Ireland with grandchildren

     It’s been awhile, and we are now back in the states. But we have a few stories left to tell and it’s time to catch up. This is a collaborative entry, with multiple authors. It is about a return visit for all of us to Ireland, the land of our ancestors. But for some this is a sixth visit; for others it is the first time since they were three (Jack) and seven months (Ellie). So the perspectives and insights will vary.

     We were treated to Irish weather throughout the trip. Periods of rain, interspersed with sunshine, and winds varying from refreshing breeze to hold-on-to-your-new-Irish-cap wind. We were only minutes from the Dublin airport when we were treated to a full rainbow. That’s a nice Irish welcome.

     We made our way to Cahir, County Tipperary, the site of a great castle and more importantly, some of Kate’s relatives. She got acquainted with cousin Claire, while the rest of us climbed ramparts and explored old rooms. According to Ellie, “it was really fun because there were lots of places to climb up on and we took some really cool pictures.”  

From there we spent a few minutes at the Rock of Cashel, famous as a gathering site of the kings of Ireland.  The weather was turning blustery again, and we had some miles to go for our hotel, so the visit was brief. Again, Ellie’s view: When we got into the castle it was not as much fun as the other one because, well, there was nothing to climb on and that was basically a highlight for us. Even the Rock of Cashel was not that big or exciting, it looked like just a piece of the building that had fallen.

Nevertheless it provided some good photo ops.

     We spent the night in Mallow; we were running out of energy and daylight. The next morning, we discovered it too had some appeal—another ruined castle. As told by Ellie:  On our way out we looked for another castle or ruins to explore since we had time.  We found this one castle in ruins and it was a free for all, we got to walk in, no one was there to pay.  There were lots of spots that you could climb up and get some good pictures. 

 

My brother and I climbed up to a window that was fairly high up and we decided, “hey, lets jump out of it”.   So, we did!  And it was really scary because it was not that high…but it was.  It was tall enough to be nerve-racking….but we made it and were just fine.  Then my mom decided to take some pictures of my brother and me.  We were by a ledge that was not too steep but it was still a ledge.  Of course my brother had to pretend to shove me off it, then he yanked me back at the last minute, which freaked me out! 

     The next day, some of us found the gift of gab. Others were not so limber or flexible to bend over and kiss the Blarney Stone. Blarney Castle retains some authenticity and charm despite all the tourist trappings. Ellie’s account:  We went up in the castle first and Lola stayed on the ground to take pictures of us.   

The spiral stairs were really, really, really tiny and I was just afraid that I would slip and start tumbling down!  So I had one hand on the rope and the other on the ground and was making sure my feet were in the right place.  Fun fact:  Most staircases were spiraled to the right and most people are right handed so that if intruders come the person on the highest step (looking down and defending the castle) could easily swing at the person coming up the steps.  The person that was attacking the castle and coming up the stairs would hit the center wall of the staircase as they swung so it was an advantage to the other person; which I thought was kind of cool. 

When we made it up to the top, it was nerve-racking and the wind was really, really bad so it made it that much more scary. There was just a big hole in the center of the castle and no roof, so we walked around the outside wall.   

There were beautiful views but it was really high up. We got in line to kiss the Blarney stone, which is supposed to give you the gift of gab. Jack went first because I was not going to go first! He sat down and there were bars underneath him and bars behind that he grabbed on to and bent back and kissed the stone.  It was my turn next, but of course because of my size I couldn’t reach the one bar when I was upside down.  So the guy had to help me lean back more so I could reach the bar.  I quickly kissed it because I looked down and saw what was holding me up and how far up I was from the ground—I freaked out and quickly came back up.  Then my mom kissed the stone and we took more pictures. 

We went down and met Lola and went to the poisonous and non-poisonous gardens.  In the poisonous garden there was one of the plants, a mandrake, from Harry Potter.  It’s the one where when you pull it up it starts screaming, I thought that was pretty cool.  There were also lots of great views from the garden.  We spent the whole day at Blarney; it was crazy how much there was to do there.  

