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A BangShifter Abroad, Part 5: The Ferry From Hell, The Book Written By Monks, And Seven Minutes In Heaven With A Stone


A BangShifter Abroad, Part 5: The Ferry From Hell, The Book Written By Monks, And Seven Minutes In Heaven With A Stone

To read Part 1,Click Here

To read Part 2, Click Here

To read Part 3, Click Here

To read Part 4, Click Here

 

The next morning we boarded the bus and left Edinburgh, driving down to the ferry port of Cairnryan to catch a ride across the Irish Sea to Belfast. The weather had taken a rather nasty turn, but apparently the SteenaLine ferries are like the USPS: come rain, sleet or snow they will operate. I wondered, as I stared at the whitecaps, if Atlantic storms registered on the “do not sail” list. After twenty minutes of waiting, the Volvo/Plaxton was driven onto the deck and we all dispersed to areas of the ship. As everyone got themselves sorted out, the captain started his announcements. I wasn’t paying attention until I heard, “…and we’re expecting some rough seas out there today, so we recommend that you do not go onto the deck. If you must, be careful.” Now, to be fair, the whitecaps that I saw while waiting to board weren’t much, and as the ferry moved out of it’s berth and into the waters of the port, I wondered just how bad it could honestly be. To prove my point, I went out on deck. Sure, there was chop to the water, but nothing that was going to bother my morning.

I could not have been more wrong. Once the ferry cleared the port waters and got into the Irish Sea proper, all hell broke loose. That “little chop” turned into a normal day for an Alaskan crab fisherman, and within seconds I was green…not that cute springtime green, but Aunt Bertha’s 1973 Oldsmobile 98 “I’m gonna f**king hurl my guts out” green. I stepped out onto deck again, because if I’m gonna puke I might as well feed the fishes, and realized that I was, at certain moments, seeing parts of the boat that should be well underwater coming out into the open air before the nose went down for another round. Unable to vomit but worried that bad things would happen, I went inside and made my way to the bow of the ship for a look. That proved to be my undoing, as my nausea was amplified, heartburn started and a headache kicked in that would not quit. I made my way to the center of the ship, right where the food gallery was and where the rest of the family was camped out at, and laid down, riding out the roller coaster from Hades with absolutely no color left in my cheeks.

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If the skies had been threatening at Cairnryan, they were unabashedly unwelcoming in Belfast, where the only prominent feature that stood out in the precipitation and fog was the Harland and Wolff Gantry crane at the docks. The rain fell in torrents and did not seem to let up a bit. Leaving the ferry, we made our way to the Titanic Museum, which is situated at the site where the Titanic, Olympic and Britannic sister ships were built. The museum stands the exact height the Titanic stood from water to the top of the main deck, and is an imposing sight. Equally imposing behind the building are four rows of steel I-beams sticking up from the dock, outlining the two locations where the massive ships were built (Olympic and Britannic were built in the same pier). Going inside, you don’t get the romanticism of Titanic like you do in the states…instead it’s a tribute to the build and the connection that Belfast had to the creation and ultimate destruction of the ship. With the rain pouring outside, it was almost like tears on what was supposed to be a proud and momentous occasion for the city.

Leaving the museum, Pat offered to take us around a section of Belfast that isn’t on any normal tourist route: some of the areas around Dunmurry and Twinbrook that were most affected by The Troubles. Most people said yes, but I’m pretty certain that they didn’t know what they were asking for. When you drive down streets and see buildings with spiked iron fences and strands of concertina wire, when you see hundreds of murals that are in tribute to hunger strikers and to those who were jailed, martyr memorials, bonfire pits…it brings a gritty side to the land most people assume is filled with clover, potatoes, Guinness and happy little leprechauns. Ireland still has its rough edges and it’s darker sides, and while some on the tour didn’t feel comfortable seeing that, I feel that it was an excellent detour and a living history lesson. We left Belfast and headed south to our overnight spot in Dun Lagoshire, near Dublin.

