We went to Ceide Fields. According to Wikipedia it means "fields of the flat-topped hill." It is an archaeological site that is the most extensive Stone Age site in the world and contains the oldest known field systems in the world. Unfortunately we did not get to walk too much of these fields because of the weather. We also drove around, saw some gnarly cliffs and kind of just planned our next few days. Speaking of depressing from an earlier post, my friend was telling me how the cliffs were known for their suicides. Depressing! The day ended with TV watching and general relaxing.
Things I learned. Ireland, particularly in the North, the wetlands are covered in what is known as bog. I would say bog looks like black tar that has been solidified. But driving around, you don't see much of it because it is covered by fields. I would say they were the type of fields that on a beautiful day you would run through like in the movies. Bog is basically millions of years of deposited plant life compressed together. So what happens is that people dig it up, dry it out and use that to burn for fires. How greenly efficient is that? I thought that was pretty cool to help planet earth.
Side note from Kevin- I read your blog and found it quite entertaining, in fact I got my sister to read it too. The whole bog and turf cutting isn't eco-friendly at all, it's a fossil fuel that burns and emits emissions which isn't too good for the environment as far as I know...
There is also a musical bridge that we only stopped by once but drove by three times. Apparently when you roll a rock across the bridge it plays musical tunes. We found clips on youtube and I really wanted to try it. Next time right?
Anyway, on my third day in Ireland we went to the Cliffs of Moher. My friend Lyndsay had recommended them as she had spent a summer in Ireland. The selling point was that they were featured in the 6th Harry Potter movie and so I kind of had a general idea of what they looked like and I was like "I'm a little tired of museums, I can see some nature." Kevin never been to the Cliffs himself despite his university being not far arranged for us to go. From his house, we drove two hours to Galway which is kind of a young, college, beach town (a total party feel running through) and we caught a tour bus from Galway to the Cliffs. Before leaving the car, we were deciding which items to take or not take. With his jacket in hand, Kevin looks at the sky and says "it should be a nice day, I'm going to leave it here." and returns his windbreaker/rain jacket to the backseat of the car. Luckily I took the sweatshirt he let me borrow with us.
So my mistake. I was thinking that they might be more environmentally friendly since they weren't chopping down ton of trees for burning wood and were using other materials that were abundant but didn't serve any real purpose. Oops.
Along the way, the tour guide does his job and tell us about the area and the history and so on and between stories we listened to traditional Irish music. Kevin proceeds to tell me that the people in the south are more into the traditional music. Everyone he knew from I think Clare county except for one plays traditional Irish instruments. What are traditional Irish instruments you ask? Pipes, flutes, bodhrans and harps. So I said "Oh, I didn't know harps were traditionally Irish." Kevin stops, looks at me and asks me "Isn't your favorite beer Harp?" (Harp is an Irish beer by the way). And I respond with "well yeah." And he proceeds "The Guinness logo is a harp. How have you not noticed this before? You didn't see that there was a pattern?" And then I stopped and could only laugh. How did I not notice the blatant signs that harps are traditionally Irish? DUH! I laughed about it the entire duration of my trip because after that, I saw the harps EVERYWHERE. I could even get little harp earrings if I wanted to! But I think the reason I found it so funny was I felt like I was in the shoes of the other people that I'm usually with and often find myself asking them "how have you not noticed that before?" It was a very humbling moment that I shall forever appreciate.
Depending on the tour bus that you take you can either stop at some caves of a birds of prey area. We stopped at the Aillwee Caves. The Aillwee Caves are some of the oldest in Ireland but were only found quite recently when a dog ran into the caves and his owner ran after him. Apparently the caves were used by bears who would come in to hibernate because the only remains they found at this time were of bears. No human remains had been discovered. Our tour guide proceeds to tell us that Ireland does not have bears, they all died out on the island. And I leaned over to Kevin and said "I didn't know you didn't have bears" and his response was "I didn't know we EVER had bears." (There are also no squirrels in Ireland).
Correction from Kevin-And apparently we do have squirrels in Ireland, two types in fact! So that was news to me as I've never seen one here, although judging by Google they seem to be in other parts of the country. So I don't know if you want to alter the blog then or not, but thought I should fill you in on those two tiny things!
Finally we get to the Cliffs of Moher. It's a little rainy, more sprinkling and as we notice the weather Kevin says "I don't know why I didn't bring my jacket. Never trust Irish weather." And I appropriately gave him the sweatshirt he let me borrow since he was kind of nursing a cold and temperature wise I was ok. The cliffs are 8 kilometers long which is about 4 miles I believe. They are beautiful! However, the mood is a little dampened by signs saying "Need to talk? Call us at....-Samaritans." I can only assume it was to prevent suicides.
We walked the appropriately labeled paths with the railings since its Ireland everything was a little wet. If I had better balance, I would have walked along the cliffs that were off the protected path but with my bad balance and the muddy, slippery path, decided against it. Then as we decided to turn back, it started raining. Not the light "oh its sprinkling, it might start to rain" that I had been in the last few days but the rain came down in big, cold raindrops and we walked to jog back to the gift shop or the general enclosed area to wait until our tour bus left. We looked at coffee table books and little Irish facts.