     Another day, another castle. This time Ross Castle in Killarney. It has been in a process of restoration for about thirty years. What it has gained is a more complete condition and tour guides; what it has lost is the freedom to roam that was allowed a couple decades ago.

As Ellie saw it: This castle was not in ruins and they furnished it to look like a castle in the old days. You had to go with a tour guide through the castle and you could not take pictures.  Lola hung back and did not go with us because she has seen it before. It was kind of cool, but not my favorite because there was nothing to climb on and that was one of my favorite parts about the castles!  

The weather was even more blustery this day, but it offered a different sort of picturesqueness as the clouds came down over the mountains.

     At this point John had to leave to return to teaching in Oxford. The others moved on to Dingle.  For Jack, the highlight of the trip was traveling the Dingle Peninsula.  His view: We got to drive around the whole peninsula. The narrow road wound thru the hills so you could see all the landscapes. When we got to the ocean views, it was crazy! All you saw was ocean on one side and these huge hills on the other side.  

     We went to Inch Beach but did not stay long because of the weather, wet, cold and very windy, which blew the sand on to us. It would have been a cool beach if the weather had been better. I actually liked the weather. I liked the gray skies and rainy days, so I thought it was really pretty. 

     We visited the beehive huts. That was pretty amazing to see how long they had lasted. I could see why they would have chosen to settle there too, because of the view! During part of the drive you could see little islands off in the distance. I don’t know if you could visit them but it would be pretty cool. I think the view from there looking back at the tip of Ireland would have been amazing. 
 

Beehive huts

Gallarus Oratory

      There was a small town (really a group of houses) where there was a valley on one side, the ocean on another and then mountains on another, it was so cool to see. I think it was near the Ballyferriter cemetery and the Ceann Sibeal golf course. I have only seen a few things in my life where the view was that great of something natural. 

Jack concludes, I have a lot of personal connections with Dingle because this is where our family has settled before and there are still some there today. I had a connection with the place because it was part of my heritage. Dingle definitely had that affect on you where once you finished the drive you wanted to do the route again. It was an amazing place and I would really recommend it for anyone going to the south of Ireland, it is definitely worth your time. 

And Ellie has a story about Dingle: We wanted to go to the old O’Connor family house [in Ballyferriter] and see another house of a relative. We kept looking for it but could not find the golf course that was near the house.  Finally we went too far down a road, and we turned around.  Then my mom started driving on the wrong side of the road!  We came around a corner and a lady was in a car on the right side of the road.  The lady stared at us in shock and my mom frantically was trying to get around her because the lady was not moving.  Meanwhile my Lola started screaming, “there is the golf course, I see it, it is over there!”  So, my mom is saying “okay, okay’ in a frantic voice. After that episode, we turned the corner to find the golf course.  Then, after one phone call to papa and quite a few arguments, we finally made it to the O’Connor house and took some pictures.   

We also headed to a graveyard that Lola thought we would want to see.  It was kind of fun except for the fact that I think I stepped on a grave by accident because there was no headstone above it but just a big mound of grass and that freaked me out so I ran back to the car.

The final day was a visit to a last castle, Carrigfoyle, an ancestral home of the O’Connors on the River Shannon. 

 

Ellie: We got there and it was really cool but unfortunately we could not get inside because we were there at the wrong season.  There was a big hole in the middle of the castle, where it had been blown up by the attacking English, and there was part of a large stone fence surrounding the castle.  We climbed all over the stone wall and took pictures.  We could only look at the castle and could not see too much inside which was a big disappointment. We took lots of pictures there.  Then we started walking back and Jack was running around acting like a two year old and taking goofy pictures.  

 

York

      We spent last weekend in York, and once again wished we had taken more time. In many guide books and websites, it is listed as a day trip from London. Technically it is with fast trains and a reduced itinerary, but it sure doesn’t do the city and environs justice.

