Over the years Anne and I each have accumulated quite a
few miles on British Airways. The fare
structure of BA flights is such that the fees (which one still has to pay with
an award ticket) are exorbitantly high.
However, BA’s partner Aer Lingus has a much more reasonable fare
structure, and their rewards require many fewer miles. We managed to redeem a roundtrip business
class ticket BOS-DUB for 50,000 miles each; an equivalent award on United would
set each of us back 140,000 miles. Close
to a no-brainer, if ever there was one.
Joe Jr helped with a lot of the booking logistics which involved a phone
call to British Airways.
Overall, our flight itinerary is a bit complex, but I am
quite proud of the arrangement we made.
First, we bought one-way tickets on United to go to Boston. We plan to make a mid-November trip to China
for meetings with a couple of non-profit organizations, so we bought an
open-jaw tickets BOS-EWR-PEK-EWR that are actually a little cheaper (I forget
how much less) than an EWR-PEK roundtrip ticket. We were to look after Emmie in Boston while
Joe and Jess went on a short break to France.
The basic idea is (i) EWR-BOS and BOS-DUB on the same day; (ii) DUB-BOS
and stay in Somerville for a few days; (iii) BOS-EWR and stay in EWR for a few
days; and (iv) EWR-PEK roundtrip. (iv)
will be a separate writeup.
Wednesday 10/29/2014.
Henry H drove us to the airport for our flight to Boston. We had a few hours before the Dublin flight,
so we took a taxi and let ourselves in Joe’s house. We had dinner at Legal Seafood in Assembly Square. After settling Emmie in for the night, Joe
took us to the airport. Even though we
didn’t get TSA Pre-Check for this flight, the process was straightforward, helped
by the small number of flights leaving this late in the evening.
Flight to Dublin was relatively short at 5 ½ hours, and I
got at most one hour’s sleep. Business
class was less than half full. While
wifi was free for business class passengers, it didn’t work very well on this
flight.
Thursday 10/30/2014.
Our arrival was at around 8 am, and the taxi to hotel took
perhaps 30 minutes. We were pleasantly
surprised when we found out that the hotel had room for us. After a short rest, we walked to National
Concert Hall to buy tickets for Friday. Our first meal in Ireland was to be at
an “all you can put on plate” place KC Peaches.
National museums are free in Ireland with suggested
donations. The first one we visited was
Archaeology – Ireland dates back a long time, and there are multiple examples
of bodies recovered from the many peat fields in the country. The National Gallery was quite pitiful. It had basically two displays: one on how art
influenced some (modern) Irish writers, and the other a small collection of
European art.
Museum of Archaelogy
National Gallery. On display were pairings of paintings and the writers they influence.
Walked around Trinity College but decided not to go see Book of Kells since we had only about an hour before the exhibit closed for the day. Dinner at a Malaysian-Chinese (Charlie’s) Restaurant.
Radisson Blu Royal in Dublin
View of Courtyard from Room
Hotel: Radisson Blu Royal, Dublin (2 nights).
Friday 10/31/2014.
Started by visiting Christchurch which through history has been
“predominantly” protestant.
Christchurch, Dublin
Sign outside Church describing its history dating back to 1030
Walked the grounds of Dublin Castle, didn’t go in. We probably would have been more interested
had we done some study of Irish history before we made the visit. As it was, the significance of the events
that occurred here was not that significant.
Dublin Castle
Next stop was Liffey River Cruise that lasted for about
45 minutes. Lots of history along the
river, much of that had to do with the “potato famine,” unfortunately I didn’t
have enough context to fully appreciate the guide’s narrations. The sights we saw along the river banks
include: Customs House, Harp Bridge (it swings open horizontally, and was
shipped to Ireland in one piece from Germany), “Tube in a Cube” convention
center, and sculptures commemorating emigrants during potato famine years.
The Liffey River
The Harp Bridge and The Tube in a Cube Convention Center
Book of Kells exhibit.
The collection holds several books from medieval times, with one from
Kells most famous. Both the Book of
Kells and another medieval book were on display. Rick Steves goes into great length about the
exhibit which greatly raised my expectations; I didn’t find it so
compelling. While we spent quite a bit
of time looking at the displays and the old library, we could have done it in
an hour (and saved a few Euros in admissions if we had done it last night, as
they gave late admission discounts.)
