Astronomical Clock by Heraldk

Yeesh, June was a busy month! I’m just now finally catching up with what we all did. Hopefully I can get through the several trips we went on before the next batch! My folks had arrived in Europe late in May and had spent some time with our Austrian relatives. Our plan was to meet them in Prague for a week and then head back to Dublin. So on our 2nd anniversary, Diane and I flew to Prague.

A Canadian visiting the Czech republic, living in Ireland… by Heraldk

We arrived in the afternoon and made the trip from the airport into town pretty easily. There’s a convenient bus from the airport into a metro stop, which we hopped on and found our hotel. Upon walking in we were greeted by my parents and my cousin and her husband who were sorting out our rooms. Apparently the hotel had some water problems, and we were moved to another hotel in the same chain but right in the old town. This turned out to be pretty handy, as we didn’t even have to make use of the transit services at all that whole week. We just walked everywhere.

Having found our new hotel, we checked in and then headed out to wander the streets a bit. The streets of Prague are quite pretty. The streets and sidewalks are all cobblestone, and the sidewalks in particular are all arranged in nice patterns of black and white stones. After wandering a ways, we found a place to eat called the two hedgehogs (after translation, of course). Dinner was simple, and tasty.

Klausová synagoga by Heraldk

The next morning we got up early (well, for us) and after a quick breakfast at the hotel, headed out towards the Jewish district of the city. This is apparently quite a draw for tourists, so we figured getting there earlier would be best. The tourist areas for this were several buildings spread throughout the Jewish district. So we dutifully took each building in order. The most impressive one of the bunch was the Spanish Synagogue — in which every inch was beautifully decorated. I wish pictures had been allowed inside …

Old Town Square Pano by Heraldk

After exploring these buildings we went in pursuit of lunch, and after getting out of the heat for a bit, hit the streets again. My mom was looking for some bead shops, and one in particular was near by so we went in search of it. After finding it, our group split up for a bit of exploring and shopping on our own. So Diane and I split off — I had seen a Crumpler store (a company that makes nice bags and backpacks) which we went off to and I bought a new camera bag. Sweet! After that, we found a lovely little park with an incredible rose garden, and a little farther along a mall that sold some cheap and delicious ice cream. We met back up with the rest of our group in front of the National musuem which overlooks Wenceslas square.

Looking over Wenceslas Square by Heraldk

From there we headed back towards our hotel to drop off our purchases and get out of the heat for a bit more — it was 30 degrees almost every day there! We then went for dinner at a pub around the corner from our hotel. Not the best choice for food, but it wasn’t too bad either.

The next day, the plan was to hit up Prague castle. This wasn’t something my dad was interested in doing again, so he took my cousin and her husband off shopping and we walked our way up to the castle to explore the many exhibits open there. It was a blisteringly hot day, but we got going and there sure was a lot to see at the castle. Probably the highlight of it was St Vitus’ cathedral, which sits in the middle of a large courtyard in Prague Castle. The cathedral itself is impressive enough from the outside, but inside it was quite amazing. It sported several large stained glass windows with incredible detail, and every nook and cranny of the church seemed to be filled with yet another thing to look at. It was a good spot for pictures…

St. Vitus Cathedral HDR by Heraldk

We took our time looking through all the exhibitions and then headed back down towards Charles’ Bridge: a long pedestrian bridge over the Vltava river. This was our meeting spot with the rest of our crew. On the way, we walked through quite a large group of people surrounding a bike race that had been setup in the area. So in +30 degree heat, these people were pedalling their bikes up and down hills for what is almost certainly a grueling amount of time. Ugh. The rest of our party were waiting for us at the bridge and we walked around the area for a bit doing some recon for a place to eat a little later. Diane had done a bit of research on wikitravel and we settled in a place called Malostranska Pivnice which turned out to be a great choice. The food was delish!

Petřínská rozhledna by Heraldk

The next day, our destination was Petřínská rozhledna (Petřín Lookout Tower). The tower sits on top of a large hill overlooking prague, so the top of the tower offered a really nice view of Prague. To get there, we took a funicular that serviced that area. On their previous trip to Prague, my parents had climbed the hill and had ruled that out as a possibility for this trip. So after taking the funicular we wandered some of the gardens at the top of the hill and eventually found our way to the tower. Since the rest of the party had already done the tower on their previous visit, just Diane and I climbed the many stairs to the top and enjoyed the view from the top.

Prague Panorama View by Heraldk

The heat had started to get to us there, so we decided it was time to head back down the hill and find a place in the shade to have some lunch. We found a place on the main road not far from where the funicular stop was. After a much needed break we wandered around a bit more before going back to our hotel to rest some more (we really weren’t used to the heat, and the whole week of heat was enough to make us slow right down). On the way though, we grabbed some ice cream from the same place a few days earlier. Mmm.

