Milos

Our trips tend to develop kind of organically.

Over the past months we had been trying to figure out where to spend some relaxing time in Europe before visiting Anthea’s friends and family in Ireland.

We are both used to relaxing on warm tropical beaches in Southeast Asia.  It’s cheaper out there than North America or Europe, the weather is nice, and the water’s nice and warm.

We had kicked around the idea of Greece, but neither of us knew much about it. We knew they have been having economic problems and the Syrian refugee crisis has been especially rough this year. We knew Greeks could use the business, but could we really feel ok having a vacation in the midst of such tragedy?

I consulted with some friends who knew more than I did about the political climate and everyone said, “Go!”. It will be fine, and they really need visitors.

But we still didn’t know how to choose a destination. There are well known islands like Santorini, but we generally don’t enjoy destinations with crowds of tourists.

We heard good reviews of Naxos and Paxos, but it wasn’t clear from looking at the web what the atmosphere was really like there.

It can also be kind of tough to do research online because Greece still uses the Greek alphabet, so there is often no universal way to spell words using the English alphabet. Frequently there are three or more common spellings of the same word or place name.

Fortunately, just when we really needed some guidance, Anthea met a Greek man who seemed to have similar sensibilities to ours. He suggested we go to Milos, a little known quiet island in the Aegean Sea southeast of the mainland.

We started looking for information but, as usual, there wasn’t much. We learned that, although the island has an airport, there are only a couple of very small planes that fly there every day - maybe not even every day. There is ferry service from Athens, but it’s a long slow ride in most cases.

This had all the makings of a nice quiet place.

We did some research and booked a little boutique hotel called Kapetan Tasos in the small fishing town of Pollonia that is known for its tasty seafood restaurants. Then we just smiled and crossed our fingers.

As we took the short thirty minute flight from Athens, we both looked down over the desert-like landscape and wondered if we had made a mistake. We had intentionally chosen this more arid environment, mostly void of green vegetation, over the southern coast of Italy, because we imagined it would be more relaxed. But looking at the beaches from above, it seemed like the sun was bright and hot and there wasn’t much shade to be seen.

We landed at the tiny airstrip and the airplane pulled right up to the door of the single small building. We ambled off into the empty terminal, picked up our bags and approached one of the three taxis waiting outside.

The very laid back and big-boned woman taxi driver knew our hotel and brought us straight there for a flat fee. Along the way, we were mostly alone on the road. There are only a few roads on the island, and most of the time they are empty except for the occasional car or tourist on a rented motorbike.

At the hotel we were met with an empty reception. Apparently they close for the afternoon, but within a few minutes the friendly hostess/manager arrived, apologized for our wait and brought us directly to our room without any check in formalities. She was more concerned that we relax and freshen up. With her limited English, she assured us we could take care of all that later.

Our room was lovely, comfortable, and stylish. We had a view from our patio to the deep blue Aegean Sea about a hundred yards away. There was a quiet beach there. We could have probably stayed in Pollonia the whole time we were there. The town itself is comfortable and charming (here is some arial footage). But we wanted to explore the island a bit.

Over the next few days, we rented a motorbike and followed a tourist map to several suggested beach locations.

Each stop had slightly different feel.

Firiplaka Beach was popular. It had a cool little beach bar playing lounge music and some shady thatch beach umbrellas dotting the long sandy beach with warm shallow water.

Firopotamos Beach was a small pebbly beach shared with about ten one-room fisherman shacks that seemed to have been upgraded to cool little vacation homes. Each was built above a tiny garage door right on the water to store a small boat.

Sarakiniko Beach looked like a different world. It was a system of what seemed like white sand dunes that have petrified into powdery contoured cliffs. There was a camera crew there filming a low-budget reality show called Global Games. Apparently there had been some kind of competition there earlier that day and they were having their award ceremony. It was certainly one of the more picturesque places on the island.

Aghia Kiriaki Beach was on one of the furthest reaches you can reach by paved road. There are other more remote beaches, but you need an easily available all-terrain vehicle to reach those. Because of the longer distance there were hardly any people on this long lonely beach, and so folks seemed to feel a bit more comfortable shedding a few more clothes.

Even though we had been concerned about the shade situation, every beach always had some kind of shade - either from a small shady desert tree or from a local who was willing to rent you a shaded chair for a few Euro and sell you some refreshing drinks to boot.

There are something like seventy beaches on the island. We only made a small dent in the number we could have have visited had we been more ambitious.

There are a few small towns we passed through from place to place. I wasn’t expecting much from the towns, but some of them were quite cool. All of them adhered to the stereotypical greek island architecture with their white stucco and blue window panes.

On the way to visit Klima, the ancient Greek town ruin with an ancient theatre where the Venus de Milo was discovered, we passed through Trypiti, a miniature town hanging off the side of a tall cliffside above the sea. The adorable town was a series of winding cobble stone roads and little cafes with tables overlooking the water. 