Graduation ceremony at Trinity College
College Library, Trinity College.
One of many courtyards in Trinity College
St. Stephen's Green
Dinner at Darwin’s.
Concert afterwards. Tonight was
Halloween, so we were a bit worried how rowdy the crowds would get when the
concert lets out, turns out to be quite well-behaved. Lots of people costumed up though.
Saturday 11/1/2014.
Took taxi to airport to have breakfast and to pick up
rental car. What was quoted as $86
became $474 with auto and full CDW!
Drive to Galway was uneventful.
(Note: $474 included charges for a tank of gas, since I returned the car
with a full tank, the charge was reduced to $358.)
Drove a bit around Galway, raining quite hard so didn’t
see much.
A little bit of rain (or a lot in this case) isn't going to stop this kite-surfing from having fun this afternoon.
These boats are left high and dry at high tide. At this latitude they get a wide tidal range.
Hotel: Pillo Hotel, Galway (2 nights).
Sunday 11/2/2014.
The sights we saw today were:
·
The Burren – limestone formations.
·
House of Sorrows (Poulnabrone dolmen) – dating
back to the Neolithic period, probably around 3500 BC.
·
A glimpse of Leamaneh Castle ruins.
·
Cliffs of Moher that rise between 100 to 200
meters above the Atlantic Ocean.
·
Doolin Pier – seas were too rough for any Ferry
ride to an outlying island or a cruise of the Cliffs.
The weather was quite variable throughout the day: cloudy, sunny, sleet, rain, many rainbows, and at least one instance of a double rainbow.
The Burren is an area filled with limestone formations. This is the area we toured on Sunday.
The roads may be few, they still can get mighty confusing. We got lost a few times.
Fences made from stones are very common.
Poulnabrone dolmen (hole of sorrows) is a tomb believed to date back to 3000BC to 4000 BC.
Leamaneh Castle dates from the 15th to the 17th century.
Doolin. Most of the inns and restaurants are closed for the season.
On a calm summer day ferries run to neighboring islands and provide tours to view the Cliffs of Moher. Not today. It was going to be the last weekend for ferries, but the seas were too rough.
The seas were rough. The big splash in the upper middle part of the photo is from waves crashing against the cliff.
A double rainbow viewed from the parking lot of the Doolin Pier.
We were greeted by sleet as we pulled into the parking lot for the Cliffs of Moher.
The famous Cliffs of Moher gets about 1 million visitors a year. It rises more than 700 feet above the sea at its highest point.
O'Brien Tower marks the highest point of the cliffs. In the foreground is Goat Island, where a seasonal puffin colony resides. The structure on the left is called the Branaunmore Sea Stack.
From spring to fall many different birds call the cliffs home. For winter only the hardier ones remain. All we could see were sea gulls.
Walking towards Moher Tower, believed to be fortified during eh Napoleonic Wars (1803-1815).
View of Cliffs from Moher's Tower.
Many places were closed for the season, including the
Caherconnell Stone Fort.
Monday 11/3/2014.
Got off to a relatively late start even though I slept
well last night: we left at about 10 am.
Today’s itinerary was Dingle Peninsula.
By the time we got to Dingle, it was already lunch
time. Many of the eateries were closed
for the season. Our lunch at Harringtons
Fish Restaurant was quite good.
Dingle Harbor is quite picturesque. We tried to follow Rick Steves’ book, but found
his distance chart and description quite unclear. Rained on and off. During our drive we saw:
·
Ventry Bay with its long beach.
·
Beehive Huts – given how good they looked, and
that there were people actively “restoring” them, one wonders if they weren’t
built from scratch and artists’ conception
·
Reasc Monastery – it was started by Celts at
around 500BC. When the Christians took
over in 500 AD they kept many of the stone pillars but carved crosses on them.
·
Gallarus Oratory – a church dating from around
700 AD.
Plots of land are separated by stone fences.
Nice landscape colors.
Town of Dingle.
Harrington Restaurant in Dingle.
Fish and chips, and Seafood chowder at Harrington's.
Picturesque Dingle Harbor.
Views of Skellig Michael and Little Skelling Islands in a distance. We would have a closer view when we toured the Ring of Kerry. A monastery was built on Skellig Michael starting sometime between the 6th and the 8th century; it was in use until the 12th century.