This being the last day in Prague, I wanted to try and find a particularly good restaurant to eat at. After doing some looking on wikitravel I found one, but when we got there it was all booked up. Oops. So we returned back to the hotel and asked them for a recommendation. They kindly made a reservation at a place really close by for a late dinner — which was fine given our late lunch. So we wandered over there and enjoyed a wonderful meal.

Our final day in Prague was a travel day, so we didn’t do much other than wander a little bit before taking transit to the airport and heading back to Dublin with my mom. It was a pretty fun week, and I think since we didn’t see much more than the old town in Prague that we’ll have to return!

Irish Road by Heraldk

On our May long weekend (May 8-10th), Diane and I decided that it had been too long since our last trip, and since it was a long weekend it was an opportune moment to hop in the car and check out an area of the Irish countryside we hadn’t yet gotten to. One of the main touristy areas we hadn’t gotten to yet was the Ring of Kerry, in South-West Ireland.

So on Saturday morning, we hopped in our car and started down in the direction of Killarney. It’s a pretty long drive! It probably took us well in excess of 4 hours to get there, and since we slept in and packed that morning we didn’t actually get on the road until almost noon. The roads in Ireland are pretty high variance: there are now quite a few fancy new motorways available, but once you get off of those the road quality can quickly degrade into roads that you really can’t drive very fast on. Most of the way out though, the roads were pretty good, so that was good.

Fresh Thatch Roof by Heraldk

We stopped to check in at our B&B – a little house a few minutes drive outside of Killarney. Our host kindly informed us that Killarney was particularly busy that weekend due to a motor rally happening nearby. Forewarned, we headed into town and took a quick pre-dinner walk into Killarney National park before heading off to find some food. Not sure where to eat, we consulted our handy Ireland lonely planet guide and it recommended a restaurant called Bricín which we were fortunate to get a table at since it was booked up later that evening. The food was absolutely delicious! A great way to start off our trip.

We returned to our B&B early since we wanted to get an early start on the next day. The day was a bit rainy and windy at the start, but after being on the road for a little bit the sun came out and the day was absolutely gorgeous. We started the day by stopping off at Muckross house which is part of Killarney national park. The house has some really nice gardens including an extensive arboretum which was quite pretty. Lots of mossy trees and flowering trees!

Our next stop along the ring of Kerry was the Torc waterfall, which conveniently enough is just a few minutes walk from the road. The waterfall is just part of a larger hike which we might need to go back and do at a later time. But we had a lot to see that day, so we didn’t really have time to spend a couple hours hiking. So on we went, next taking a quick stop at “the ladies view” which is a nice viewpoint from the road over the hills and lakes. The place gets its name because of the “pleasure expressed by Queen Victoria’s ladies in waiting on their visit in 1861 in that spot”. It is indeed a very pretty view.

Not too far from there, we stopped at Molls’ gap and the Avoca cafe stationed there for a small lunch. From there, it was a fairly short drive to Kenmare which the guidebook said had a stone circle to see, so we did! We also made stops at the Staigue Stone fort (an old ring fort overlooking some stunning scenery) and at the viewpoint at Coomakeesta pass which offers an absolutely incredible view from the road. The road is up high with green rolling hills dropping below us and spreading out dramatically right out to eh rugged coastline. For us, this was probably the highlight of the very scenic ring of kerry drive.

More Fantastic View by Heraldk

Our stop for the night was a town called Cahersiveen, which is a lovely little town. We got there pretty early so instead of going to dinner right away we wandered around the town a bit, finding not only the giant Daniel O’ Connell memorial church but also an old abbey that had long since fallen into disrepair. So much so that there was a whole bunch of vines growing in and through the bricks. Pretty neat … Dinner that night was at the seafood restaurant QC’s. Another really good meal!

On the Sunday we decided to call and see if there was any space left on a boat headed to the Skelligs: two craggy rocky islands shooting out from the ocean off the coast of Ireland. Apparently, getting on one of the boats in the summer is pretty tough, but they were just getting going for the season so we got a spot. Nice! So on Monday morning we found ourselves on a boat at 10am heading on a 50 minute boat ride to Skellig Michael. The water was calm and lovely, and we were soon climbing the hundreds of steps up to the top.

The skellig’s stairs were numerous and it took quite awhile to climb them. The view from the top was sure worth it though! Near the top there is some beehive style huts set up  – apparently there was a small group of people who used to live there a long time ago. I can’t imagine it though.

After a couple of hours climbing around, we got back on the boat. The boat operator took us by the other skellig which no one is allowed to land on — it is reserved as a bird sanctuary … and my oh my there were a lot of birds!!! We didn’t just see the birds though – there were also some spotted seals sunning themselves on the rocks! The waves were pretty choppy on the way back, so we were given yellow raincoats to prevent us from getting soaked.

