Ireland, Saturday Sep 26, 2009

   We left Philadelphia for Ireland on Friday night to visit my wife Mary’s family home in Donegal, Northwest Ireland. Mary’s first cousin, Ann Baiada rented a cottage in the village of Kilmacrenan about 5 miles north of the Town of Letterkenny (population 12,000). The cottage is big enough to comfortably put up Mary and I as well as the rest of our travel group; Mary’s sister Rose, her sons Sean and Mark and Sean’s 11 year old daughter Brigid.
   Ann is staying for 6 full weeks and graciously invited us to spend a week with her to meet with Irish family and figure out the connections that sometimes seem complicated on the American side.                  
   Kilmacrenan is close to Mary’s mother’s (Brigid) childhood home (Screen) before immigrating to America at age 19 to live the adult part of her long life.
   Our flight was direct to Dublin and was an easy 7 hour ride; we landed at 9AM and rented two cars for the 3 1/2 hour drive to Kilmacrenan. Sean and I both drove and had the chance to brush up on our left side driving skills (driver’s seat on the right while using the left hand to shift the manual 5 speed stick). Mark watched over the GPS in the lead car, with Mary & me following in our Toyota.
   The car rental seemed like a reasonable deal at less than 300 Euros for unlimited mileage for Mary & my 16 day stay, but the fees and mandatory insurance more than doubled the cost. The ride from the airport was pretty straight forward and even the roundabouts didn’t seem as hard to manage as I remembered from the last time I was driving in Scotland.
   We made it to the cottage at around 2:30 after a brief stop for food along the way. We met with Ann when we got in; she had the room assignments figured out from managing her own family’s comings and goings from the US during her long stay. At around 5 we all went to our rooms for naps so we could go out to a local pub later where some cousins were playing on Saturday night. I never have much luck sleeping on planes so when it was time to wake up and go to the pub, I didn’t make it, Mary and the rest of the group walked (about 3 blocks) to the place around 10:15 and had a great time singing with the crowd. Sean and Mark were the last ones home close to 2 am when we tried to figure out how to lock the front door for around 20 minutes before Mary came downstairs and knew the trick on how to do it.
   Ann goes into Kilmacrenan daily to a community center with an internet connection so she can check her mail. It looks like I’ll be downloading posts to my travel blog from there for my first week; the second week will be on the road so later posts may get spotty later depending on connections. I’ll pick up my travel blog where I left off in Norway and try to keep the same format of a few pics and a couple of paragraphs each time I post. It’s now almost 4 am so I’ll try to catch another couple of hours of sleep before morning.

   Regards to all, John

Last Day

   




















   Today I took a loop around the city on a different trolley line. I went further out from center city and rather than walking back into town like I did on the other days, I got on and off the trolley when I saw something interesting. The bus pass I got the other day is good for unlimited travel, so it was easy and cheap.

   I went to see the national gallery near the university and it was a nice little museum, old but well organized and taken care of. It was crowded with lots of Asian tourists from a cruise ship and little kids with their school classes. Lots of kids were sprawled out in front of the paintings with paper and crayons on the floor. Maybe that's a good way to look for budding artists.
It was tricky navigating my way through the rooms without stepping on any little kids, or knocking over any old ladies. The paintings were at eye level and the kids and old ladies were at hip level and below. The museum had a handful of Impressionist paintings and it's most famous piece is 'The Scream' by Norwegian Edvard Munch.

   I went by a news stand with lots of papers, wondering if the late game ball scores were in there. I got off the trolley and had lunch at a place recommended in the travel guide, called Godt Brod. It sold loaves of fresh bread for takeout and made sandwiches for eating at tables inside. I had a ham and cucumber baguette, it tasted better than it sounds. For dinner I went to The Dubliner Pub, (as a side note, the vikings take credit for founding the city of Dublin). I ordered a Guinness and a menu item called 'The Codfather's Fish & Chips'. The waitress said they were out of fish and recommended the 'Hangover Burger' instead; it wasn't bad. The price for the burger and Guinness was close to $40. It made me think the reason my pants have seemed a little looser wasn't all the walking afterall, it's my wallet getting so thin after a week here.