Adamantas is the main ferry port for the island. It has lots of tiny shops and restaurants for tourists. It is also home to a hot springs and thermal bath spa once mentioned by Hippocrates in one his medical texts. We had to check it out. I never miss an opportunity to visit local hot springs. The one woman who ran it was a little bit peculiar, but we definitely came out relaxed and refreshed after some steam rooms, a water massage, and the warm mineral baths heated by the volcanic island innards.

We mostly ate meals in Pollonia. Neither of us was too sure what to expect from small town greek restaurants, but we were never disappointed. Judging by the busy fishing boats and the daily specials, the seafood was clearly very fresh. They seemed to specialize in a local flavor of delicious fish soup and we also saw some locally caught squid and octopus specials. But there was also a wealth of other varieties of fish, muscles, and grilled shrimp.

The suggestion with most meals was to start with bread and some kind of spread like tzatziki, hummus, or fava bean mash. Every restaurant also seemed to provide cheap carafes of local wine.

By the end of our trip, it became clear that, at least here on the island (but maybe in all of Greece), it is customary to bring you more than you ordered.

Every time we felt full and satisfied and asked for our bill, they would bring something else to eat or drink first. Sometimes it would be a digestif drink. Sometimes it would be some cold sweet yogurt with fruit. Sometimes it would be a pastry. But there was always something - without fail.

The generosity did not end with food though. The friendliness and hospitality consistently went above and beyond our expectations at every step. It also didn’t seem like obsequious pandering to tourists. It seemed to be cultural. They are just nice.

When I rode my motorbike to the hotel to pick up our backpacks, before I could park the bike, the woman at the desk ran up the stairs smiling and carrying my pack.

The guys who rented us our motorbike offered to give us a ride to the ferry port all the way across the island so we didn’t have to take a taxi. Our driver wouldn’t accept any money or any tip after the ride. He just laughed and said, “No, no! You are good people! But no!”

Milos was just the kind of easy going experience we were hoping for and satisfied all of our needs for the week. It also gave us our first taste of Greek culture which left a very warm impression with us both.

Rome

As a kid in school I never cared that much about history.

It was a subject that, in my mind, mainly just required a lot of rote memorization of facts and dates. Who really cares what happened a long time ago anyway?

Maybe my attitude was partially due to the fact that I grew up in California, a place where the oldest things you'll see are from the late seventeen hundreds at best.

As an adult I've become much more interested in history. Each time I travel to a new country, it sparks an interest in learning more about the place and how it came to be the way it is.

When Anthea and I decided to visit Rome this year, the decision was influenced more by the fact that she used to live there and knew some people, she speaks some Italian, and loves the city - than by any particular aspect of Rome itself.

Until we got here, it was just another interesting stop on our summer trip. I wasn't even really giving much thought to the must-see sights on offer in Rome such as The Vatican and The Colosseum.

At first I was more interested in the people and the food.  The only things I had on my personal to-do list for the four days we had there were some restaurant tips we had gathered from a culinary TV show.

But after our first breakfast, a traditional quick stop for pastry and cappuccino, Anthea suggested we go check out the ancient ruins.

At first I felt uneasy about the throngs of tourists and touts lining the area around the Colosseum and Forum - and I wasn't thrilled about standing in line to get in.  But once inside The Forum, my historic interest began to pique. Reading plaques scattered around the Forum whet my appetite, and eventually led me on a beeline for the Palatine Hill museum.

There it began to sink in just how old this place actually is, and how much of human society began here.  In fact, the very place I was standing was the etymological root of the word palace. In other words, this was the first one.

The museum's history worked backward even from the empire, republic, and monarchy days further into pre-history - before there was even written language to record it - arguably up to 11,000 years before any of the 600 BC ruins we could plainly see.

Ok. This city is far older than I thought.

Now as we walked through the main part of town, one by one, another Rome-originated food item would register with me mentally.  Roma tomatoes, Romano cheese, Romaine lettuce, Romanesco. Right, right.

As you walk around the central part of the city, normal life is happening everywhere. There are apartment buildings and offices, and people going about their day. But around every corner there seems to be something very very old - like an old temple or theatre. Something that, if it were any other place, would be the central historic monument.  But here in Rome, they are scattered all over town.

The one sight that really humbled me the most was The Pantheon.  It would have been your run of the mill nice old building with a giant ornate dome. It had the impressive feel of a much more modern building - only this one was built in 128 AD. Normally buildings this old are ruins so it's tough to get a feel for what they were like originally.

All I could think while looking around the impressive interior was, "They could do this back then?" Clearly my understanding of what was possible was flat wrong.

The whole experience re-sparked my interest in ancient civilization and architecture.

Returning to modern times, we continued our food tour over the next few days.