Having made it back to port safely, we were now facing a multi-hour drive back to Dublin, so we started high tailing it back. We stopped in Limerick on the way for dinner at a pub recommended from our handy tour guide… and the food was pretty awesome for pub food.

Not much else to say about our trip. We got back to Dublin pretty late and basically fell into bed after a good long weekend trip! We’re going to have to do another one of these trips in the near future — there’s so much to see down there.

Morgan

One of the weekly highlights of my winter has been singing up a storm at St. Tiernan’s School. There are two nights I’ve been attending. One is super relaxed and fun (and is starting up again in late September if you’ve been craving that singing fix– all are welcome!), and the other is a little more formal than I’ve experienced yet, with something like 130 members divided into official parts (I am serving with the 2nd altos).

I sang with this big choir in their Christmas concert and again last week in the Spring concert, both held at the National Concert Hall downtown by St. Stephen’s Green. On both occasions I’ve been privileged to share in bringing an original composition to life. Here below is a clip from the more recent one, a Magnificat* in Irish composed by my friend Brian from the bass section. It’s really cool to sing local composers, to meet them and get to know them, and then to be part of a group large enough to give considerable power to the notes they’ve written. Almost as cool as sitting in rehearsal again (after more than a decade away for me) and feeling the shivers up your spine when some passage really comes together. The concert itself was great too – nobody screwed up too badly except maybe me – and for those who couldn’t make it, I’m sure there will be another soon. And then you can come see where I’ve begun to lean my appreciation of Irish and Latin and old school musak.

So, once again, a great big thank you to everyone for their fanship and encouragement.
It makes it even more fun to prepare the songs when we have such a lovely audience!

Diane

Magnificat (Mórann m’Anam an Tiarna) by Brian Ingoldsby

*For those like myself who initially suspected the Magnificat to be something out of an Andrew Lloyd Weber musical, it’s from Christian tradition; a psalm echoed by Mary: “My soul magnifies the lord…”
**Sorry, video uploads seem to be eluding me at present. The same clip is on the choir’s website, at the bottom of the “performances” page.

Go Canada! by Heraldk

Wednesday was particularly awesome because all of us went up Ahorn together.

Lemme backtrack for a sec though. Morgan wasn’t kidding about those first few days making you stiff and sore, so my Tuesday (or Day 3) was spent at my own pace on familiar Penken runs in the morning and in town with Bea in the afternoon. We strolled through the village, grabbed a snack – oh weißwurst, how I love you! – and read in the hotel solarium until it was time to soak, eat and bowl!

But Wednesday was good because the sun was shining (again!) and the Glüwien was flowing and Christine gave lessons to whoever wanted. (Pick me! Pick me!) And I got to see the ski-out, which had some very lovely scenery and more après-ski at the end. We caught a somewhat fortuitous/somewhat unfortunate bus, which left right away and passed very near our hotel, but which did not pass our way again after we missed our stop.

Giant T-Bar by Heraldk

We ended up taking a taxi from the train station, where the bus route terminated. Then more sauna/swimming/steaming and more wonderful soup with supper. By this point the stiffness of the first days was leaving. Three cheers for the steam room and sauna!

Evening… lemme see… probably spent at Mo’s. That was the bar on the corner closest to our hotel. We discovered a few beers and mixes that were new to me at least. Would you believe I had my first Jäger bomb at Mo’s?

Hintertux Skiout by Heraldk

Thursday was a “ski-away day” at Hintertux, half an hour away. We got on a bus that wound it’s way past dwellings with stacks of firewood to the first of three gondolas that get you up to a snow-covered glacier. Included with this were three guided groups (slow, medium, fast) you could join. Morgan and most of the rest went down all the runs they could, including an absolutely epic T-bar (I saw a shorter one that disappeared into the distance) that they agreed led to their favorite run of the day. I joined the slow group and skied over the glacier in the morning, and then in the afternoon, took a tour under the snow and inside the ice itself. The layers and ice formations were quite pretty, and it was neat to see it from above and below. In the cafeteria, we discovered the tasty Tyrolean gröstl – pan-fried potatoes and onions and sausage with a fried egg on top.

As night fell we were to be found once again at Mo’s, where salsa night was going strong. It was a fairly early night for me, as we had one more day left and had to make the most of it on the hill. Morgan stayed up late to watch the women’s gold medal hockey game.