   I called SAS Airlines today to check on my flights. When I had to take Plan B on the front end of my roundtrip, I was worried the airline would cancel the return like they do in the states. I stopped in at the SAS Office when I arrived in Bergen and they said my return was safe, not to worry. But today (of course) SAS said my return was also cancelled. After about a half hour of polite but assertive phone conversation, they agreed to re-book me on the same flights. It makes me wonder if Edvard Munch was dealing with airlines before he painted The Scream. It's an early night tonight, trying to re-pack everything in my bag before bed. I'm up at 5, checkout around 6 and to the airport around 7 am. I'll be tired but happy to be home again. Thanks for reading and for (almost) all the comments over the last 3 weeks (wink/smile). It's been a fun little travel project for me. Safe travels, all !

More museums and getting around Oslo

    
  

































































   Monday was a local holiday, I figured this out when I went walking and noticed that all the shops were closed. Luckily the museums and bars were open. I went to the harbor castle fortress which still serves as a military headquarters and hosts formal receptions for visiting heads of state. There's also a royal mausoleum down below next to the dungeon with the coffins of King Haakon and Queen Maude. On the grounds there's also a museum for the German Resistance during WW2.


   On Tuesday I wanted to get out of the city center, and I was able to figure out the city bus and trolley system. I've been doing a lot of walking the last week and my legs are starting to feel it. I took a trolley ride to the trendy Grunerlokka section which reminded me of a small Brooklyn, with some good looking restaurants. The bus and trolley stops have computer signs showing the wait time for each line that passes by. There was even a nice looking doggie on my morning trolley.

   I hopped a bus to the Kon-Tiki Museum on the other side of the city which houses the actual reed boat (Ra II) that another famous Norwegian exployer, Thor Heyerdahl used to cross from North Africa to Barbados in 1970. Thor was also famous for sailing the Kon-Tiki, another reed boat from Peru to Polynesia in 1947. That boat was destroyed on a coral reef when it reached dry land after 101 days at sea. Also in that area was the Norwegian Folk History Museum. It's an open air museum covering acres of ground where historic farmhouses, countryside homes and a wooden stave church were relocated to save as part of the cultural history.

   Oslo is an expensive city, the bus ride costs $6 one way. A beer is $10 for a small draft local brew; a beer and burger tops $30. Norway was expensive when I was here in the navy in the 70's, it hasn't changed. I ran across this Karaoke Taxi service a couple of times this week and it makes me think about bringing the idea to the US for my next career. I can picture this as a big hit in a place like New York City. Two more days here in Oslo before I fly home on Friday morning. It's been a great trip but I'm missing everyone and I'm ready to come home. I'll try at least one more post from Norway before I leave. I'm sure there'll be something interesting to take a picture of.

Museum weekend

    It was warm in Oslo this weekend, I'm glad I brought along one decent short sleeved shirt to walk around the museums. I went to the Viking Ship Museum and a couple of close by maritime museums. They were located away from the central part of the city so I took a water taxi to get there. The taxi passed 4 cruise ships in the harbor, so as you can guess it was busy.

   The Viking Ship museum was built especially to show 3 ships from the 800 AD era that were excavated in the early 1900's in northwest Norway. They were all working-type boats that were eventually used as funeral ships for local kings and queens. They were on display with some hand carved sleds and a wagon, along with other relics buried with the ships.

   One of the maritime museums housed the M.S. Fram, which was specially built in the 1880's for ice exploration. It made two Arctic expeditions with some (locally) famous Norwegian explorers trying to be the first to get to the North Pole. In one of the voyages, the ship became trapped in packed ice and stayed stuck for 3 years. The crew left with enough provisions for 5 years so they had enough to survive. But with the ship stranded, the members of the main expedition team decided the only way they could make it to the pole was by dog sled. So they set off on a year-long trek over the ice but only got to 86 degrees north before they gave up and turned back south. The sled teams eventually were picked up in northern Russia by another ship and they returned to Norway around the same time the Fram got free of the ice jam.

   The Fram later made a trip to Antactica with Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen who became the first person to make it to the South Pole in 1911. The ship is now housed inside it's own museum and visitors are allowed onboard and even below deck. You can guess how cool I thought that was.  Outside the Fram Museum is the M.S. Gjoa (don't ask me to pronounce it) which was the first ship to make it through the Northwest Passage over the top of Canada to Alaska, in 1906.

