper strips. He failed, I suppose. They grabbed him and took him off the train. A minute or so later we were moving again and I fell back asleep. It was 6:30 in the morning. 

            When I woke up again we were in Italy and I got a couple of pictures of the mountains fading away in the distance.

            The train pulled into Milano Central Station at about 10:00 and we got off the train and walked to the guesthouse we were staying in.  This would be our only day in Milan and there were a few things I wanted to check out. We purchased a metro ticket for the day for only 3 euro a piece and went at it.  Duomo is the city’s center and home of the worlds largest gothic cathedral.  When you emerge from the metro onto Piazza de Duomo, the cathedral towers over you.  The whole plaza is massive and full of people. 

            Entry was free for the cathedral so we walked inside. A big sign said that there were no photos allowed, which was a bummer because the place was downright gorgeous.  I whipped out the video camera and took some video before coming across a sign that said that no video was allowed either.  I respected it and closed the camera.  But all around us, people were taking pictures. And it wasn’t just the English, or the Germans that were doing it. It was the Italians too—flashing cameras all over the place.  I understand that the flash from a camera can be harmful to old paintings and stain glass as well as for the preservation of color in old stonewalls and brick. At one point it just seemed like no one cared so I pulled out my camera and took a couple of pictures—still didn’t use the flash, which was difficult, but I held still enough during the 1-2 seconds the shutter was open and got some decent shots.

            Next we walked through Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II.  There were high, arched glass ceilings and very expensive stores. In the center of the mall was Gucci, Prada, Louis Vuitton, Mercedes and of course McDonalds.  Milan has been declared the fashion capital of the world and I can believe it.  It seemed like everyone was wearing designer clothes there.  All of the men were in suit and tie and all of the women dressed in the latest fashion. I’m not going to lie, some of the suits the guys were wearing were really, really stylish and I was tempted to drop some money on a nice suit. Of course, I refrained, but I can still see myself wearing a blue or yellow suit and tie… admit it, I’d look pretty suave.

            The streets of Milan are pretty cool. Most of them are cobbled with tracks through them for streetcars.  There were a lot of streetcars and because of this, above most of the intersections there were strewn with cables and powerlines.

            For the rest of the day, Jeanne and I relaxed in a couple of Milan’s parks.  The first of which was Giardini Pubblici (Public Gardens).  The park is a relaxation spot for the locals where they can lay in the sun, let their dogs off their leads and let the kids play on the playgrounds.  The park was so relaxing that we accidentally took a short nap on a bench.

            Next we went to Parco Sempione, another beautiful park.  This one was larger than Giardini Pubblici and there were musical acts going on throughout the area.  On one end of the Park was a massive fortress called Castello Sforzesco.  The castle made for some good photos along the walk, There were more guys in suits and I thought again about buying one.

            Anyways. The people in Milan were so nice. Everyone was patient with our Italian and so kind and helpful in guiding us through our words as well as theirs.  They were polite and beaming with happiness and I think I know why. The food is amazing.  I’ve eaten two meals in Italy so far: Lasagna for lunch and Pizza for dinner.  I can safely say that the two meals were the best of the dishes I’ve ever had.  The lasagna went down too fast to remember fully, but the pizza I can say something about.  They’re huge, thick slices, with the best sauce and cheese I’ve ever had. The triangle slices were cut into squares and everyone ate them with a fork. Also, A liter of wine was cheaper than a liter of beer, which was also uncommon of any restaurant I’d ever been to.  This is a picture of the Milanese streets from a Pizzaria

            We called it in early that night and caught up on some much needed rest.  The next morning we woke up at 6 and walked to the train station to catch the 7:25 train to Venice.

More to come…

Beirut - The Concubine

Sorry I’ve Been off the radar for a few days. It’s hard to keep everyone posted while I’m traveling. This is a photo taken on my last full day in Barcelona. Tomorrow I’ll post some more along with what has been happening on the last couple of days of my journey. Ciao.

I apologize in advance for the lack of text in this post. Barcelona is too much fun to use up time typing on a computer.