Friday came so fast. The last day. So sad! And yet so good because even though it was raining in town and visibility was a bit poor on the mountain in the morning, there was fresh snow just for us – what Christine calls “freshies”. In fact, it appeared that lots of people were dissuaded by the vis and came down early, leaving more mountain for those of us without hangovers. Morgan, Christine, Aaron, and Breece took down the “Hara-kiri” – advertised as a groomed run of 78 degree average pitch (I hear they use cables and winches to groom it.) – just to say they did. Apparently they didn’t find it terribly vertical, but the morning mist and snow made it less fun than it might have been. Just as well I met up with them at lunch. And lunch at the Schneekarhütte (top of the Shcneekar lift) was pretty posh. There was this bacon `n’ egg pizza with a super tasty hollandaise-esque sauce. Mmm! (We want to go back!) I spent the afternoon with Morgan and he showed me some runs he had enjoyed. All too soon we were on the last run home, but we were tired, it had been a good week, and it wasn’t too crowded on the gondola. We watched as we descended down through the mist, toward an invisible base.

Skiing the Harakiri by Heraldk

One last dip in the pool, one more sauna session… I totally miss having steam rooms, pools, saunas, and plated dinners brought to me whenever I show up in the dining room. Friday’s dinner was just the two of us. So romantic! Everyone else fancied steak that night, so the dessert buffet was ours! We went to Mo’s with everyone for a few nightcaps and then we called it a night, though some of the lads stayed out über late. Well, I called it a night for a while. Morgan stayed up to watch semi-final Olympic men’s hockey (Canada v. Slovakia), and I woke up at the end of the first period of a game that could have gone either way and was really exciting. Plus, between the periods, there was coverage of speed skating events that worked out for a bunch of Kanadischens (that’s us) as well. Totally worth not going to sleep until 4 or 5 or whatever it was. Kind of cool, actually, to watch the Olympics from an area that’s hosted so many competitions and Olympic events.

Errr… Where’s the Ground? by Heraldk

And the next day we got our sorry (yet vicariously victorious) selves up and breakfasted and checked out. Going home is always a bit sad, but it was mid-day on the way back to the airport, so we got to admire the mountain scenery. And be served another meal on good ol’ Austrian Air even though it was only a few hours back to Dublin. We made sure to get together later that weekend and watch the men’s gold medal hockey game. (I actually forgot about rugby while anticipating hockey, but we (we of Ireland now) were busy beating England on their home turf while I was occupied with pre-game snacks. I’m such a bad immigrant! I hear it was a great game too.) And now we are home! Morgan has a bit of a helmet tan still and I just feel great. Spring is allowed to begin now.

Pretty Mountains by Heraldk

Diane

Cheers by Heraldk

A couple weeks ago, we joined a group of friends heading to Mayrhofen, Austria to go on a weeklong ski trip. The week was incredibly fun. We benefited from some awesome weather which certainly helped make our trip a success.

Our flight left Dublin on Saturday afternoon. The group of us included Diane and I, Aaron and Christine, Diarmuid and Bea, Jeremy, and Bryce. Half the group had the earlier flight, with Aaron and Christine being on the later flight with us. Our first surprise on the trip: our 2.5 hour flight to Innsbruck with Austrian Airlines included a meal! I don’t think I had ever had a free meal on a sub 5 hour flight before. So it was a pretty pleasant flight over (although Aaron had an incident with a glass of red wine during the meal).

PenkenBahn by Heraldk

We arrived at Innsbruck airport, and met our tour operators who directed us to some buses taking us the hour or so drive to Mayrhofen. The procedure was swift and well organized which meant that we were soon at our hotel all settled in and being served our first multi-course meal of the week. Having purchased the package that we did, the flights, accommodation, breakfast, and dinner were all included leaving just lift tickets, rentals, and lunches as the necessary costs of the trip. So despite arriving at the hotel relatively late for dinner, we were promptly served a two-course “snack”.

The next morning, we got up relatively early to get in the queue for ski rentals for the week. Our hotel had a ski rental shop next door so that was nice and convenient. Having got our gear, we joined the giant queue for the main gondola up to the Penken mountain. The queue formed a multi-level spiral which you had to shuffle along slowly. Not a very comfortable way to start the day, particularly in a pair of ski boots, but hey … we’re here to ski right? The Penkenbahn gondola is ridiculous. Between the start and end points, you gain 1200 meters of elevation, and between those two points, there are just two structural towers supporting the cables that carry the gondola cars up that far. The amazement didn’t really leave me throughout, despite several rides in that gondola on the way up and down over the week. It was … well … ridiculous.

Skiing Valley by Heraldk

Octachair by Heraldk

The sky was cloud-free and the sun shone down on us all day. It was a gorgeous first day for skiing. Apart from an hour or so stopping for lunch, we hit the slopes pretty hard – exploring various parts of the mountain. The area is pretty vast, but there were also a lot of people in the common areas, causing there to be some pretty massive queues at the numerous chairs around the hill. So in the afternoon, we ventured a little farther away which helped with the queues.