The Shambles 

      The walls around the medieval town are mostly intact, the narrow street in the city centre (the Shambles) are still cobblestone in many places, the parks along the river are green and vibrant, the pubs snug and lively, and the York Minster and Cathedral dominates the skyline. (By the way, “minster” is a missionary, teaching church—this one was built upon a Roman site to convert the heathens of the north.)

      We walked most of the walls, peeking out occasionally at some well-kept gardens, a couple of small wedding receptions, a few noisy and happy beer gardens in the back of pubs, and many, many daffodils. We came down from the heights (brave Kate) to walk along the riverside, which was filled with young adults, ostensibly watching an FA Cup semi-final, but really simply enjoying beautiful weather.

      The York Minister claims to be the largest medieval cathedral in northern Europe and to have more medieval stained glass than the rest of England. The key word is medieval in both cases, but still the place is huge. I’m not looking up cubic footage, but it sure felt like the biggest church we’ve seen. Having scaled the town walls, we opted not to climb the 275steps to the top of the church tower.  The current building is at least the fourth on the site--one had burnt down, another destroyed by Normans, and a third destroyed by Vikings and Danes.  The construction of this one began about 1250; the East and West windows are mammoth and date from the 14^th Century.  The Reformation and Civil War did some damage on this one—lots of headless saints—but at least it survived. Well, not entirely, in the 19^th century there were two fires, one by arson and another by accident. In 1984 there was another fire started by lightening (no comment). Roughly in the middle of the church is a choir screen adorned by sculptures of the seven kings who can claim credit for supporting the church, from William the Conqueror to Henry VI (the latter also started the cathedral at Kings College, Cambridge). Attached to the church is an octagonal chapter house, which also seemed huge, partly because it doesn’t have a center column like most of the others we’ve seen.

from the city walls

note the dragon on the left wall

       We had a good tour with Wendy, a local woman with a keen sense of humor. She enjoyed pointing out the slight irreverences and quirks of the place—the statue with two right feet, the laughing and profane gargoyle-like carvings above where the Dean sits in the chapter house, the optical allusion of a bizarre dragon statue high on the nave wall.  She also showed us how they are restoring the stained glass in the north window, removing the 19^th century “improvements” and correcting the errors from when the windows were put back into place after World War 2—as with other great cathedrals in England, the stained glass had been removed to preserve them during the Nazi bombings of Britain. 

      After the tour we walked over to the York Museum and Gardens. The Museum had closed--no Richard III experience for us this day, but the gardens along the Ouse River were gorgeous. The museum is relatively late (1830) for York, but next to is the ruined St Mary's Abbey--Henry VIII ransacked the Abbeys to promulgate his new religion (and cover the expense of going through six wives). There are also remnants of Roman walls and towers in the park.

 We stayed in a family-owned small inn—they called it a B&B, and we did have a fine English breakfast. It also had a cozy whiskey bar in the front. And as this is the closest we will get to Scotland on this trip, we tried a few special malt whiskeys. Yum. We also spent the weekend trying local ales. A New York Times article in 2014  listed Yorkshire as one of fifty top destinations in the world--because of its famous local beer. There are 131 distinct breweries in the shire, and we heard there were over 300 pubs in York. I said at the start, we didn’t have enough time.

      The next day, we visited Castle Howard, about fifteen miles north of York. It is listed as one of the top ten great estates in Britain, a part of the treasure houses tour, and the location of numerous movies and TV shows, most notably Brideshead Revisited (twice).  I plan—foolish mortal—on writing about the great homes and gardens we’ve visited. Blenheim and Castle Howard, alone, each deserve an entry because of their history, architecture, and gardens, but then I am looking forward to offering some American views on the English aristocracy and their piles over the years (see past Warwick entry for a start)

Preview of coming attractions:

Cambridge

      We’ve been busy. I finished my class, we had family visits, and a trip to Ireland. Now it’s time to catch up with this blog. We’ll post a short entry now, while working on the Ireland trip and London with grandkids. Our time is growing short. Two weeks from today we will be back home in Virginia.