We ate delicious modern takes on pizza at Bonci and Emma pizzerias. We stumbled upon a charming place called Taverna de Mercanti while wandering the medieval alleyways near the Tibor river. There we tried the cacio e pepe, a deliciously simple Roman pasta dish.  We ventured out to the Pigneto neighborhood so I could get my hands on some quality porchetta, which is basically a lovely warm pile of sliced roasted pork.

But the most authentic evening of our stay was a dinner we had with four of Anthea's Roman friends she knew from the year she lived in Rome back in the 90's.

Sometimes when I travel to a new place, I go there with preconceived notions in my mind of how it will be - sometimes placed there from images from movies and television. Normally, those stereotypes give way to the reality of a place and I end up with new understanding and brand new stereotypes.

But not this evening. There was one moment while eating with Anthea's friends at an outdoor table where I felt like I was sitting on the set of a Hollywood movie about Italy.

Four of us sat at an outdoor table at Maccheroni, a small restaurant in a narrow cobble stone alley and waited for a few others to join. Apparently it's normal to be somewhat late for social occasions, and while we waited, one of the locals took the lead and ordered wine and antipasti - an abundance of cured meats, a variety of cheese, and warm bread.

Italian nightlife meandered by our table - little motorbikes and tiny cars squeezed by; a Roman priest in a grey suit and white collar; then an actual accordion player walked up playing music from The Godfather as the full moon peeked over one of the neighboring ivy covered buildings.  Then all four of the local Romans ordered cacio e pepe as their entrée.

I had a moment where I had to stop and blink hard and make sure I was really sitting there and this was really happening. I laughed to myself, pointed it all out to Anthea, and enjoyed the moment.

Mawlamyine

Hpa-An was an exceedingly pleasant visit. But I was excited to get to Dawei and start chilling out at the beach for a more extended, relaxed stay.

But it turns out the transportation that direction was not super easy. We wanted to take a boat down the river to Mawlamyine (pronounced MALL-uh-mee-aiyne). There is a bus that heads that way, but the boat ride sounded more scenic and comfortable.  We had to check in the previous night with the local backpacker hostel to see if the boat would be here today. Apparently it's availability depends on sufficient demand. 

They gave us the good news that the boat would indeed float up at noon and would take us the four hour journey to Mawlamyine.

I had pictured a larger river boat.  But it turned out to be nothing more than an oversized longtail with a canopy over some plastic chairs.

The trip was indeed scenic and relaxing but there wasn't much to see except a few men farming along the river banks. The river was calm and slow moving. Farm kids waved excitedly as we passed by.

After awhile we saw signs of civilization. The river widened further and, off in the distance, a long bridge led our eyes to a small city.

We didn't dock at a pier. The water washed up to the end of a city street, and we stepped out into the shallow water.

This town was far more bustling and less charming than Hpa-An. It was kind of a culture shock moment. We had considered staying here an extra day to see some sights, but on the taxi ride to the hostel we had reserved, we both thought maybe we'd just keep moving.

A German girl we rode over with warned us that our hostel was meant to be really unpleasant, so when we saw our slightly more expensive second choice hotel, we hopped out of the taxi and crossed our fingers they would had a vacancy.

The OK Hotel was aptly named. The reasonably modern building stood at the end of a chaotic street market.  It had a tiny private room available and the boss lady seemed able to help us with our onward travel. The room was flourescent lit with ceiling-level windows open to the hallway but not the outside. It felt a bit like a college dorm room.

We had actually arranged a guesthouse in Dawei for tonight, but hadn't received a confirmation, and seeing as the sun was already setting, it didn't seem possible we could make it that far by this evening.

We asked the boss lady about the train to Dawei. We read that it was slow, but maybe more scenic than a bus, and was only recently available to foreigners. But she said that it would not actually get us all the way to Dawei and that it was terribly uncomfortable. We should take a bus. But the next bus didn't leave for twenty four hours.

So we had our day in Mawlamyine anyway, like it or not. After sundown, the streets went vacant fast. The street that was packed with people and cars a couple hours earlier went dark and quiet.  Only a few pods of teenagers hung out in the shadows. We walked by one pod. I expected either to be ignored by the kids or get a friendly "Mingalaba". But instead, one shouted, "HI!" a bit sarcastically. I couldn't help but chuckle. Smart ass.

The recommended Indian restaurant down the road was run down and basic. The employees were friendly, but we were a little bit hesitant about cleanliness. The staff and room were especially dirty. But without any other clear choices in the area, we ordered and ate.  It felt risky but tasted fine.

Back at OK Hotel, we managed to get some sleep despite the fact that the hallway lights remained on all night, lighting up our room through the high windows.

In the morning, we headed off to find some sights. We walked up toward the local high ground temple to get some city views.

On our way up the road, a local man walking his bicycle started chatting us up. My urban defenses went up a bit. He seemed nice and asked us some small talk questions. But I figured he must want something, and would slowly roll out his pitch.

But I was wrong. He did continue walking and talking with us, but he just wanted to interact. He was truly just a friendly guy showing interest in the foreign visitors.