One thing that was pretty amazing about this hill. In Canada, the best chair lifts I’ve been on were the high speed quad chairs. For me, high speed quad was what they were — but at this hill, there was a couple of quad chairs, but they mostly had 6 or 8-man high speed chairs. Woah! Not only that, a lot of the chairs had conveyer belts which helped get everyone to the line where the chair would pick people up. At first I thought it was weird, but the conveyer belts really helped ease the process of getting on the chair which meant less stoppages for people who failed to get on the chair properly. So all in all a pretty solid improvement.

Ridiculous Gondola by Heraldk

One of the downsides to skiing on Penken is there isn’t a skiout from the mountain to the Mayrhofen townsite. There are two skiouts to neighbouring towns, but this didn’t seem like a palatable choice so at the end of the day we shuffled back into a giant queue for the gondola on the way back down. Of the things that went on that week, the lineup for the gondola on the way down was the most miserable. You don’t really have much to do except deal with a bazillion other people in the line all shuffling along. At the end of a lengthy day of skiing, this wasn’t all that fun. But if that’s the worst part of the trip, that’s a pretty good trip, I think!

Apres Ski by Heraldk

Having made it back to our hotel, we returned back to the gondola area where we entered the “Ice Bar”. The bar didn’t really have anything to do with ice besides being next to the gondola, but it was a pretty hopping place. We tried our first mulled wine (or Glüwein) on the trip there while listening to catchy german songs — many of which we had heard at Oktoberfest, and other singable well known songs. Partway through our visit, a guy dressed in a polar bear costume jumped up on one of the stands and started dancing. A few minutes later a girl jumped up on another one and started dancing as well. This was apparently one of the features of this particular establishment since on ensuing nights we would see various people dancing above the crowd of people in the bar.

Having polished off our Glüwein, we returned back to our hotel where we enjoyed its rooftop pool (an event that would be a nightly occurrence all week). The hot tub there would’ve been awesome if it was actually hot … but the pool was pretty nice and warm, and having a rooftop pool with the mountains all around was a pretty awesome experience!

A fairly late dinner followed the pool. The food at our hotel was pretty good in general. There was a few misses, but there was some pretty darn good food — and the soup every night was fantastic.

Our Ski Party by Heraldk

The next day we got started a little later without the need to beat the lineup at the rental store. The queue at the Penken gondola was still ridiculous, but after making it up that, we got started skiing. I’ve always found that the second day skiing was really rough. My knees take a beating when skiing, and after one full day of skiing my muscles really have a hard time getting going. But we were there to ski, so I pushed pretty hard to keep going. It wasn’t easy though!

That night, the Crystal Ski tour operator put on a pub crawl touring some of the bars in Mayrhofen. So we started at the “Movie Bar” and proceeded to visit half a dozen or so bars. Each was a bit more hopping than the last, and after a shot of (terrible) Schnaps at the first 3 bars and a few rounds of beer … well lets just say we were pretty buzzed. Before leaving from the airport in Dublin, a set of funny Irish hats were purchased, and they made their appearance on the pub crawl. They were pretty popular, and got a fair amount of attention! Some of our party even went so far as to start doing the leprechaun heel click. At one of the bars, we even got the security guard to do a heel click!

Chillin’ at the Igloo Bar by Heraldk

The next morning we were in no great shape to get up early. Diane and I were the only ones to make it to breakfast, and it wasn’t until after noon before we made it to the gondola. On this particular day, we decided to go check out a neighbouring mountain called Ahorn accessible by another ridiculous gondola. This particular one was much newer and only had two cars: each holding between 120 and 160 people! Ahorn is a pretty friendly mountain for beginner skiers with a beautiful long-ish gradual slope heading down to an octachair. There’s a bit more advanced skiing from there, but not a huge amount of it and its basically all serviced by a single double chair.

Cheers by Heraldk

It’s a good mountain though. One of the cool features of it is the White Lounge at the top which is a big igloo with a bar inside. On that particular day, it was absolutely gorgeous out and we spend a fair amount of time at the top lounging on beach chairs/bean bags enjoying the sunshine with a beer. We did a little bit of skiing, but there was a lot of time spent relaxing in the sunshine too. The other cool feature of Ahorn is that there is a ski run right back into town. It was a bit icy in spots, but it made for an excellent way to get back to the town without waiting in a lineup for the gondola.

That was our first three full days in Mayrhofen, Austria. Hopefully I’ll get around to posting about our last three days soon.