The next morning we took a tour of the city of Dublin. We drove through housing that is older than a majority of U.S. states, then stopped for a tour at Trinity College. Stephen, a history grad student, gave us a tour of the campus and it’s story, then we were cut loose to go find the Book of Kells, a priceless manuscript of Insular illumination creation that contains the four gospels of the New Testament. After Trinity, our next stop was one of the most anticipated ones on the itinerary: the Guinness Storehouse. We got the quick and dirty tour before everyone darted off to get their free pint of the liquid dinner…well, everyone but me, of course.

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We got cut loose that afternoon for some free time away from the tour, so naturally the wife and her mother went shopping, while I stood outside the door watching traffic and taking notes. After returning to the hotel later in the evening, we got back on the bus and headed to a canal, where a restaurant/barge that used to belong to Guinness was waiting in the rain for us. As we boarded we were greeted by Brian, an entertainer and singer who also did duty as the barge’s safety announcer: “If, fer some reason there is ah need to leave this vessel due to, say, ah fire…just follow me, ‘cause my arse will be the first one off’a this boat, ok?” As we ate, he sang, though he regretted asking for requests when a cheerful lady from Texas blurted out, “Sing us a Christmas song!” I stepped outside onto the deck to get some fresh air and almost got brained by a bridge…we later learned that instead of the usual full canal tour that we were floating between two locks because the canal was just about to crest into flood stage and that we would not fit under any of the other bridges on the route. As we floated to a docking, the rain finally ceased and we headed back to the hotel to rest up for the beginning of our drive around the island of Ireland.

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The next morning the sun had broken through. After breakfast and loadup we headed south towards the Irish midlands, with the majority of the bus’s occupants somewhere between comatose and just barely awake. After about an hour and a half the bus left the motorway and headed into the rolling fields of barley fields and sheep pastures. He pulled up to an absolutely gorgeous white farmhouse, and after squeezing the big Volvo-Plaxton through the driveway gates that could’ve given me fits in my 300C, we disembarked at the house of Robert Power. We were greeted with tea, homemade scones, and homemade blackberry and black currant jams. Once our mid-morning snack was over, we headed outside into the sun, where Power’s two working dogs were eager to show the crowd how easy herding about fifty sheep could be. Within a minute of hopping the fence, the two dogs rounded the herd up and had them trotting nicely in a formation towards the fenceline.

Back on the bus, we continued on to Blarney. The location of the castle ruins with the famous stone at the top, Blarney also has the Woolen Mills shopping center. I went one way while the rest of the family went the other. Being in castle ruins is a very ethereal experience. The stone is cold and slick to the touch yet details are still prominently visible, from the dog kennels to the staircases that were made for people with feet a third of the size of mine. Holding onto the rope that ran on the inside of the spiral staircase, I made my way to the top. Yes, I kissed the stone…Lord knows that with this job, eloquence is certainly needed and I certainly could use some. After I left the castle I headed into Woolen Mills for a bite to eat, then called it early, heading back to the bus. I talked with Pat for a couple of minutes about DeLorean’s plant in Dunmurray and though he was polite enough, I got the feeling that the subject was more a social taboo than anything. We left Woolen Mills and headed to Killarney, where my wife hoped to hear someone singing her favorite Christmas carol.

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The tour continued on, with a drive on the Ring of Kerry, which has now become a bucket-list drive road, a visit to Valencia Island and the Skellig museum, a visit to the Cliffs of Moher, Bunratty Castle (which hosted a medieval dinner replete with loads of mead) and a visit to the Clonmacnoise Monastic site, before we ended the trip in Dublin for a couple of days. A planned trip out to the Arin Islands went bust when the fog refused to lift, resulting in five hours on a train crossing the country for no damn reason, but in the grand scheme of things, it was worth doing. Would I rather have rented a car and done it myself? You bet your ass. But if you want to digest a country in a week, this was a pretty good way to do it.

Three countries down, many more to go.

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