He is a carpenter named Kosin. He wore a loose fitting shirt with a pot leaf pattern on it.  As we walked up toward the temple, he pointed out the giant hundred year old prison we were walking past.  He pointed out some trees growing along the road and explained that cutting one down would get you a three year sentence in that very prison. I tried to understand what was so special about the trees, but it was lost in translation.

He asked us to have some tea with him to talk some more, and led us to a tea house across from the temple run by a friend of his.  He told us about his teenaged kids, and gave us a war history lesson involving the British and Japanese armies during World War II.  Apparently there was a major battle right where we were enjoying our tea.

We insisted on buying his drinks and snacks but he wouldn't have it.  He paid for ours in return for bending our ear.  Sweet man.

Anthea and I both softened on how we felt about the city after that experience. But we were still ready to go.

Our bus was scheduled to leave town just after sundown and would be a good twelve hour drive overnight before arriving in Dawei.

But schedules are merely loose guidelines it seems.  We sat in a parking lot with other ticket holders for several hours waiting for the bus to show up and then waited while the teen crew loaded up all kinds of cargo.

The television in the bus never stopped blaring all night at top volume.  It was impossible to sleep.  I suspect the teens may have blasted the volume so that they didn't fall asleep at the wheel.

In the middle of the night at one of the rest stops along the way, the bus wouldn't start back up.  Folks got out to push it started, which was no easy task given the uneven pot-holed road.

Rolling into Dawei after sunrise, Anthea and I agreed that would be our last overnight bus ride of the trip.

Hpa-An

Three years ago, when I first visted Myanmar, I really wanted to try and see the southern coastline. It's just north of the gorgeous west coast of Thailand but hasn't seen the same tremendous development. However, foreigners still weren't allowed to travel freely in that part of the country yet.

This year, two factors pointed me back in that direction. First, the restrictions were recently lifted in the South. And second, Anthea wanted to visit Myanmar while she's still local to Southeast Asia. So it made a good rendezvous point and an opportunity for a new adventure.

Myanmar now allows many countries to get an entry visa online which is infinitely more convenient than it use to be. The old style embassy-issued visa now allows entry over land. But the new visa still only allows entry through the Yangon airport for the time being so that's where our trip would start.

Shwedagon Pagoda, Yangon

I was initially thinking of just flying straight to Dawei, but Anthea heard that Hpa-An was worth visiting. It's a small town just inland from Mawlamyine with some great limestone formations and caves to explore.  

We decided to make the first few days of our trip as comfortable as possible - ease into the challenge. We spent the first day with a friend of Anthea's who lives in Yangon teaching. The city seemed to have cleaned up a bit since my last visit.  It wasn't so different, but there were fewer broken parked cars, and a fair number of new buildings under construction. But Yangon wasn't really what we came to see.

So after a day of sight seeing and visiting, we hired a private driver to take us the first leg to Hpa-An. We'd have plenty of time to take buses, trains, and boats. Today we'd travel in style.

I wasn't expecting much in the way of luxury from our ride. The last time I was in Myanmar, most cars were just barely holding together, but this ride turned out to be first class. A nice, new comfortable Toyota with a friendly, polite driver. He showed up to our apartment right on time and whisked us off into the countryside.

There wasn't a ton to see along the highway. We had to drive a bit north from the capital before getting to the highway that headed south. There were a few small towns, but mostly just lots of grassy plains.  

After a few turns, it was clear that the driver wasn't entirely clear how to get to Hpa-An because he kept stopping to ask for directions, which turned out to be common practice everywhere we went in the country. Over the next couple of hours, we stopped-and-asked our entire way to the Hotel Angels Land, one of the cushier places to stay in Hpa-An at around $40 per night.

Two attendants opened the glass doors for us and several uniformed employees lined up behind the registration desk smiling and nodding at us as we checked in. They were adorable. And we were happy to be off the road.

They gave us a hand-drawn map of the surrounding area including the town itself and some points of interest we might venture out to.

Our experience in Hpa-An is the first time I can remember spending an extended period in a place where I was a tourist, but most of the people in the area were not used to seeing tourists.  There weren't very many people around who wanted to sell us gifts.. or take us on a tour.. or recruit us for their guesthouse. They were, by and large, not merely tolerant of our presence, but seemed sincerely happy to see us.

In return for a town with little tourism, we also got a town with little to offer in terms of the comforts of vacation, like nice restaurants or other entertainment.  But people there seemed happy and relatively comfortable in their day to day lives. Their charming town was beside a river and surrounded by beautiful scenery.

We found a local restaurant that served traditional Myanmar dishes that all came with a dozen little steel bowls filled with various appetizer dips that were meant to be mixed with a main dish and a plate of lettuce, cucumber, and green beans. It was a lot of mysterious new flavors to take in.  The whole spread cost about one dollar each.