Las Ramblas is the center stage of Barcelona.  So much goes on on this long street that it’s difficult to describe it with simply one picture.  This one was taken around the corner from the famous street.  In the days to come I’m sure there will be several pictures telling what goes on throughout these streets.

The bay of Port Veil is full of fish. There were schools of them just hanging out in hopes of snagging some leftovers from passers by.  They liked my spit a lot… Stupid fish…

The temperature in Barcelona was so much warmer than in Ireland.  We wore short sleeves and sweated for the first time during our trip.  The weather could not have been better.

This was my first view of the Mediterranean Sea.  The water was just as clear and as blue as I had heard it would be.  The beaches were topless like I’d heard they would be too.

Jeanne and I walked out near giant cubes in the sea and shared a bottle of wine in the sun.  We both decided not to look forward to anything else for the rest of the trip due to the fact that we had too much to look forward to. 

This is one of my favorite photos.  The narrow streets are the coolest part of Barcelona.  It seemed like a labyrinth of walls and windows.  Every now and then the streets would open up into a big plaza where there were restaurants and all kinds of people entertaining.

Tonight we took a long walk around the city and looked at the architecture.  We concluded that Gaudi, an architect who designed some of the most famous buildings in Barcelona as well as in Spain is a genius.  We weren’t the first, I’m sure 

This is the Arc de Triumph in Barcelona. Just to the right of it is Port Veil and not too far behind it is Barceloneta, where the beaches are.

I’m thinking about living here.

Yesterday morning stared off with a 6:15 wake up call from the front desk. I was interested to see how this would be carried out, mostly because there is no telephone in our three-bunk bedroom.  The way it worked was someone poked his head inside the door and shined a little flashlight in Jeanne’s eyes while whispering “good morning.”  Poor Jeanne had trouble sleeping the night before. In fact, I think she might not have slept at all. You see, it was one of our roommate’s 24^th birthday and I suppose when he drinks he snores, because we would have noticed these kinds of snores some other time… They were the kinds that were loud and relentless throughout the night—not like the gentle sawing of a log… more like the deforestation of a rainforest.

            Of course we took too long for tea and toast downstairs. It was nobody’s fault, it just so happened that I looked at my watch and realized that the train would be leaving in thirty minutes and the station was some walk away from us. We ran to the station and it still took us 20 minutes to get there. We bought our tickets in a hurry and went upstairs to the tracks. Our train was leaving at 7:34 and we stepped up to the tracks at 7:30 just as a train pulled into the station. We hopped onto the train. There was a period of about 5 seconds where that question came into both of our heads, “are we on the right one?” During that brief period we were about to sit down and I looked down at my watch. “It’s 7:31… it’s not 7:34.” And the doors closed. The next ten minutes were one of sheer hostility, argument, worry, stress, and disbelief.  It was the same line… we were still headed in the right direction… was there a stop we could get off at and get on the train behind us? It was time to make a decision.

            As the train slowed to a stop I got up and walked over to a door near the back of the car. When we stopped there was a man in the railway uniform just on the other side of the door.  I tapped on the glass to get his attention, but the door wasn’t opening. I looked toward the front of the car where the door had opened and people were walking out.  I scrambled to get up to it and yelled out the door. “We got on too early… trying to get to Rothdrum.” He made a hurried motion for me to get off the train now. I looked at Jeanne. In a matter of seconds the doors would close. She was swift to grab both of our bags, and I ran over to help her. We barely squeaked by the closing doors and stumbled onto the platform.

            “It’s the next one commin’,” he said as we regained composure, “you’re fine now.”  We couldn’t thank him enough for helping us. As we sat and waited I looked from the platform over the Irish Sea.

            The rest of the train ride was much more enjoyable.  The trip lasted about an hour from the spot where we got on.  We would be in the Wicklow Mountains by 9.  The line ran down the coast for the majority of the trip and there were some really pretty views from the train car window.