     This past Sunday was “The Boat Race,” 8-person skulls from Cambridge and Oxford racing on the Thames in front of thousands. Can’t quite decide on the American equivalent—clearly more than anything Yale vs Harvard, or Army vs Navy, yet more clearly amateur than American collegiate big time sports. Still, it is a very big deal, broadcast on BBC and watched across the country.

not the Boat Race; punting on the Cam

     Oxford won for the third year in a row, and four out of the last five. It was an historic event since, for the first time, the women’s crews competed on the same day as the men. Oxford won both. It was time for us to don our Oxford Blues and take a day trip to Cambridge. The town and the University are smaller than Oxford. While a day trip cannot due it justice, we took a two-hour walking tour, visited colleges and cathedrals, ate and drank at a historic carriage-stop pub, oh, and window-shopped.

Cambridge Senate and St Mary's Church

     From an American perspective, the two great Universities look a lot alike. Cambridge started when a small group of pious students fled the 1209 riots in Oxford, and a century later the Pope recognized it as a studium generale.  The growth of both universities ran roughly parallel from the late middle ages to present day. Now, Cambridge has thirty-one distinct colleges; Oxford has thirty-five. One doesn’t spend much time in Oxford without hearing, and hearing again, about the twenty-five Prime Ministers who graduated from Oxford (and the leading candidates in next months election are both Oxford men); while in Cambridge, we heard, and heard repeatedly of the 60-plus Nobel prize winners from Cambridge. One more distinction: During the Civil War of the 17^th Century, the king lived in Oxford, while the puritans, led by Oliver Cromwell, who attended Cambridge for a year, encamped in Cambridge.

     Kings College is the big show in town. The King in this case is Henry VI, but he didn’t get very far into his creation before he was deposed and the War of the Roses ensued. It wasn’t until the Tudors claimed the throne and wanting some legitimacy and peace, appropriated the design and work of the previous founder. The college started as a place for poor boys of merit, and it still is known for its appeal to a range of economic classes. The grounds dominate King’s Parade, one of the main streets in town (“get your selfie sticks here”), with a huge imposing gate, and an even huger and more imposing cathedral.  The cathedral is rich in history, and unlike many other churches managed to remain relatively unscathed from the puritan rampages of the Civil War.

Great Courtyard and Chapel (right)

     Pembroke is the third oldest college, and has an illustrious history. The College was founded in 1347 by a Frenchwoman, Lady Marie de Valence, trying to bring some peace and calm to the war between France and England (now that’s a challenge—it’s the 100-year war). Pembroke’s list of graduates can match any. There is a fine statue of William Pitt, who as Prime Minister (Cambridge did graduate some) led mad George III and England to recover from the grievous loss of the American Colonies and defeat Napoleon.

     Interestingly, two of the first three colleges at Cambridge were supported initially by woman and a number of others (e.g., Queens College) were created by women over the years. The first college for women was in the late 19^th century, but the Cambridge fellows overwhelmingly voted against women receiving actual degrees; that didn’t happen until 1948. There are still a couple of women-only colleges.

     Trinity College is the wealthiest of the colleges at Cambridge, and fittingly it is the sister college of Christ Church at Oxford. It was founded by Henry VIII, and funded by the money gained by the dissolution of the monasteries. The ancient wooden entrance gate is a must-see tourist spot for the statue of Henry VIII (no, I’m not obsessed with the guy, the English are). In place of his scepter is a wooden chair leg, probably first placed there by an undergraduate scaling the façade. It has become tradition, and when the wood rots it is replaced by another chair leg. Another noteworthy feature of the Trinity entrance is an apple tree grown from the seeds of the apple tree that dropped one on Newton—a wonderful image of how steeped this place is in history and tradition. Unfortunately, the courtyard wasn't open while we were there[ it is the largest and among the most beautiful of the colleges.