Beehive huts. These are either well-preserved or rebuilt from scratch. They seem to date from the 12th century.
The Riasc Monastery most likely dates from the 5th Century. Before that it probably had been a celtic religious site dating back an additional 1000 years.
This stone has a cross on it. It was earlier used by the Celtics perhaps as far back as 500BC.
The Gaallarus Oratory was an early Christian church.
View from inside Oratory.
A typical Dingle town we drove through.
The Inch Strand, a long stretch of beach on the Dingle Peninsula.
Killarney Riverside Hotel probably had seen better days
before. With the low season it simply
looked sad. The staff was friendly and
helpful, though. We had dinner at their
dining room, lots of fancy words in the menu, unfortunately the food was just
so-so.
These foods at the hotel restaurant unfortunately looked better than they tasted.
Tuesday 11/4/2014.
The Ring of Kerry is another peninsula jutting out from
the Western Irish sea coast. Today we
drove around this ring. Supposedly it
gets very congested during the tourist season, and in Rick Steves’ book there
is a detailed strategy on how to not waste too much time in traffic. No such problems today.
We stopped by:
·
Ladies View and Molls Gap, both scenic stops
along the way,
·
Staigne Fort (where we paid the 1 euro admission
by dropping coins into a bin) from “olden days” – they don’t know when.
·
Skellig Experience with film on Skellig Michael.
·
View of Skellig Michael and Little Skellig.
Panoramic image of the fort taken by the iPhone 6.
Ladies View.
Molly's Gap.
Typical secondary road in Ireland, this one leads to Staigne Fort. Speed limit mostly likely 80 km/hr.
Staigue stone fort, probably built between 300 and 400AD by a local lord or king.
The thick walls of the fort.
The fort is about 90 ft in diameter.
View of Skellig Michael and Little Skellig from near the Skellig Experience.
Portmagee, across from the Skellig Experience.
Got back to Killarney at 3:20 pm and grabbed Burger King
for lunch. Anne had to attend a conference
call and I walked around town and had coffee and cake.
Dinner at Caragh Restaurant. We had “traditional Irish food” of meat stew
and Ham and cabbage. This place is also
frequented by what appeared to be locals, and isn’t big on presentations. The food was quite good.
Dinner at Caragh Restaurant in Killarney. The local dishes are quite delicious.
Wednesday 11/5/2014.
Today was spent mostly on driving from Killarney to Dublin,
with a rather long stop at The Rock of Cashel.
Legend has it that St. Patrick caused the demon to spit
out a piece of rock it chewed out of a mountain. The oldest structure on the rock is a round
tower from about 1000 years ago. Other
buildings include a sizeable cathedral, a vicar choral which housed singers,
and a chapel with sandstone roof that is being restored and thus closed to
tourists. Interestingly, people are
still being buried there due to legislation that granted burial rights to two
generations (I didn’t catch all the specifics): most recent was in 2013. Admission was free on the day visited, and we
were on a guide-led tour for about 45 minutes.
There is also a music and history exhibition. We didn’t linger long enough to understand it
fully. It was interesting to see some
replicas of horns in use as far back as 500BC.
The Rock of Cashel.
The plague has a description of the various building on the rock.
Vicar Choral.
The windows were made smaller to accommodate the smaller stained glass windows.
Bru Boru is a dance and music exhibit center.
Along the way we heard over the radio station RTE-Lyrics
that there was going to be a performance of Elijah in town, so we drove back to
the National Concert Hall area, and got there a bit after 5 pm. We found parking across the street (paid 5
euros for the space) and bought tickets for that evening’s concert. We walked around and had dinner at Metro
Café, the beef stew I had was just so-so, and Anne didn’t think her pasta dish
was that good either.
Singers getting ready for Mendelssoh's Elijah.
We didn’t get done until around 10:45 pm. And I drove to the wrong Travelodge. When we got to the with our booking, there
was great confusion about availability of rooms. It was very late when we got into this room that
had only one light, little furniture, dirty chair, but clean linen. We did get free breakfast as compensation.
We returned the car after gassing it up. Like in Canada, US customs clearance was at
Dublin. Today the business class section
was full. Somehow I managed the 6:40
hour flight without watching TV.
We took a taxi to Joe’s place. We would be staying there for a few days
while he and Jess made a short trip to Lyons, France.
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