            When we arrived, we got off the train and walked up an unmarked road from the train station. From there we took a path up a gravel road that spat us out onto Main St. where our bed and breakfast, Stirrabout Lane was located.  The town of Rothdrum was very small and compact—Main St. was pretty much it.  The roads were very narrow and the cars all had to hop up onto the sidewalk on one side of the road in order to park out of the way of traffic. We soon made it to our destination and Daphne, the owner of the bed and breakfast gave us our key and showed us to our room.  We told her we would only be staying one night and that we would be catching a plane to Barcelona the next day at 4.  She was kind enough to print off timetables for the outbound trains back to Dublin.  We would take the 11 o’ clock train back the next day and have around 4 hours until our flight. She recommended a scenic walk for us called The River Walk.  We set our stuff in the room and were on our way.

            Before setting out for the hike we stopped by the supermarket and packed some lunch for ourselves and along the walk when we found an ideal bench in some shade we sat and ate.  The total distance we walked was probably around 5 miles and it was beautiful.  The area reminded me of the Appalachian Mountains, but definitely greener.  Also, there were more conifers—some really cool looking western hemlocks and some other pine trees that I couldn’t figure out what they were. I got some really good pictures of the place.

            That evening we bought some vegetables and a bottle of wine and had a really big salad for dinner. After that we went to the local pub and sat down for our usual drinks. I had a couple stouts and Jeanne had a couple waters. While we were sitting in the pub everyone was watching horse races. Apparently it’s a pretty big thing in Ireland. I had noticed before that there were an unusual amount of bookmakers in Dublin, but the mere fact that there were two in Rathdrum confirmed it.  While the locals were watching the races, I remembered a puzzle that my grandfather had showed me when I was little.  He had told me that if could solve it he’d give me a thousand dollars.  In the puzzle there is a box drawn with a line dividing it in half. The first half is split into thirds and the second half is split into halves—all boxes. The solution to the puzzle can only be found by drawing a solid line through every line of the puzzle without crossing a line twice and without crossing the line you are drawing.   Jeanne and I gave it several tries before I concluded once again that it was impossible. At that we decided to call it a night.

            On the walk back to Stirrabout Lane I stopped in a small takeout place and got some chips and vinegar.  We decided to walk to the other side of town while I ate them. As we passed the bed and breakfast a few little Irish girls yelled to us from a second story window. They were saying things like “hot stuff” and “sexy”.  I laughed and waved as we walked on by, but we only made it 2 minutes down the road before we realized we had reached the end of town.  We turned around to go back to the bed and breakfast.  When we got closer, the girls must have seen us coming and all three of them left the window and filed out the front door.  “Where are you from?” they asked. We told them we were from America to which they responded, “Really? You’re from America?” We nodded. “Do you know any famous people?” they asked.  We responded promptly and told them that we were actually famous before disappearing behind the doors of Stirrabout Lane.  The night ended with us reading “The Fifth Quarter” a Stephen King short story in the TV room.  The story was about pieces of a map leading to a lot of money. It put us to sleep and we went to our room and talked to our parents before falling asleep to Ben Stiller and Emenim on a BBC late night talk show.

            The next morning we went downstairs for breakfast and Daphne started up small talk about when we were thinking about leaving and when we should square up. The subject of train departures came up and we reviewed the timetables only to realize that she had printed off the wrong one.  She went and looked at the right one and told us the train left significantly later than we had thought.  We would miss our flight to Barcelona.  We were kind of worried; it startled the appetite out of us and we began wondering what we were going to do.  Daphne walked out of the room and came back a few minutes later.  She told us she could take us as far as Rathenew, about 15 minutes north. From there we could catch a bus that took us directly to the airport and have us there by 1.  This would work.  We finished packing our stuff and loaded it into her BMW.

            The drive there was weird for me. The roads twisted about the countryside and I felt like I was sitting in the drivers seat with no steering wheel.  We listened to talk radio and talked about people who snore and the different kinds of snorers.  Daphne also told us about the last time that she had been to Barcelona. She said that the Gothic Quarter was really cheep and you could find great deals there—a lot of really neat clothes for only 10 euro.  Soon enough we were at the bus stop and she told us where to wait for the bus.  We said goodbye and sat and waited. She had said the next bus would be coming within the hour.  Jeanne had a strange feeling and wanted to double check so she crossed the street and asked someone in a supermarket when the next bus to the airport was coming. Some things just happen to work out I guess.  If we hadn’t happened to talk about the timetables this morning, there was no way we would have had any chance of making the plane.  Likewise, if Jeanne wouldn’t have went and asked about the bus, we would have been standing at the station for the rest of the day. It turns out that the station we were supposed to be at was a couple minutes walk down on the other side of the road.  We made it there with some time to spare and before long we were on the bus to the airport.

