Day 30

I’m in Dublin. Exciting but sad.

I woke, yesterday, at 8:30 ish and breakfasted on the remains of the bread and honey. When I stop travelling, I think toast with honey will become a staple, or part of a staple breakfast. Honey was made to go with toast. Bananas and bread, however, will not be eaten as a sandwich for a very long time.

I found Kieren, the innkeeper, and he told me there was nothing yet to do. I asked him what I could do today, he said he wanted me to take the sheets of the hostel to the laundrette down the road. And that was it. When? ‘Not now, er ... later’.

I asked to do something, anything, and in desperation he gave me a broom to sweep the floor. The hostel has a cleaner that comes in everyday and gets paid the same no matter what the state the hostel is in.

While waiting for the clothes to be cleaned (once I actually took them down) I watched television. One of the channels had live coverage of the first official meeting of the North-South Council, brought into existence by the Good Friday Agreement. This was the measure not wanted at all by the Unionists, but insisted upon by the Nationalists, bringing, as it does, the North and the Republic closer together, institutionally.

The Council will be meeting in Armagh, at some house that I passed as I rode out of that town. I have to say I am quite proud? excited? pleased? at the prospect at being in the country while history is being made.

I felt guilty about not doing any work in exchange for a discount. Taking three sacks down to the laundrette and then back is not much work. Kieren, sticking to the bargain, was willing to charge me £4, plus the Internet time I used last night. I disagreed, and in the end, I paid £9 for the night and the Internet access (which normally costs £2.50). Which made me feel a little less guilty at doing no work.

I finished the clothes by 12:45 and decided to do some tourist type thing. There was a map on the wall of the hostel of Drogheda, with some of the highlights of the town illustrated. I have to say it doesn’t seem like the most exciting of towns, considering how old it is.

As far as I know, Drogheda was founded by the Vikings, as were quite a few towns around the country - Dublin, Wexford and (I think) Cork being some examples. Shortly after the Norman invasion, there was an area around Dublin that the English had control over, the rest of Ireland was still hostile to them. This area, about 50 km in diameter, was known as the Pale; Drogheda was the northern border of the Pale. The expression ‘beyond the Pale’ comes from this region.

I am sure that Drogheda should be famous for another reason, but I don’t know it. Now that I am here in the comfortable warmth of Dublin, I am thinking with hindsight that I should have asked someone there more about the place.

Anyway, I noticed that there was an old monastery outside the town, so I thought I would go there, as every other place on the map looked like they would cost money.

The ruins were 10 km from the hostel, and I thoroughly enjoyed the ride. It was bitterly cold, of course, but 15 minutes on a bike solves that. There was little wind, no rain and what’s more, I didn’t have the backpack. The ride was nicely hilly and the countryside beautiful. Of course, there were no signs at all pointing to the monastery. I remembered which streets I had to take to get out of Drogheda from the map on the wall at the hostel. Once I was on the road, outside of the town, I knocked on the door of a B+B and was assured that I was on the right road.

Mellifont Abbey was founded in 1142 by Cistercian Monks. It had a troubled history, with the first lot of monks returning to France (obviously sick and tired of the weather) and an unspecified scandal which caused the church in the abbey to be burnt in the 14th (or was it the 13th?) century, and rebuilt in the following century. Finally, the local lords took it over as a residence in the 16th century, though monks continued to stay there, the last abbot died in the mid 18th century.

The ruins are in fairly good condition. Although most of the walls aren’t over a metre in height, there are some areas where the walls reached over my head, particularly doorways and one impressive hallway covered over by a stone ceiling.

The latest church (16th century, I think) clearly stands, with complete walls and ceiling, while other rooms are clearly what they are shown to be, the crypt and the infirmary are the examples that spring to mind. Compare this with the ruins at say, Masada. A blue and white sign there tells us that a pile of stone was the bakery or whatever, when in truth, it looks like any other building. The infirmary at Mellifont was clearly that, with stone platforms for beds, in neat rows, a stone hallway between them.

The old monastery that I saw in Wales somewhere was much larger and in better shape, but then, I only saw that through a fence, and had to peer through people’s shoulders to do so. Here, I was completely alone, on a beautiful, sunny day in a quiet, ruined monastery.

I wandered around for about half an hour. There was a nice little stream gurgling past the ruins on its way to the Boyne. It was a really pleasant afternoon, and I enjoyed my time there.

I took a photo, not so much to show the ruins but to show the length of the shadows cast by a sun of 1:45, a long way to the south. I guess this photo also proves that there was sun at least once on this trip, which also counts for the general lack of photos; this camera is so cheap, I think one drop of water would wreck it.



The ride back to Drogheda was more enjoyable - I think the wind was behind me - and I got back to the hostel at 2:30.

I went into town to post the journal and ate lunch, going back to pack my bags and catch the 4 pm bus to Dublin.

My fare cost £4.80, the bike cost £6. Six pounds! I couldn’t believe it. I should have caught the train. It would have worked out cheaper, quicker and more comfortable, but it was too late; the ticket was bought and I (and the bike) were on the bus.

Looking back, it was sheer laziness. It is 50 km from Drogheda to Dublin, but I didn’t have to worry about looking for accommodation, so I could have kept riding well after 3 pm.

It would have been a nice easy ride, as well (I noted this from the comfort of a bus seat) but the thoughts that I have had for a day or two (that my trip is basically over), were strong and my laziness overtook my thriftiness.

At some point on Sunday I rang John Kelly, and he asked me if I wanted to stay in his apartment while I was in Dublin. He said he would be delighted to have me, so I accepted (of course!)

