Ireland: Initial Smaoinimh

Those of you following us on FB saw the pics. Irish August is like Yankee September. Summer? What summer? Every day there was a possibility of rain and every day that possibility was realized. But don't worry, as fast as the rain came, it left. Don't like Ireland's weather, eh? Just wait a minute.

We stayed in a lovely house in Baldoyle, northeast of Dublin. Baldoyle lies on an inlet lashed by Irish Sea winds and shrouded in mist. One need only look out upon the water to imagine Viking longboats approaching, for a thousand years ago approach this place they surely did.

A decade and two daughters ago the Fami de Stroock went to Ireland, and we came away thinking, this looks like Pennsylvania especially after our drive from Dublin down to Cork. But here, and throughout our tour of the countryside, Ireland looked like Ireland. It was green, hilly and felt like Middle Earth, or Westeros anyway, which makes sense.

Dublin...ahhh Dublin. When we were there a decade ago we were impressed. To be honest, this time, not. We'll go into more detail in a later post, but if one is looking for Olde Dublin one will only find it at Disney's Epcot Center. Dublin has lots of bums on the street and a graffiti problem. They better get Rudy Giuliani there quick. Dublin is also globalized, we saw the hijab.

The people looked... as expected. Still, every once in a while we'd see a faire Irish lass, red of hair,  with big blue eyes set in high cheek bones themselves splashed with freckles. We'd nod to ourselves and think aye... Most of the young men were skinny, like American Millennials, but the older blokes were stockier, with hard, weather beaten faces. In every instance these people treated us well.