            I don’t really want to talk about Ryan Air right now.  Lets just say they find some ways to stiff you and it’s a real stressor.  All the same, the flight itself went really well. I fell asleep on the plane and when I woke up were flying over the Pyrenees. The mountains were all snowcapped and gigantic; it was quite a sight to see. That was definitely the highlight of the flight.  Only about 30 minutes later we landed in Rues. From there it was only an hour bus ride to Barcelona.

Here is a picture of the first Spanish sunset we saw.

Today I think I took in more Joyce than I knew what to do with and I can’t imagine how Jeanne felt. When we woke up I ate a sandwich and we set off for the James Joyce Centre near Parnell Square—only about a fifteen-minute walk from the Kinlay House.  It certainly was a Dublin morning. There was a thick overcast sky that spat a constant drizzle on us as we made our way across the Liffey and over to the centre. We were about an hour and a half early for the Dubliners walking tour that I wanted to go on so we were invited to go upstairs and check out some of the exhibitions free of charge. 

            This was no museum, in fact, it was barely big enough to hold over five people in each room, but the information that it gave out was extensive.  They had a replica of Joyce’s room constructed as soon as you walk in from the stairwell. It was this tiny room with only a bed and a bookshelf. It looked like the ideal nook for an early 20^th century genius to lock himself up in and produce a masterpiece. I was quick to notice, however, that there was no desk; there was no place to write. The fact is that contrary to a lot of writers in his time, James Joyce actually preferred to write outside of his room—he actually wrote with the bustle of everyday life all around him. Jeanne was quick to point out how admirable that was and I immediately agreed with her. I feel like if you’re trying to hold a mirror up to life and comment on it, you might as well let it happen around you while your doing so.  Well, that and I was really just surprised by the fact of it. 

            Next there was a computer installment where we took a pretty in depth look at Joyce’s biography. The guy lived a pretty incredible life—traveled around Europe during the First World War and wrote what some critics hail as one of the greatest masterpieces of the 20^th century while he did it. He lived in Trieste and in Rome, in Paris and in Zurich, but his writing was received so weirdly in his hometown.  Dubliners was regarded as porn by a lot of critics when it was published, and there is nothing anywhere near what I would call explicit—only the mention of the word “prostitute” or an allusion to it. Very strange.

            On one side of the next room there were some books of his on a table with some chairs, a telephone, and an empty brandy container, on the other side there was a flat screen television showing documentaries on Ulysses, but in the far corner next to the flat screen there was Joyce’s actual death mask. I’m not really into that kind of thing, but it was pretty cool, I guess—I snapped a photo.

            We made our way down to the first floor and out back we saw the door from Leopold Bloom’s house on 7 Eccles Street in Ulysses. I haven’t read all of the novel yet… I tried to about a year ago, but it was pretty intense. I could have gotten through it just fine, but I think when I read it I want to understand it, so its on the back burner right now. The guy at the centre said that being in Dublin and knowing the streets that Bloom walks will be very helpful in tackling what Joyce is trying to get across. He threw in a couple of other bits of information that I kind of brushed off—I’m glad that I’m studying Dubliners for now.

            The tour started and it was just Jeanne and I with the tour guide. The rain started coming down a lot harder than before so we bought an umbrella. Even though it was raining, the tour was awesome. The guy knew so much about Joyce and he seemed to be able to spit out information on the fly for every question I asked him. It was very impressive. I’ll save everyone all of the details—if your interested, get back to me at the end of this summer when my paper is due.