On the way back to our hotel, we took a detour and got semi-lost in what turned out to be an exceedingly charming neighborhood.  The street was mostly dark, but the wooden homes had enough lights on to give a glimpse in to some of them which seemed warm and decorated with love. The block had that special vibe that everyone anywhere wants in a neighborhood. I wished my camera could capture the dimly lit scene, but there was no way. Good detour.

We arranged a motorbike for the following day so we could check out some of the sights from the hand drawn map.

The first stop on the map, a limestone tower topped by a Buddhist temple, turned out to be a real tourist attraction. There were tour buses, cars, and motorbikes and people walking around everywhere.  But no western tourists - only local tourists who had come in from surrounding areas. We stuck out like a sore thumb. I walked around with a permanent sheepish smile on my face because everyone looked directly at us as we walked by. If someone didn't notice us, their friend would whisper in their ear so they wouldn't miss seeing the odd foreigners.  Most of the time they smiled shyly and some would say "hello!" or "mingalaba!". Some would hold out their hands to shake.

It felt like we were Brad and Angelina trying to anonymously attend a public event to no avail.

Anthea was initially hesitant to put her camera in people's faces and take pictures without permission. But she soon discovered that people wanted to take pictures with us, and we could trade favors.  At one point things started to get out of hand as some teens were practically lining up to trade pictures with us. It started to snowball.  But it was flattering and sweet.  We felt so welcomed.

We got back on the road to see a couple more sights.  The cave that got the most enthusiastic review from the hotel staff was also the furthest ride.  But the map wasn't to scale.

After a long ride and some wrong turns, we realized we had no idea where it was. Oh right. This is Myanmar.  You have to ask. So we stopped and asked a couple of times. People were happy to help, but without any signs it still wasn't easy.

Out on the highway, teens would speed by waving and giving peace signs.  Some trucks held camouflage clad youth and sported blue and red Republic of Kawthoolei flags. It was hard to tell if this was just a fashionable way to cruise or a show of military resistance.  Both seemed equally likely, and not mutually exclusive.

We thought we were getting closer to the last cave, but weren't sure. We saw a building with a sign written in Burmese and a bunch of cars, so we headed up the driveway.

We were met by a parade of Buddhist monks driving a variety of random bullhorn-equipped jeeps and tractors. They seemed both confused and amused by our presence. One asked where we were going, and Anthea remembered the name of the cave, "Saddar!".

They motioned for us to follow them. So we joined the parade - between a couple of tractors.

They enthusiastically pointed us down a red dirt road just around the corner. Thanks monks!

The road led to one of the most fabulous landscapes I have ever seen. Our narrow dirt road split an expanse of green rice field, and led to a limestone mountain. We had to just stop, get off the bike, and stand there for a minute. Are we really here?

The road ended at another Buddhist temple with worn stone white elephants at the entrance.  The cave was adorned with a number of golden statues. Another place that had been painstakingly and lovingly adorned with creative spiritual artwork.

But then I saw a string of light bulbs lighting a path deeper into the cave. So we followed it. And kept following it. We had to leave our shoes at the entrance. And I began to wonder what the clammy mud under my bare feet was made of. Bat poop? Ack. But ok, let's keep on climbing through it.

After awhile we saw a brighter light. There's an exit. There's a nice lake surrounded by trees out there. And there are some row boats in the lake.

And they want to take us on a ride back to the other side. Oh this is cool.

They float us through another cave tunnel and out into the rice fields back toward our shoes.

And whistle us a tune along the way.

Nice work.

Ireland

My Irish friend, Anthea, was heading for a close friend’s wedding outside Dublin this summer. After our successful road trip in California, I knew we made great travel partners and I was excited to tag along with her to check out Ireland and spend some more time with her.

Anthea was keen to have me along and to show me around her country.  She was interested in seeing some places she had never been, and taking me to some of her favorites.

In addition to the wedding, Anthea wanted to take the opportunity to see some friends and family in various parts of the country. She whipped up a road trip that would take us from Dublin along the west and north coasts and into Northern Ireland. Even though Anthea doesn’t live in Ireland anymore, she still has a car there that her mom drives these days. So we’d have freedom to drive far and wide.

She met me at Dublin Airport in “Bobby”, her tiny Fiat subcompact.  It was morning when I arrived, and I was determined to stay up all day without taking a nap. I knew it was important to get on the clock properly so I wasn’t jet lagged for my whole trip.

The first thing I noticed about Dublin was the astonishing lack of high rise buildings.  Normally when I come to a new town, I’m surprised by how big it is.  Though its Ireland’s largest city by far, Dublin feels small, and almost suburban.

After a few errands, we took a drive into the local countryside and had some seafood and Guinness at Johnnie Fox's, a very charming pub in the hills popular with visitors, then stopped for a nice view at The Blue Light Pub to get a good view of Dublin from above.  The surrounding hills were lush and green, as expected, and we enjoyed a great view of most of the city.  I was surprised to see sailboats in the bay. I always think of the sea around these parts as being especially rough.

