March 31, 2009: Swinging in the rain....

March 31, 2009: Swinging in the rain....

Our first full day in Northern Ireland was going to be spent close to home, to give folks time to recover from the trip. My goal this year is to actually get the kids out the door at a reasonable hour so we can actually get somewhere and do stuff before the country goes to sleep for the night (starts around 6 pm).

We set out for a drive up along the coast, and ended up about five miles away from home, at Carrick-a-Rede.

First, a word about distances in Northern Ireland.

We are staying in Ballycastle, which is about 60 miles north of Belfast. To get there, you go to Ballymena (23 miles from Belfast) and then head out towards Ballycastle.

In the US, I live about 23 miles from Washington DC. I frequently make the drive to DC without a minute's thought, and yet when we lived here, we wouldn't have dreamt of driving the same distance to Ballymena. Going to Ballycastle was the stuff of going away on vacation!

My point is, I'm surprised at how relative distances are in different cultures. I work with a guy who has an almost three hour commute. In three hours in Ireland, I can get from Belfast to Limerick. The thought of driving the length of Ireland on a daily basis is riduculous, but in the US, folks it seems will absorb the longer distances without complaint.

The Belfast-Ballycastle drive isn't too bad distance-wise, but the narrow winding roads at the tail end of the journey draws out the trip a bit. Can't beat the view though!

Back to Carrick-a-rede:

Carrick-a-rede is the site of an abandoned salmon fishery (North Atlantic Salmon) that closed down 7 years ago. THe National Trust maintains the bridge though, which is a rope footbridge suspended over an 80 foot drop into the sea below. The whole point of going to Carrick-a-rede is to walk on the footbridge, there's literally nothing else there. It doesn't stop a steady stream of visitors trekking along the 1 km path to the bridge.

The walk from the carpark to the bridge really should only take about 10 minutes. That is, if you actually walk, and don't stop along the way to take pictures of every lamb, vine, bug, leaf or flower that the good Lord saw fit to put there. I started teasing the Craig shutterbugs with:

"Show us some pictures of your holidays"

"Sure, here's a picture of a plant, and here's another plant, oh, and here's another plant......"

The view along the path is absolutely staggering. It was a clear day, so clear that you could see Scotland (quite a lot of the coastline, with the mountains behind). Rathlin Island, Sheep Island, and the limestone cliffs marking the LarryBane quarry stood in brilliant contrast against the bright blue/green of the surrounding sea. It was an absolutely beautiful day, for about an hour, then the grey clouds rolled in. Northern Ireland weather, it's almost iconic.

Lauren, Bethany, Conor and I all went across the bridge, crossing into the island that now serves as home to several species of seabirds who make their nests in crannies in the cliff face. By this stage the wind had picked up, and an occasional spot of rain was appearing.

Having done the bridge, we set off back to the carpark. What took over an hour to walk one way, only took about 10 minutes in the other direction. I guess all the interesting plants were located on the outbound walk.....

That afternoon, I took the kids down to the town to get some snacks (Northern Ireland has THE BEST potato chips in the world. Tayto Cheese and Onion are number 1, all others are number 2). Took the opportunity to call an old school friend while the kids were in the shops, it was great to catch up with her.

Last night, I went to Belfast by myself, to have dinner with some work colleagues and
friends from my days in the lab in Belfast, followed by a Benefit Concert. The concert was a memorial concert for Jim McKeown, my old boss from the lab. I can still remember his last words to me before I left for America; He looked me in the eye and said, "I'm tellin' you now," (he was always tellin' me now), "don't fuck this up." To this day, if I'm trying something new or unsure about something, I have a mental flashback to the GC-TEA lab and Jim McKeown tellin' me now....

Another friend, "Sandy Rowe" was in fine form with "the Clarence Diggs band". The craic was fierce, which won't mean anything to anyone who a) doesn't know was craic is, and b) hasn't been around craic when it is fierce. It's Ulster code! Had a great time catching up with some old faces, and before setting off again for the drive back to home and bed.

Here's where the culture shock sets in.

As a part time musician, I occasionally end up playing at venues a considerable distance from home, until early in the morning. In the US, I could always count on finding a 7-11 or 24 hour garage, grab a coffee, and go on my way. Not so in Northern Ireland. They have Burger Kings and McDonalds now, but still nowhere that I could find to get a travel coffee at 11:00. Maybe thats a good thing, the sensible people should be in their beds anyway and not drinking coffee at all hours of the night.

An uneventful (and coffee-less) drive home in the dark (no streetlights for much of it) and Jackson Browne on the iPod rounded off the day.