I got to Dublin at 5 pm and found John Kelly’s apartment building by 5:45, though no one was home. After a pint, and then another, given to me by a Dublin man impressed by my efforts, he still wasn’t home. I had to leave the pub, or I would have (finally) met John drunk. The men I was sitting with in the pub had asked me if I wanted another! I wandered, and eventually found a place selling wedges and a coke.

The apartment was in a place called The Old Distillery, in a beautiful area of Dublin. It is within spitting distance of the Four Courts, which is next to the Liffey, and only a couple of blocks from O’Connell St.

At 7:30 John answered the phone and I came here. John Kelly lived in Australia for 10 years, and for one of those years he was working with Julie in Sydney. Upon hearing I was coming to Ireland, he offered his house as an emergency address.

He is a very kind man and both he and his wife Allison have been most hospitable. And their apartment is incredible! Not only is it very comfortable, but after spending last night in a hostel, and the night before that on a haystack, it is luxury. Allison later apologised for only having an air mattress. I told her the carpet itself would have been a luxury, for which I got a funny look.

We talked for a bit when I got in and went out to a chic noodle house and ate, which he paid for.

On the walk back to his apartment he took me on a brief tour of Trinity College and the streets around it.

Trinity was really impressive by night. Clever lighting illuminates the Elizabethan buildings to make them glow. We walked through the Temple Bar district (the fashionable quarter of Dublin) and he pointed out the Kitchen to me, which wasn’t yet opened (the time then was just before 11 pm).

The Kitchen is the nightclub owned by Bono! Of all the things I want to do in Dublin, going to the Kitchen is number one on the list. As far as I know, this is the place that U2 filmed the clip to Even Better Than The Real Thing. I do know that they sometimes make impromptu appearances there.

I fell asleep, quite exhausted, in the spare room, on the air mattress.

So, my riding is over, with 457 km on the dial. I am quite proud of myself with that figure, though I did get lazy in the last two days and skipped the last 100 km. I woke up at 9:30 and helped myself to the shower, the muesli and washing machine.

John had left me the keys and instructed me to make myself at home.

Last night I rang Morgan McStay. He is the Ireland representative of the ICEJ. Mum had given me his address. He agreed to meet at 2 pm near John’s apartment. I left at 10:30 and walked to the Temple Bar district, amazed at the cafes and general wealth I was passing. A month in the countryside on a shoestring budget will turn any one into a country bumpkin.

I found St. Steven’s Green, a fairly large park with different memorials for different parts of Irish history; the Famine, Wolfe Tone, Parnell, etc. St. Steven’s Green was one of the strategic sites captured by the Irish Volunteers in 1916, along with the GPO, the Four Courts, etc.

From the park, I wandered blindly, enjoying the sunshine and the buildings and the beautiful Celtic women. I passed the Natural History Museum, the National Library, the ‘Government Buildings’ and the National Gallery but didn’t go into any of them.

After an hour or more, I found myself back at the main entrance to Trinity College, so I entered the arch and walked to the library. This is where the Book of Kells is kept, but they charge a price to see it; so I declined, mainly on principle.

The Book of Kells is very old, though I don’t know how old. It is an illustrated edition of the Gospel of Mark. Maybe it was written by St. Patrick’s groupies, I don’t know. I will have to look that up when I go to Australia. It is proof that Irish culture was ‘flowering, while Europe writhed in the Dark Ages’, to loosely quote Mr. Uris.

Which reminds me, Conor spent a good part of the book in Dublin. Actually a map of Dublin is one of the maps at the start of a section (hence, I found the place quite familiar once I was here and walking along the streets).

I found a student union type place and ate cheap food and helped myself to the free Internet access. A healthy Irish accent and a messy, half-grown goatee, complete with a backpack slung over my shoulder convinced everyone I was a student.

I walked back to the apartment at 1 pm (it took twenty-five minutes to get there) and waited until five to two, at which time I walked to the end of the street, waited two minutes and was picked up by Morgan McStay.

He is a retired engineer who is quite involved with the ICEJ and has spoken at one of the Feast’s seminars (on the Jewish roots of Christianity).

All day we had interesting discussions, even if sometimes they did go way over my head. It was good to listen to someone who is interested in the same things I am yet knows so much more about them than I do.

We drove along O’Connell St. and onto St. Patrick’s Cathedral, the Dublin Church of Ireland cathedral. He paid for us to go in there and we looked around. It was certainly a nice building, but I wasn’t all that impressed.

We drove on and came to Kilmainhem Jail. Now, this is what impressed me.

Although it was commissioned in the late 18th century as an ordinary jail, within ten years it would be the detention centre of Ireland’s republican prisoners. It held Wolfe Tone, Parnell, Robert Emmet, the Fenians, the Young Irelanders, De Velera, Pierce, Connolly and many others. The tour (paid for by Mr. McStay) was very good and intimate; there was a total of three tourists. A 30 minute film retold a lot of the history of the jail.

We were shown the place the seventeen men were executed by the British after 1916, and many other places, including rooms of the various famous prisoners. It was fantastic to see.

When we entered the ‘East Wing’ I recognised it instantly; it was where In The Name Of The Father was filmed. However, the ‘Guildford Four’ were caught, tried and jailed in England.

Mr McStay dropped me off at 5 ish and I spent a very entertaining evening drinking wine with John and Allison, talking about everything from siblings to work to history to politics to food to Sweden and back again. We drank wine, had take away Indian food and talked until midnight.

I wanted to go to The Kitchen, so I changed into my newly cleaned jeans and shirt and set off, getting there about 12:40. The doorman was very kind but very firm and said they were full and there was no way I was going to get in. It’s a Tuesday night! He said Tuesday nights are their busiest, and it wasn’t worth me waiting.

I have to admit I am pretty disappointed. Never mind - it will be there when I come back to Ireland.

Now it is 2:15 and I am going to sleep. It is very difficult to write a journal while propped up on elbows, on an air mattress.