            After the tour was all over we ended up at Trinity College.  Joyce wrote a lot about Trinity in Dubliners as well as in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and Ulysses, but always with a certain degree of spite.  The college stood as a symbol for British colonialism that always seemed to rub him the wrong way.  He attended University College Dublin, a university that is no longer in Dublin but was moved south during the late 80s if I’m not mistaken.  All the same though, Trinity College has a beautiful campus busy with students all over. This week is actually what they called “Trinity Week” and there were a lot of tour groups roaming all over the campus. It reminded me of UNCW and the giant tours that fill up campus walk and block the main arteries of campus. I sensed that the students here felt the same way about the tour groups—except for a young couple that made-out on the stairs of the library in front of everyone for the a solid 3 minutes as we walked by… they were still going at it even after rounded a corner and they went out of sight (for us at least).

            After that we went to the National Library of Ireland. The front steps of the building where Joyce and the students from University College used to sit were under renovations, but we got to walk inside and see the reading room where all of the studying went on.  The room was beautiful with high ceilings and light green painted walls. There were rows mahogany desks with green office lamps.  I really wanted to take a picture but there was no photography allowed inside—I wasn’t even allowed to bring my backpack into the library.

            After a brief rest and some more sandwiches, Jeanne and I decided to go on a walk. In my favorite story from Dubliners, “An Encounter”, two boys skip school for a day and walk to Dublin bay, take a ferry across to the south side and wind up in a field where they encounter a strange old man.  Dublin is not at all the Dublin it was in the early 20^th century so Jeanne and I tried our best to trace the footsteps of the boys. Our new friend, Christian from Oklahoma was interested and tagged along for the walk. I don’t think any of us knew exactly how long of a walk it was going to be.

            The idea was to follow the Liffey as far as we could and then go from there, this seemed to work out quite well and after about 3 or 4 miles we found ourselves out of the metropolis and in a more residential area. We kept walking past shipyards and boats, cranes and cruiseliners, eventually we came to some big industry plantations and factories where smokestacks peeked out from the Dublin fog.  We kept onward, hopping concrete barricades and hoping to get to the sea, and finally we came to a field next to this huge wall. I wasn’t quite sure if we were close or not—also wasn’t sure if we were trespassing or not—so we pressed on and soon enough we came to a fence with an open gate. We passed through the gate and over a small hill and there was the sea—sort of.

            It was low tide and it there was sand for almost as far as we could see. Just below the horizon, a couple of people walked with a dog, it was a sight to behold.  A path went down the coastline so we decided to follow it. We kept on walking, I couldn’t stop looking at the coastline.  It looked like someone had drank the sea up. Before we knew it we came to a sign that told us where we were.  I hadn’t even realized that we had walked through the field from the story, but I didn’t mind not turning back. I had gotten caught up in the moment and we had already walked about 5 miles.

            The walk home was another 4 miles.  We took a different route through a residential neighborhood and we found ourselves close to where we had explored the day of our arrival. When we made it back to the Kinlay house it had been around 4 hours since we had left. Christian’s and my feet were aching and Jeanne’s hands were frozen from the cold and the rain. We exchanged goodbyes with Christian, who would be leaving for London the next morning.  It was late and time for Jeanne and I to get a little planning done. We had sent an email to a bed and breakfast in the Wicklow Mountains asking about a room for tomorrow night and we heard back from them welcoming us to stay. We’ll take a train from Pearse St. Station to Rothdrum at 7:34 the next morning.

            The sun doesn’t go down until nearly 10 o’ clock in Dublin this time of year. It’s kind of neat, but that in combination with the jet lag that we were experiencing last night made it difficult to keep track of time.  We ended up going out looking for a place to eat around 8:45 that evening and realized that just about everything around was in the 10 euro and up range. I wasn’t feeling it, so I started having this very perverse thought of going to McDonalds and just doing it up there with some cheap food (nothing against Dublin cuisine, but I’m saving my food spending money for Spain, Italy, Germany and France) and I was shocked to get a look what we in the states know as the dollar menu. In Dublin it’s the 2 euro menu. That’s right, 2 euro for a double cheeseburger—that’s close to 3 dollars so I passed on Mc O’ Donald’s and we kept looking.  We finally came across a hole in the wall pub where the menu offered 6 euro burgers with potatoes and potatoes, so I was all in on that. We sat down, I went to the bar and ordered my first pint of Guinness in Dublin and asked where I placed my order for dinner. The bar tender was sorry to tell me that they were all done with dinner for the night.  It was ok though; I sat down with Jeanne and drank the pint while watching a soccer match—she had her three-course meal of an apple, an orange, and a banana.  The pint was fantastic.