   And while I'm not fond of Indian food, I couldn't help but think how great dinner would be at such an authenic ethnic restaurant, so I took a picture.

   The main strip in Oslo is Karl Johans Gate which is pedestrian-only and about 3 miles long from the Royal Palace to the main train station. All along it are tall buildings, shops, bars and cafes and it's always crowded. On Saturday night there were thousands of young people (20 something's) out cruising from bar to bar. Every few blocks there were street musicians, some pretty good but also a couple of gypsies playing mostly unintelligible stuff on acordians and tamburines.

   As I walked down the hill towards my hotel, from a distance I heard what sounded like the entire drum section from the Notre Dame marching band. When I got up close, it turned out to be one teenager with a set of drums and a couple hundred people standing around going crazy and cheering him on; he was terrific. The sound bounced off the tall buildings and you could hear him for blocks.

   With thousands of young people out, many of them drunk long before the bars closed at 3am, you can imagine what the street looked like last night. But this morning I was out at 9:30 and it was perfectly clean; every trash can even had fresh bag liners. There were families out walking with little kids and dogs and the only hint of last night were a few small puddles of water that hadn't yet evaporated from the cleaning crews' excellent work.

Oslo

    I made it to Oslo late this afternoon after a 7 hr train ride from Bergen. The trip turned out to be as scenic as advertised and I had a nose-print seat at a clean window. The scenery changed a few times along the way from coastal salt air, to fresh water mountain streams, then to almost blinding white over the top. The highest point was about 4,000 ft and the bright sun and white snow made me wish I had sun glasses. There were country hillside scenes of horses and sheep with new lambs, also some long tunnel stretches. No moose though ;-(

   At first look, Oslo is a very pretty city and there were big crowds roaming the main streets around the harbor after dinner. The city population is around 500,000, double the size of Bergen, but it looks much bigger. It seemed like the whole city was out tonight.

   I'm staying at a Thon Hotel not too far from the harbor. The online rate was good and the room is big so it'll be a comfortable place to spend the week. My legs are starting to feel all the walking I've been doing. Tomorrow the Viking Ship Museum ..... and lots of exploring the city. Have a good weekend, everyone !

Last day in Bergen

    I got my train ticket and then did some shopping and sight seeing. I went to the aquarium and was probably the only adult there without a little kid in tow, but the fish didn't let on if they noticed. I was down at the warf and saw some construction going on. There were guys working with actual logs replacing the floor in one of the old wooden warehouses; talk about authentic restoration! 

   I managed to get all my photos on Flickr; they're not organized other than being in thumbnail format so you can go through them pretty quick. Here's the link if you're looking for something to do: http://www.flickr.com/photos/19368857@N02/sets/72157617530107651/ Sorry but you'll have to copy and paste the link in your browser address to get to the site. I'm not smart enough (yet) to send it to you in the quick format.

   Off to Oslo tomorrow for my last stop on this trip, enjoy your weekend everyone.

Back in Bergen

    We got into Bergen on Tuesday afternoon and it was an easy transfer to my hotel. It was raining so I didn't get around as much as I'd like, but I did find the train station and a place close to the fish market to have an outdoor beer.

   After a long night's sleep, today I found the martime and cultural museums. They were on a far side of town (pretty too) after a big walk up to another old church. Funny how you can hardly get me into a church at home, but it's the opposite here (even though I don't stay long).

   I did a little window shopping at the old warf area where some of the original wooden buildings are now used as art studios and shops for tourists. It started to rain again in the afternoon so luckily I found myself close to a another bar with an awning. I relaxed a bit and watched people walk by until the rain stopped.

   Tomorrow I go the train station to buy my ticket for Friday's trip to Oslo. I saw a sign at the station yesterday saying I need to buy the ticket a day ahead. The train ride is around 8 hours through the mountains, so it should be pretty out the window.

   Is there such a thing as scenery fatigue? I'm having luck uploading my 400 (or so) pictures onto Flickr. I'll include the link on the blog after I organize them a bit, it's pretty messy in there now.