Getting Close to Town by Heraldk

Morgan

the classic broom method

my neighbour trying to scrape his car with a pot

But before we embrace the springtime, a look back at the winter. It was actually pretty formidable weather here. Maybe it didn’t have the gigantic snowfalls of Canada’s east side or the dry deep freezes of the west, but still. It did freeze and there was snow. Pipes froze and burst and thawed and leaked. People were without water and unable to get places because the roads were so icy. And they were icy, even from a Canuck’s point of view.

there's at least one plow in Dublin

Winter driving is easy with good tires and a small army working through the night to clear and sand the roads for your morning commute, but there’s not much point here in buying grit or salt or chains or all-season tires. And the prevalence of ice was really something here.
I’ve driven the Yellowhead from Sherwood to St. Albert in freezing rain, and I’d lay odds that while not exactly fun, it was far more… possible(!) than getting traction on the goat paths that serve as roads through the hills in Wicklow. I myself chose not to drive for the duration.

Edmonton in March? No, Dublin in January!

Still there were some wins. By the first good freeze, boys were out in parking lots learning to pull doughnuts. My neighbour figured out the classic mini-van dust-off with his broom. People left work early to beat traffic and falling temperatures on the road surfaces. (Definitely should’ve done that all those nights I wasted half a tank sitting in traffic on St. Albert Trail.) There were probably 10 snowmen per square kilometer on average in town during those weeks. And of course, there was great appreciation of snowball fights. We even cavorted on a skating rink!

a land of snow and palm trees

little new year's party persun of snow

Diane

2009 wasn’t set up to be quite as crazy a year as 2008 was — after all, we had set up shop in Ireland already and didn’t have a life-changing schedule involving getting married and moving to another country! It wasn’t without its share of adventures, however. We had visits from several people in 2009, including both my family and Diane’s family, as well as several friends. These visits necessitated trips to various corners of Ireland, and served as good excuses to explore the island we’re living on.

January was a pretty slow month as we went through a fairly lengthy post-holiday case of procrastination. One of the only noteworthy events was we got our Irish learner’s licenses, which was one part of a saga which we needed to go through in order to legally drive our car. The other major part of that saga was a trip home to renew our Canadian driver’s licenses in February. Unluckily for us, delays caused by a week of snow in Dublin made us take 3 days and unplanned sleeps in Dublin and London before finally getting home.. That meant that we unfortunately missed the ski trip out with our friends that we had planned. Doh!

St Patrick's Day Parade

March and April flew by. The company was ramping up for one of the biggest releases we’ve ever made, and tensions were high for what turned out to be an amazingly smooth transition. So I guess I was pretty preoccupied with work. The big event of March though was St Patrick’s day — which is a national holiday here. We headed into town to watch the parade and joined several people after that for pints which lasted well into the evening. In April we made one foray to the Dublin Zoo, and that’s all I can remember!

Budapest Parliament

In May, we finally got out and headed to Budapest to visit my friend Mike. He was planning on applying to work at the company later that year so getting there before he left was high on our list of things to do. Budapest was an excellent time, and we were quite happy to enjoy the time with friends and the wonderful food (I think I really want some goulash now …).

Cliffs of Moher

My parents arrived for a long visit in June, so that was a crazy busy month. We took them out on weekend trips out West to see the Cliffs of Moher, and up North to see the Giant’s Causeway, and Diane took them all around the various day trips outside of Dublin that we had seen while I worked during the weekdays. My dad headed home earlier than my mom who stayed on for a couple more weeks — allowing for a short trip out to see the Hill of Tara and Trim Castle as well as a weekend trip to Brighton to visit some friends of my Mom’s there. It was a pretty packed month and a half, and by the end of it we needed a vacation from all the tourism!

In the latter half of July, my friend Mike was in town for his interview, we had an epic company summer party, and we caught one of three Irish tour dates for U2′s U2360 tour.

Sheep

At the start of August, our friend Bryce came for a visit of about two weeks. That caused us to organize another couple road trips on the weekends – the first out to Galway and the Aran islands, and the second a trip that Christine organized up to Bundoran to go … surfing! I had never been surfing before, and I never expected that Ireland was the place I’d get my first try. But hey, you never know what life’s gonna throw at you!

JR and Shelly Married

In September, we headed back to Canada for our JR and Shelly’s wedding. It was held in Jasper, which to us Edmontonians is a pretty special place to us. The weekend went beautifully, and we were very glad to have made it home for that trip. Apart from that, we used the trip home to catch up with as many family and friends that we could conceivably squeeze into a week and a half.

Just a week after Diane and I returned back to Dublin, Diane’s mom and sister arrived in Europe. Diane went over to meet them and they saw some of Britain before coming over to Dublin. The first weekend they were here, we grabbed Carolyn and headed off to Munich with Mike for a whirlwind trip to Oktoberfest. We were there for all of 12 hours, and returned to Dublin just 24 hours after we had left. It was a blast! I’m not too sure that I’m doing that again though. The second weekend of the visit, we took the car back up north again and saw the Giant’s Causeway and the Glens of Antrim.