The River Liffey cuts Dublin in half and empties into Dublin Bay.  I’m told folks identify closely as being from either the north or south side of the river.  Anthea grew up on the south side of the city in Churchtown.  

Anthea gave me a couple of choices for cultural sites to see in the city.  I chose the Guinness Storehouse tour.  Since the 1700’s, Guinness beer has been made in the center of Dublin. Even though I don’t often drink it, it is one of the world’s most loved beers, so I was curious.  The factory area is the size of an entire neighborhood and it’s a charming place to walk around.  But as we neared the entrance, it sunk in that I was dragging Anthea on a tourist activity tantamount to Alcatraz in San Francisco.  It turns out that the tour doesn’t really show you actual operations of the plant.  It’s more like a museum celebrating the company.  But you do get a properly poured Guinness served to you at a penthouse bar that overlooks much of the city.  

From there we walked across the city center meeting her old friends along the way.  A good tactic for getting face time with friends during a short visit is to set a time and place and put out the word. Those who are really hot to see you won’t miss the opportunity.

We posted up at Grogans bar in the city center, and the friends streamed in.  It was super fun for me to be welcomed into what was clearly a hot spot in town and get to chat up Anthea's friends and other locals.  It was an unusually warm evening so we lounged outside in the lanes all night where a band was busking and entertaining the pint-guzzling masses.

After a couple days in Dublin, we headed for a music festival held at Charleville Castle in Tullamore, west of the city. The previous couple of days had been rainy there, so the ground was a muddy slop. Luckily I was able to borrow some wellies, the knee high rubber boots most locals keep on hand.  

We bopped around from big top tent, to backyard DJ party, to main stage, sampled all the local talent and met up with some more of Anthea’s local friends.  We were all impressed by one band called Meltybrains, an original, high energy, high concept band that reminded me a bit of Talking Heads and Arcade Fire.

Between performances, I got to meet some members of another local band called King Kong Company who were hanging out in their camper van.  They enjoyed indoctrinating me as an honorary member of their clan by showing me the proper way to sip their home brew cider from a giant glass jug - curling my pinky finger through the ring at the rim while resting the bottom of the jug on my elbow and lifting it into the air.  “You’re one of us now!”, they shouted.

I also got to taste another of their creations made out of a local swill called Buckfast that they named Commotion Lotion.  One of them rattled off a number of Buckfast recipes including one champagne cocktail called The Velvet Elvis.  It was neither tasty nor terrible, but they were a fun bunch.

My biggest accomplishment of the day, however, was refraining from letting any of my belongings ever touch the mushy ground.  I wouldn’t have access to a washing machine until I returned home over a week later. So keeping clean was a big win.

The next day we headed to Achill Island, a sleepy beach getaway town off the far west coast of Ireland.  The road to Tullamore had been a modern highway, but the proprietor of our B&B described the road ahead as “savage.”  I didn’t know what to make of that.

Indeed, I found the drive to be far more bumpy and curvy than I had expected on this trip.  Luckily, the diphenhydramine sleep aids I was using to combat jet lag also double as motion sickness pills. Otherwise I’d have been in a world of hurt.

On they way to the island we passed a large sign that read “An Ghaeltacht”, which indicates we were in Irish-speaking country. Now I felt a bit ignorant. I always thought that Gaelic was an ancient Irish language akin to Old English.  I didn’t know people actually still speak the language (they call Irish) in many parts of the country.  There are radio stations and newspapers that are completely in Irish.  All signs and government forms are written in both languages.  Kids are encouraged to learn it in school, but unless they live in one of these areas, they are likely to forget most of it.  I also noted that it doesn’t resemble English much at all.  Accents vary across the country but the Northern variant I heard on the radio reminded me more of Hebrew than anything else I could think of.

I wondered how long it has been since it was the main language, so I read up. It was in the late 1300's that locals were forced to assimilate and learn to speak English after invasion and settlement by the English over the previous hundred years or so. It seems like a matter of political history and luck that many languages we take for granted today are still widely spoken.

Anthea has a friend named Paddy living in Achill who we’d be staying with.  Our first mission was to find our way to his restaurant and hostel called Pure Magic.  The coast was wild and stunning. Horned sheep run wild everywhere, munching on the ubiquitous grass.  Herds will sometimes run through the middle of town on their way to some mysterious appointment.

Some of the locals still burn “turf”, a mixture of grass and mud that makes an inefficient but fragrant fuel for fireplaces, so the air has a sweet musky scent at times.  A few fishing boats scoot around the bay.  Every other car seems to have a surfboard or a bike affixed.  It feels like life hasn’t changed much out here for decades.

Achill is a destination for mainly Irish tourists, but it’s still only sparsely populated.  Houses dot the landscape, but mainly what’s out there is nature.  High green cliffs descend sharply into the Atlantic Ocean to a wide sandy white beach.