A descendent of Newton's apple

     There is more story here, but not enough pictures to with it. One final note: our impression is that Cambridge is more old school (despite its standing in the high tech community and its very modern science campus), with the college porters in their bowlers and shops catering to traditional ladies and gentlemen (there might be more tweed here than all of Scotland).

Spring Break in Tuscany

Flying back to England after five days in Tuscany, my first thoughts about how to describe this adventure are of time and space. If the past couple months have been a lesson in the presence of the past—weekly doses of palaces, castles, colleges, and museums that celebrate times before the U.S. was a country—the last five days have been a master class in an even earlier time. Consistently we were walking streets and visiting buildings that predated Columbus finding America. What was considered old in England is likely a Renaissance remodeling job of a Roman or even Etruscan building here in Tuscany. A church near where we stayed describes a 1604 painting as modern, and I suppose it was compared to the medieval frescoes of a couple hundred years earlier painted on the adjoining walls.

Tuscany is a very distinctive space, made all the more clearly distinctive when driving from the flat farm lands near Rome. From artichoke plants to huge rosemary bushes, to olive groves, to hillsides of vines, Tuscany’s rolling hills and agricultural setting is also very much a cultural one. The hill towns make clear why an Italian “nation” has always been such a challenge. While they share an agriculture, each town stands on its own with distinct pasts and presents. Sienna and Firenze (I have to find out why the English—and Americans—use the name Florence) were the big kids in the neighborhood and a number of other town’s fortunes were dependent upon them, but others carved (literally) their own place.  I suppose one could say something similar about certain regions of the U.S. and elsewhere, but it is striking here.

            We stayed half way between Florence and Sienna in a modest not-hill town, Tavarnelle Val di Pesa, at an old house converted into seven apartments. Actually we were in the converted barn. The views outside our place were spectacular. We took dozens of landscape pictures during our time in Tuscany, but it will take a better camera (and photographer) to capture the scene and atmosphere.

        The first hill town we visited was Sienna, the widely acknowledged best of the bunch. The piazza and duomo (cathedral) are justly famous—really beautiful buildings—and a nice essay could be written comparing this setting with Brugge.  

"PiazzadelCampoSiena" by Massimo Catarinella -

where's the car?

The narrow, medieval streets are a maze, and that was unfortunately literally true for us, as we were completely lost when we left the city center and headed for our car, which we had so confidently parked near a school whose name we didn’t write down and of course forgot. (That 50-word sentence is an attempt to capture our meandering ways.) We couldn’t ask anyone how to get to our car, because we didn’t know where it was. As we walked down one narrow lane after another, we would remember a window or door or sign and feel momentary elation until we realized we had (or had not) since taken a turn that put us in unknown alley. The weather wasn’t awful, but it was drizzling, and by the time we did find the car, we were miserably wet.

        We learned our lessons on a trip to San Gimignano and Volterra. We wrote down in detail our starting places and took pictures of the parking space with what we thought were distinctive backgrounds. That the towns were considerably smaller, with generally straight (if still narrow) streets, helped considerably. Both of these hill towns have wonderful settings. San Gimignano is distinctive because of its fourteen towers (once upon a time there were seventy). They dominate the town from afar and within the walls. The piazza has a medieval well in its center and two gelato shops along the side (one with a line of American school kids, the other with Italians school kids, but we still managed to secure a cone and cup of the rich treat).

well in the piazza, with two of the towers

 

The duomo’s walls are covered with magnificent 14^th century frescos telling Bible stories—we were impressed with how much of our Catholic schooling we could recall in recognizing the tales. The details of the faces and the clothes are so remarkable given that the artist was working with wet plaster and had to finish the work before it hardened. It is also remarkable how preserved this art is six hundred years later. 