Oslo Opera House

Gaudí Mosaic Roof

In November, we went to Oslo, Norway for a weekend which was a pretty fun trip. We followed that trip up with a busy December in which we went to the company Christmas party and then followed it up with a week-long trip to Barcelona! We rang in the new year at a small party with a couple of friends which was a lot of fun — and the big feature of the evening was the inch or so of snow that proceed to fall over the course of the evening.

It was a pretty packed year, full of more traveling than I think I realized. We spent several weekends driving around Ireland, and made trips to Brighton, Budapest, Munich, Oslo, and Barcelona. Oh yeah, two trips home to Canada as well! We sure flew a lot!

Happy New Year

To sum up this post, here are some of my favourite photos from this year:

Rhinos at the Dublin Zoo

Statue Sunset in Budapest

Dad on the Irish West Coast

Vibrant Waters Northern Ireland

Sissinghurst Tower

Elk in Jasper

Rugby Tackle

Cable Car up to Montserrat, Spain

Misty Tree on Montserrat

Candles at Montserrat

This year has been pretty cool for me, I must say. Sailing, surfing, feeding the sheep… finding new recipes, and then making them over and over… hosting visitors and meeting up with friends and family… giving in to the gardening itch with a few bulbs and seeds in pots… witnessing concerts and matches… most recently finding a choir to sing with as well as an informal “barbershop” group… and I just created a flickr account with two pictures. That’s right, two blurry pics rate the new year post: http://www.flickr.com/photos/quebarbarakan/

Massage school continued through most of February and exams were in April. I missed a few sessions when we went home to renew driver’s licenses and so on, but I’m now an ITEC qualified holistic massage therapist. I haven’t taken any classes since, though I’m pondering music instruction in the new year. I finished up the rest of a sailing class owed me from the previous year, and got up for a surf lesson in Donegal, which was really fun. It’s pretty great living near an ocean for a change.

Throughout March a crop of lambs was born at Airfield, and thus began my first serious foray into photography with Morgan’s lovely Canon schtuff. It’s all mine now, especially the zoomy 70-200mm lens, which I like to pretend is a macro. (Thanks dear!) Quite a few afternoons were spent on the grounds of the Airfield Trust taking pictures of flowers and animals after the morning feeding. The farm should really get a post of its own at some point, as I’ve been volunteering a few times a week feeding animals and watching seasons go by in the gardens.

Or at least, I’ve volunteered during weeks that visitors aren’t staying. Both our families have been, as well as a handful of adventurous friends. The spare room has been getting good use, and I do love the apartment, so we’ve decided to stay in it for this year as well. So come make our rent worthwhile by visiting us! Guests are always good for getting us out and about to discover new spots.

Though we always want to travel more, this year had its fair share of trips: Oktoberfest in Munich (and again in Dublin in similar company), Budapest, Oslo, Paris, York, Brighton, and other bits of England, and most recently Barcelona. I’ve revisited favorite places in town (shops, restaurants, museums), and favourite places on the island to the North and the West. I got to see my sister and her boyfriend perform in Gilbert & Sullivan’s “Iolanthe” in Vancouver, and see my friends get married on a beautiful day in Jasper, which totally made my trip, not to mention my year.

Around town there is always good company to be had. And pints. I’ve discovered language exchange at the library, cheered on the Belvo ladies rugby team (well, I don’t really yell much, I just take pictures and wonder when I should bite the bullet and play), gone walking in the hills, arranged lunch dates with the girls, and seen a bunch of great concerts downtown, including Serenity’s only tour date before their singer got sick. And being part of the human tsunami that hit Croke Park for U2. Dublin `09, baby! Also, a shout-out at this point to the “pocket queens” who’ve been keeping my spirits up: a happy new year to you wherever you are, and all the best to you wherever you find yourselves in the coming seasons!

Looking ahead to 2010 now, I plan to keep up with my newfound vocal groups and keep spending time at Airfield. I hope to do more blogging and sort out a bunch of the pictures and videos we’ve amassed into something for us all to enjoy. I want to keep taking pictures for sure. Same thing with knitting – hey, I can cast on and off now! Pretty good eh? Almost ready for scarves…