The bus took us past a lighthouse which was really pretty and then to a small town called Doolin. I had soup to warm up and after we ate, of course the sun was out so we sat outside to enjoy the sun and dry off a little bit. I don't know how we got into the subject of naming objects but he had very strong opinions of naming objects that weren't people or pets but it only went as far to cats and dogs. I then told him about our office and naming Clare (the plant) and how she was part of the office. I didn't mention the birthday balloon or the pictures of her, I think he would have thought we were too crazy had I mentioned them. Anyway, he believes that the naming of objects is an overly American idea and as he previously said I could name his car, decided against it. Sad day.
The day ended with us going to Supermacs which is an Irish fast food chain but partnered with Papa Johns. It was good and had skinny fries which I hadn't seen much of here. On the way home, we talked about how the day was a bit "Irish" which really is what I wanted. And then it dawned on me, I hadn't seen a rainbow yet. Then, as luck would have it, I saw a rainbow and was completely happy. That was the ending of a really good day.
Along the way, the tour guide does his job and tell us about the area and the history and so on and between stories we listened to traditional Irish music. Kevin proceeds to tell me that the people in the south are more into the traditional music. Everyone he knew from I think Clare county except for one plays traditional Irish instruments. What are traditional Irish instruments you ask? Pipes, flutes, bodhrans and harps. So I said "Oh, I didn't know harps were traditionally Irish." Kevin stops, looks at me and asks me "Isn't your favorite beer Harp?" (Harp is an Irish beer by the way). And I respond with "well yeah." And he proceeds "The Guinness logo is a harp. How have you not noticed this before? You didn't see that there was a pattern?" And then I stopped and could only laugh. How did I not notice the blatant signs that harps are traditionally Irish? DUH! I laughed about it the entire duration of my trip because after that, I saw the harps EVERYWHERE. I could even get little harp earrings if I wanted to! But I think the reason I found it so funny was I felt like I was in the shoes of the other people that I'm usually with and often find myself asking them "how have you not noticed that before?" It was a very humbling moment that I shall forever appreciate.
Depending on the tour bus that you take you can either stop at some caves of a birds of prey area. We stopped at the Aillwee Caves. The Aillwee Caves are some of the oldest in Ireland but were only found quite recently when a dog ran into the caves and his owner ran after him. Apparently the caves were used by bears who would come in to hibernate because the only remains they found at this time were of bears. No human remains had been discovered. Our tour guide proceeds to tell us that Ireland does not have bears, they all died out on the island. And I leaned over to Kevin and said "I didn't know you didn't have bears" and his response was "I didn't know we EVER had bears." (There are also no squirrels in Ireland).
Correction from Kevin-And apparently we do have squirrels in Ireland, two types in fact! So that was news to me as I've never seen one here, although judging by Google they seem to be in other parts of the country. So I don't know if you want to alter the blog then or not, but thought I should fill you in on those two tiny things!
Finally we get to the Cliffs of Moher. It's a little rainy, more sprinkling and as we notice the weather Kevin says "I don't know why I didn't bring my jacket. Never trust Irish weather." And I appropriately gave him the sweatshirt he let me borrow since he was kind of nursing a cold and temperature wise I was ok. The cliffs are 8 kilometers long which is about 4 miles I believe. They are beautiful! However, the mood is a little dampened by signs saying "Need to talk? Call us at....-Samaritans." I can only assume it was to prevent suicides.
We walked the appropriately labeled paths with the railings since its Ireland everything was a little wet. If I had better balance, I would have walked along the cliffs that were off the protected path but with my bad balance and the muddy, slippery path, decided against it. Then as we decided to turn back, it started raining. Not the light "oh its sprinkling, it might start to rain" that I had been in the last few days but the rain came down in big, cold raindrops and we walked to jog back to the gift shop or the general enclosed area to wait until our tour bus left. We looked at coffee table books and little Irish facts.
The bus took us past a lighthouse which was really pretty and then to a small town called Doolin. I had soup to warm up and after we ate, of course the sun was out so we sat outside to enjoy the sun and dry off a little bit. I don't know how we got into the subject of naming objects but he had very strong opinions of naming objects that weren't people or pets but it only went as far to cats and dogs. I then told him about our office and naming Clare (the plant) and how she was part of the office. I didn't mention the birthday balloon or the pictures of her, I think he would have thought we were too crazy had I mentioned them. Anyway, he believes that the naming of objects is an overly American idea and as he previously said I could name his car, decided against it. Sad day.
The day ended with us going to Supermacs which is an Irish fast food chain but partnered with Papa Johns. It was good and had skinny fries which I hadn't seen much of here. On the way home, we talked about how the day was a bit "Irish" which really is what I wanted. And then it dawned on me, I hadn't seen a rainbow yet. Then, as luck would have it, I saw a rainbow and was completely happy. That was the ending of a really good day.
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