Ireland Day 4

Sunday, December 16, 2007

Update from yesterday, I was tired and forgot some details. We also went to Temple Bar, which is a district in Dublin similar to Bourbon Street in New Orleans. I suspect Gregg, Em, and I will go back another time sans parental supervision. I was also accosted by the cleanest and most well dressed homeless man I had ever met. Today we took a taxi to the DART (train station) to meet out bus tour on time. The bus tour was long but interesting and entertaining thanks to the stops and the funny little man driving the bus. Our first stop was Powerscourt House and Gardens, one of Ireland's treasurers, in the Wicklow Mountains. There was a Japanese style garden complete with wooden gazebo and bridges over a babbling brook and the typical Italian style found in most European castles. I picked up a few gifts in the gift shop for people stateside and then it was back onto the bus for stop two. Next, we arrived at the monastic settlement of Saint Kevin. Legend has it he lived to be 120 with his hermetic lifestyle and devotion. It's one of the best preserved monastic settlements in all of Ireland, situated serenely in a valley between two lakes. Very picturesque. It almost rekindled my interest in archaelogy, haha. We ate lunch at a nearby hotel where they made a great lamb and potato stew. Our third and final stop was a peat bog. Pretty quick walk across the peat and back into the bog because it was really cold and winding high up in the mountains. The summary makes the trip sound pretty short, but the destinations were pretty far from each other. At the train station coming home I was ambushed by another extremely well groomed and well dressed homeless man. They really catch you off guard with their appearance and politeness, not at all like in America, haha. Another thing I've noticed about the Irish is that the letter H is in every Gaelic word, but they don't pronounce it. This language quirk translates to English words as well. Thirty thousand becomes tirty tousand. Dad has a field day with that because the letter H is very pronounced (think h as in ha), but they never pronounce the letter in words. Dad walks around saying "there's no H-ech in Howth (our town name)" No doubt where I get my sense of humor from...