Beach life is leisurely.  Our choice of activities was eat, hike, walk the beach, or nap.  We sampled all of them equally.  I was also introduced to the “99”, a soft serve ice cream cone popular with Irish. Like San Franciscans, they will not hesitate to eat ice cream on a cold blustery day.  I’m normally not a big ice cream eater, but I gobbled down a huge cone like it was a contest.  It was delicious.

It turns out Pure Magic is quite popular and we hadn’t booked in, so our second choice, The Chalet, served up an array of locally-caught seafood.  The wild salmon was mouth watering and their house wine was quite good as well.

The next day we headed to the even more remote Keem Bay a little further up the coast.  The road ends there and it feels like the end of the earth.  A small beach with a surf shack surrounded by green rolling hills and nothing else but sheep.  No signs of civilization in sight. I like beaches, and this one was especially picturesque and charming.

But we couldn’t stay long.  Anthea had booked us a seaweed bath appointment in Strandhill near Sligo along the northern coast.  We had a little problem though.  We were relying on Google maps for directions everywhere on this road trip.  I had brought my car iPhone charger to keep us juiced up, but it turns out American cigarette lighter jacks are different than Irish ones.  So we were rationing battery power for the whole trip.  We made a couple of wrong turns along the way, but the back roads we ended up on were a highlight.  Tiny and gorgeous.  It only added to the adventure.

We arrived to the Voya spa in the nick of time to make our appointment.  The spa prepared us each our own personal bathtub and steam room.  The tubs were filled with warm water and natural strands of the abundant local seaweed.  I never had a bath like this before.  After a steam to open my pores, I slid in under the seaweed and rubbed it all over my skin.  It was surprisingly gelatinous.  It was a little strange at first but it did feel like it was somehow good for me.  It must be, right?  

After an hour of alternating between hot steams, cold showers, and more bathing, we emerged relaxed and walked a few steps to Shells Cafe next door that came highly recommended.  I had a “hot pot”, which I guess is just a general term for a hot bowl of something.  Their hot pot du jour was beans and chicken in a tasty broth.  It really hit the spot. Although our weather was still holding up reasonably well, I can imagine on a cold stormy day, a delicious hot pot like this would be a more than welcome sight.

The following day would be relatively leisurely.  A drive up the north coast of County Donegal. But a big storm had blown through the night before.  The radio reported severe widespread flooding and the clouds were still looming.  A coastal drive would be pointless if we couldn’t see anything.  But just as we came to the crossroad to make a decision, the sun came out and we headed for Slieve League Cliffs.   

The cliffs were majestic and relatively quiet of visitors.  It was a place to have a peaceful hike and gaze at the sea.  Anthea was grateful the weather had cleared.  She had never seen this part of the country before.

Our destination that night was Ramelton, where we had another B&B reservation at Frewin House, another welcome recommendation.  But this time, our luck with the map and battery had run out.  Our battery died before we arrived in town.  It was a delightfully charming little village, but a cursory drive around bore no obvious signs of our destination.  So we stopped at a local pub and got directions. The nice thing about small towns, is everyone knows where everything is. It was only a few doors down the road. But we may never have found it on our own.

The house and grounds were magical.  An iron gate off the road led down a gravel path to a large stone house surrounded by lush greenery.  We buzzed and no one came, so we just walked in.  The old house was incredibly charming and full of art and knick knacks.  A formal dining room overlooking a back garden.  A library full of comfy couches and books.  After poking our heads around for awhile, the keeper emerged and seemed puzzled that the buzzer hadn’t worked.  Maybe the storm had broken something.

We settled in and then drove up to the nearby lake big enough to have a beach of its own, then ate at the Rathmullen House for dinner.  This would likely be our most upscale meal of the trip and we were both excited.  The grounds around the place were heart-melting.  It seemed like an obvious choice for weddings and the like.  I felt a little grubby for this place.  It seemed like it could easily be stuffy, but, like everyone else I’d cross paths with on this trip, the staff was exceptionally friendly and hospitable.  They greeted us and seated us on a couch in the lobby for a cocktail while they prepared our table.  They even took our order ahead of time, so our food would be ready soon after being seated.  Apparently we lucked out by walking in without a reservation.  It’s normally booked quite solid.

I was quite surprised to detect a party of several older Texan folks in the lobby with us.  They were the stereotypical loud Americans.  I thought to myself, “how did they find this place?”  I could never have found this place on my own.  I sipped my Irish coffee and tried to quiet my judgements, replacing them instead with thoughts of my aged Irish ribeye to come.

The food and service were lovely, of course.  It was a special place - the whole region, really.  There was nothing that was not beautiful the entire drive into and out of Donegal.  Mostly expansive, green ranches with grazing cattle or loose horses - short stone walls separating properties.  Of course, we were still beating the odds on weather.  Rain had only come overnight, and for a little bit of the drive.  