After we left the pub I stopped in a supermarket and bought a loaf of bread, some peanut butter and some jelly for about 5 euro total.  We went back to the Kinlay House and I ate a couple sandwiches while Jeanne and I passed a bottle of wine back and fourth. Not long after that we walked down to Temple Bar and had a couple more pints. The Temple bar was really neat. There were 4 or 5 rooms in there, each with a bar and they had an outside section right in the middle.  The man with the guitar played U2 covers all night…typical. But the night was a success, it was only a 5 minute walk back and Jeanne and I were shocked how close we were to everything in Dublin.

            This morning was a lazy one. I woke up feeling very restless at 6am so I got up for a few minutes, but when I laid back down I felt like the bunk bed was sucking me in and I stayed down until around 11 o’ clock. After a couple peanut butter and jelly sandwiches Jeanne and I went for another long walk around a different area of town.  We walked around St. Stephens Green, a place James Joyce frequently wrote about in Dubliners as well as in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. The park was beautiful and green with all kinds of plants and pigeon romance. I took some footage, but I don’t have a cord to upload anything yet—I’ll try and get one tomorrow sometime. We walked long enough that eventually we found ourselves close to the Guinness Storehouse after a few hours so we decided to see what the deal was.

            It was 11 euro each for us… but you got a free pint at the end so I made the call and we went in. The storehouse was huge and there was a lot to learn. It was all self guided and we were simply handed a map upon our entry.  When you walk into this place you find yourself in this big circle, but when you look at the map you realize that it’s the bottom of the world’s largest pint glass… typical. After this, there are arrows that point you in the direction you need to walk to take in the tour in the right order. First you’ll learn about the ingredients that go into a Guinness. They use the over 200 million pounds of Irish barley every year.  They use three kinds: malted barley, un-malted barley, and roasted barley. The roasted barley is what gives Guinness that “rich roasted flavor.” 

Hops are also used. Did you know that Hops only grow in between 35 and 55 degrees longitude north and south of the equator? Yeast. The same strand of yeast has been used in Guinness since Author Guinness decided to make porters and stouts instead of ale. This strand of yeast is only grown at St. James’s Gate in Dublin. In fact, this strand of yeast is so valuable to the company that the director of the storehouse keeps a reserve stash locked away in a safe. All of these ingredients are necessary to producing a Guinness, but what they made the biggest deal about was the water they used. They called it the “liquor” and made it a point to tell everyone that the water used in making Guinness isn’t and never has been drawn from the River Liffey. The water they use comes from the Whicklow Mountains, a mountain range about 30 miles south of Dublin.

Anyways, all of the barley and hops are milled, or ground up  and then thrown in a “kieve” with the Wicklow water and this is where the brewing starts. The kieve is strictly a Dublin term for a mash turn… apparently they had to set themselves apart from all of the other brewers somehow and they decided that making up new words suited them best. 

The substance in the kieve is called wort, which is more or less a term for pre-beer.  The wort is boiled at 100 degrees Celsius for 70 minutes and then it is poured out and the yeast is added. The yeast feeds on the wort for about 2 days and then floats to the top when the brew cools. After this, everything filtered out during a rigorous maturation process. We got to taste some of the Draught after it had finished the maturation process. It tasted so delicious that I sped through the rest of the tour, climbing floor upon floor to get to the very top where the tour ends and the free pints begin.

            So the Guinness Storehouse tour was also a success, and with my belly full of stout, Jeanne and I walked back to the Kinlay House where I ate a few more peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and took a nice long nap. Tonight will probably be a lazy night. We might go for another walk or watch a movie or something. We’ll be here for 3 more days, so I’ll do some work on this James Joyce stuff I need to do tomorrow, but I also want to go to the mountains sometime before I leave for Barcelona