Around Skerries

Just a few pictures for family that haven't been here yet. These are along the coast in Skerries.

Lovely Easter weekend

Easter weekend here was fantastic. The weather was great and I had 4 glorious days off from work. Sunday we went to the Gaelic football match at Parnell Park (up the Dubs!), but for the rest of the time we just hung out at home and in Skerries.

Now Easter weekend is a strange thing here. No booze can be sold at all on Friday (stores or pubs) but all of the other stores are open. Monday the stores are closed but the pubs are open. Strange.

Oh, and Irish people (yes, all of them) seem to have spent the entire weekend washing their cars. Over, and over again. Then they vacuum the interior. Then they wash again. Fixated with clean cars these Irish.

This coming weekend I'm taking my class to Marble Arch Caves in Fermanagh, right on the border. Should be fun!

Corcomroe Abbey, The Burren

Offerings at Corcomroe Abbey

The beach at Fisherstreet, Co. Clare

You have to love the geology of this country. Everywhere you turn there is stunning scenery, and as a geologist I tend to dig a little deeper and get my thrills from the strange landforms, faults, folds, exposures and drumlins. I'll just leave this post at that, with a picture of some limestone at the Burren in the west of Ireland that had been smoothly shaped by the waves.

Yuppy (?) apartments

The above photo, from the Shankill area of Belfast, may point out much of what is wrong with the housing situation in Ireland (of course when I say that I include the North). Much of the recently-built housing stock is of course yuppy apartments. Irish people have been sold (and bought!) a lifestyle. Unfortunately it is one that comes without proper transportation networks to get those yuppies to work, nearby shops, or places for kids to play. Ireland made these same mistakes that America made with the development of their suburbia, but at least in America suburbia came with land and distance from your neighbours. Ireland now seems to rely on the car, and a report on the radio last night indicated that Dublin has the lowest usage rates of public transport of any major city in Europe. Ahhh, so that's why traffic is so gridlocked!

But now, many of those recently completed yuppy housing estates are lying empty, the developers are going bust, and the places are being sold off at fire-sale prices. They're still far more expensive than they are worth, but you won't find me living in any of those Adamstown, Swords, Lusk, Balbriggan-type 'villages' anytime soon. Most self-respecting yuppies that I know wouldn't dream of living in these Legoland villages.

Irish Rail idiots....

Yep, it's confirmed. The mahem I predicted (see previous post) for St. Patrick's Day owing to the incompetence of Irish Rail certainly came to pass. Not only had the bright sparks there decided to run a Sunday service on possibly one of the busiest days of the year, but shockingly they also put on short trains only. That means fewer carriages for the passengers.

Catherine and I got on the train at about 11 am in Skerries only to find the train already very packed. Fair enough, we got on at least. The platform at the next stop, Rush and Lusk, was full of passengers, all of whom seemed to get on but it rendered the train completely full. Nobody from any of the next 5 stops could get on. Hundreds of families, kids all painted and dressed up for the parade, were left on the platform with no way into town. I just wish the head of Irish Rail was there on the platform to see the dejected looks on the kids faces.

Apparently 600,000 people were in the city centre for the festivities, and if the people at Irish Rail can't predict that it would be a major day for passengers (and therefore revenue) then they should be fired for complete incompetence.

Our first St. Patrick's in Ireland

Tuesday will be the first St. Patrick's Day that we've spent in Ireland. Sounds great, but there are a few things that most of the world probably doesn't know. First of all, the Irish don't take this all that seriously. It's just another holiday to many people I know, and those out partying on the streets are more likely to be American tourists or Italian exchange students. Apparently the Dublin accent will be a rare thing in Temple Bar on the day. Oh well, can't hurt to give it a chance.

It seems like loads of Irish would prefer to travel to New York or Boston for the celebration. It's much more of an expatriate event celebrated all over the world except in Ireland. I can't think of any national holiday that is more celebrated outside of that country than inside. Imagine if the UK went crazy on July 4th?

Still, it would be a shame not to try it out, so we'll be in town and ready to celebrate (back in my yoof I would have said 'pppaaaaaaarrrrrty'). Expect a report here on Wednesday.