In the morning, on the way out of Donegal, we stopped at an ancient stone ring fort at the highest ground in the region.  When I saw the pictures online back home, it didn't seem all that exciting. Just a round ring of stone.  But when we arrived, I could imagine back to the period when it was built - around the time of Christ.  The most strategic location around, you could see 360 degrees in every direction.  If someone was invading your kingdom, you could see them from there.  I imagined the king being ushered into the fort, only twenty yards across, and guards hurling arrows and spears at invaders from the fifteen foot walls above.  One would not want to be backed into that type of (albeit round) corner.  It seemed like a hideaway of last resort.

The good weather again gave us a spectacular view of the countryside that may not look all that different than I imagine it did a thousand years ago.  Patches of green farmland, wild hills and river valley.  It was somber.  I appreciate that this landscape still exists, devoid of most traces of modern life as far as you can see.

The rest of the day would be ambitious.  We’d leave Donegal and head across the border into Northern Ireland.  Anthea had some sites in mind and then had some relatives she wanted to visit while we were in the area.  Her parents were both born in Northern Ireland and many aunts, uncles, and cousins live there.

It occurred to me that I didn’t know much about recent political developments in Northern Ireland. When I saw that we’d be heading over the border, I wondered if it was safe to travel there given the violence I grew up watching on television.  Referred to as “The Troubles”, the major problems are mostly over now.  There are no more bombings and no more armed guards at the border.  It’s safe now, but not entirely without division.  Historically Irish but now part of the United Kingdom, buildings in villages fly flags, some Irish and some British.  Ending in the late 1990’s, The Troubles are far from forgotten.

After some more stunning coastal driving, including the Giant’s Causeway world heritage site, we landed in Larne, a small town that may be best known as the closest point to Scotland to ferry across. After some visits to relations in Larne, we headed for Belfast.

The largest city in Northern Ireland, I had always imagined Belfast as kind of bleak or gritty.  But far from it, as we landed in the city center to the boutique Malmaison Hotel, my first impression was of a crisp, energetic city reminiscent of Portland, Oregon.

We met some more cousins out for drinks in the Cathedral Quarter, an up and coming neighborhood that feels a lot like the Mission District in San Francisco.  There has clearly been some recent investment in stylish new remodels of old buildings on par with London and New York.  I’m not sure how far it extends into the rest of the city.  But I did find myself wishing I had more time there to hang out for awhile.

But we were on a schedule.  The next day we’d head for a wedding, the main reason Anthea was in Ireland.  We zoomed down to an old estate in County Meath, which seemed to be setup specifically for occasions like this.  The party had the whole grounds to themselves.  

The catch was, I wasn’t exactly invited to the wedding.  So while the rest of the group ceremonied and dined, I got some much needed rest in our room.  I’d join them for drinks and craic in the bar later on, but for now I’d make myself scarce.  

My main logistical difficulty was food.  I had planned to just get some room service, but this wasn’t a hotel per se.  Their only food service was catered for wedding guests, and the estate was in the country, far from any restaurants or groceries. I’d have to drive somewhere.

But I never drove a right-side steering car before.  I’ve driven a motorbike on the left side of the road in Asia, but never drove a stick shift car.  This was another level.  But I was hungry.

I got behind the wheel and was immediately confused.  I felt like a teenager, awkward and uncertain. I made it to the main road and took a deep breath.  I didn’t want to go too far, because besides being awkward and unlicensed, I might get lost.  I didn’t have a map, nor did I know where town was.

Luckily I didn’t have to go too far before I saw a pub that advertised food.  I grabbed some fish and chips to go and felt lucky to get back to the estate without making a fatal mistake on the highway.  

I felt truly accomplished.

I slipped in to the party later on.  Dancing and socializing ensued.  I don’t always enjoy weddings. But this one was good fun.  A great group of people, good music in a nice setting.  It wasn’t the three day Irish wedding I’ve heard some people have, but I was glad to be there.

Our final day would be relaxing.  We booked another B&B in Howth on the north side of Dublin.  The King Citric is more known for its delicious fresh seafood restaurant than its guest rooms, but it is quite charming at the end of town overlooking the Irish Sea and the marina next door.  The keeper was nice enough to upgrade us to the penthouse suite with windows that opened over the water.

The seafood is fabulous and is largely caught in the neighboring sea.  The staff is folksy and friendly and proud of their offerings.  On a nice day, you can walk up the road and into the wild hillside and peek over into Dublin Bay for a full view of the south side.

It was a whirlwind tour.  But I was so grateful to see so much and meet so many great people from different regions and walks of life in such a short time.  The Irish folks I met along the way did not disappoint.  Their culture of fun and hospitality was exactly what I hoped to find.

I'm grateful for the opportunity to visit Ireland this way and pleased with myself for taking it. Anthea made the journey possible for me and did most of the planning.  I couldn’t have had this experience without her.

 

Thank you, my dear.