Diane

Umm… you’re big. by Heraldk

We had previously found the aquarium and taken silly pictures outside it, and we succumbed to advertizing and went to see the captive creatures of the sea. There were fish in the marina beside the aquarium, so we got to see a preview before we got our tix and had our picture taken, cruise-style, as we entered. It was actually pretty cool, very kid-oriented and family friendly as well. After viewing the bulk of the exhibition tanks (which includes the obligatory “Nemo” tank), there are more kid-sized tanks and interactive play places that we enjoyed too. Because we’re big kids. We always love the sea horses, who look so mopey as they look around for edible tidbits. Tiny Eeyores all. There were also sea dragons whose leafy appendages made them look like different kelps. One of the most mesmerizing little fellows for me was what I now call a “nose fish” (spotted unicorn fish, actually) – it looks very cartoonish, just like you’d draw if you anthropomorphized a fish – y’know, like I draw after years of biology. I should explain that, sophisticated lady that I am, I spent most of my visit making fun of everyone else – the rays with their eyes above and smilie-faces beneath, the unfortunate looks of the frogfishes, the way snails steadily nom…nom…nom, crabs wearing other people’s shells. We watched feeding time in one tank. At first it was just lazy swimming and the anemones swaying their tentacles; eels were hiding in plain sight. Then the first bits of food dropped – mussels and bits of other fish, I want to say? – and it was a feeding frenzy! Anyway, it was good to get out of the rain and see those who might otherwise eat me if I were to go where they live, or who I can’t visit because it’s a little deep and cold for me. The main tank has lots of viewing space and a glass tunnel so you can watch sharks and stingrays swim overhead. I got a little obsessed trying to take pictures with the battle-scarred sunfish.

We wandered back across the Rambla del Mar and Passeig de Colom with Columbus atop his pillar pointing out to sea, and back on to La Rambla once again. By this time it had really become our familiar street. It was still spitting, but there were covered market tables set up, and we browsed the stalls and discovered a new wallet for Morgan and all kinds of baubles and bags and handicrafts. The buskers were setting up for the rush, and we passed our painting guy as we made our way along. I definitely <3 our little picture of la rambla!

Crazy Seahorse by Heraldk

Back at Hotel Principal, we formulated our plan of attack and headed back to Maria del Mar’s hood to check out a tapas place some friends had been. But we were too lazy to stand at the bar or around high tables to drink and chat as everyone was doing, so we went to dine in the fancy back restaurant. If you just want good food, you’ll get better value at Carmelita’s or Los Caracoles, but I must say the service here was the finest I’ve experienced anywhere in recollection. The wine list looked really tantalizing, and they served cider from a spigot that was run through a huge decorative cask set into the wall. That looked really good too. Our serving gal was good at pouring the cider from a long way away and making it look artistic.

By the time we were released back into the wild, it was the end of our trip. The next morning we got up early and grabbed the first croissants and juice of the day, checked out and caught the train, as Spanish-less and Catalan-less as we came.

Montserrat (I think) by Heraldk

Sunny Day by Heraldk

Our 5th day in Barcelona was Christmas day, and since not a lot was going to be open, we decided to sleep in a bit. After a bit of breakfast at the hotel, we wandered out in to the … sunshine! Yup, the clouds finally broke for us and we had a chance to wander around in the sunshine for once. Our plan for the day was to head over to Montjüic, which is a large hill overlooking the city and is the site of several of the venues from the 1992 summer olympics.

The first part of that plan was trying to find the funicular station to take us up, but we missed that which ended up being a good thing since the walk up wasn’t really that taxing, and if we had taken the funicular up we probably would’ve missed some of the views we did get. So as we climbed up, the city fell below us and we got a pretty good look at the city itself — primarily white and beige coloured buildings stretching out before us. Our wandering took us to one end of the closed-for-the-holidays cable car that takes people across the harbour for what I’m sure would be very nice views.

After wandering around a bit more, we took a gondola up to the very top of the mountain where there is a fortress called “Castell de Montjuïc”. This fortress offered some great views of the surrounding countryside, and conveniently for us had a restaurant in the fortress courtyard that was actually open for Christmas day. So we stopped for some food before continuing our exploration and picture taking from the top of the fortress.

Instead of taking the gondola back down, we decided to walk down through some of the olympic venues. This turned out to get us a little lost since there wasn’t a simple route back to the main road so we wandered in between the Stadi Olímpic and the Palau Sant Jordi before finally finding our way out to in front of the Palau Nacional which overlooks a large stairway heading back down into the city. There was quite a few people out on that beautiful day to enjoy the weather.

We headed back to our hotel via metro to have a nap and figure out where a good place to go for dinner was. Once again consulting wikitravel, we eventually ended up at Los Caracoles, which translates to “The Snails” — which also happens to be the restaurant’s signature dish. The restaurant’s exterior features a window where chickens are being roasted on spits, and when you walk into the restaurant, you first walk through the bar to the front desk where you ask for your table. From there you walk through the kitchen to the dining area. Our table was right next to the kitchen so we could see the cooks working away and the delicious dishes being whisked into the extensive dining area behind us. The inside of the restaurant was extensively decorated and felt quite comfortable. To add to the snail theme, not only were there some decorative snails everywhere, but the bread that came with our dinner was curled up to look like a snail! The food was excellent, and it turned out to be a great place to have our Christmas day dinner.

Our last day in Barcelona is up next …

Morgan