One chapel in the duomo is devoted to Saint Fina, the saint of gillyflowers, who was grievously ill and paralyzed at age ten, and for the next five years lay on a wooden plank (legend is that she fused to the wood) until Saint Gregory the Great appeared in a vision and announced she would die in three months on his feast day, March 12th. His prophesy came true, and when the townspeople removed her body from the plank the church bells rang out on their own and gillyflowers—known as Saint Fina’s violets—burst into bloom on the plank. It became a shrine, and the sick who visited it were cured.

       No point in trying to make a clever or even smooth transition from that story. The next hill town, Volterra, we approached on a road that wound across the hills so that we saw it from afar on three sides before reaching it.  Outside the medieval walls are ruins of a Roman amphitheater. Nearby, part of the walls and fortress are a state prison. It was a weird juxtaposition; we wondered what conditions were like inside the prison. At least they probably aren’t waiting to meet with lions or bears on stage.

The town has an Etruscan museum that honors its pre-Roman past; a Basilica that is probably the earliest church we will ever see, a peaceful walled park, and a piazza with a palace. We thoroughly enjoyed this place. It just didn’t have any stories to top the previous one.

Approaching Volterra

medieval basilica

         Firenze is just about the complete opposite of the hill towns. It is a massive modern city in the valley along the Arno. We were stuck in traffic, surrounded by a swarm of motorcycles and scooters. As city workers blocked traffic to cut down some shoes on a wire across the street, they were met with a cacophony of horns and gestures. What a show for us tourists! But Florence does share an early Renaissance past with its region, and the major sites there are almost unbelievably major.  Dominating them all, is the massive duomo with its Brunelleschi dome (largest brick dome ever) and Giotto’s bell tower next to it.

 

It is awe inspiring—as was its intention. Interestingly to us, the wall paintings and sculpture inside the cathedral were not as remarkable as many other churches in Tuscany. But the art on the dome, which gave us instant headaches as we strained to view it, is magnificent. I would love to lie on the floor and look up, but I’d be quickly trampled—and this is the off season for tourists. Probably the second biggest attraction is the Market, with its leather goods and many tourist items (don’t worry we aren’t coming home with plastic bell towers for you). The actual Mercato Centrale is filled with food stalls celebrating the modern abundance of this area (and the rest of the world). We stopped for slices of pizza and glasses of chianti—when in Florence…

Speaking of food (now this is a transition),we learned how to make pasta in various forms from Vilma of Pasta Fresca in our town. I admit to some skepticism at first, but was completely won over by Vilma’s style, energy, and good humor; she was a perfect match for Kate. We made three kinds of ravioli as well spaghetti, farfalle (bowties) and penne. The recipes and techniques had been handed down from grandmother to mother to our teacher, who had been running the pasta shop for twenty-two years. We ate our hard work for lunch, and it was delicious with a bottle of chianti and Vilma’s sauce. We currently have great determination to put our lesson to use—beware if we stick to our resolution!

In the midst of all this ancient settings and traditions, we went to a very modern winery for a tour and tasting. The Antinori family has been making wine since the 12^th Century, and it is clear they plan hundreds of years more, given the massive, futuristic facility they opened in 2011.   The vats are huge and the caves have row upon row of barrels. Antinori has become a very large enterprise with multiple sites and various wines, but this shrine is mostly devoted to chianti. 

 

We visited other towns and sites, but I’ve run out of stories and leave you with some more pictures and captions:

	Carousel in Florence piazza
Butcher shop in Greve in Chiani--his brothers are all hanging from the ceiling inside
Rosemary Bush & Olive Tree	Olive Jars at Antinori Winery

            A final note to travellers: Our Alitalia flight home was cross listed with Etihad (UAE) Airways so beware when booking--no Chianti or Peroni on the way to London. On the other hand at least it flew, not like the hundreds of other flights cancelled because of a strike.