May 12, 2015
We were awakened
at 7 when the announcement on the hallway speakers broadcast that the tender
transport (transferring by the lifeboats from the ship to the Dún Laoghaire
pier) was in place. The temperature was 12 C, windy, but sunny. The water was
quite choppy with white caps, which caused a delay in sending tenders due to
difficulty of people entering the boats as they bobbed beside the ship. We had
to wait 35 minutes for a tender to leave the ship, there was a rumor that the
tendering might stop due to the 1 ½ to 2 meter waves, but, at last, we got into
the tender to take us to shore. We
jogged to the train station about 1 km away. The cost of a return ticket to Tara
Street station, Dublin, was 6 € each (or less than $9 Cdn). It was 10:30 a.m. and we wanted
to take an 11 a.m. walking tour from Trinity College’s front entrance. The commuter
train arrived within a few minutes and had Wi-Fi. We arrived at Tara Street station a few
minutes to 11 and followed the directions to Trinity College. However, we turned in the wrong direction and
took almost 10 minutes to find Trinity College’s front entrance and saw no sign
of a walking tour. We passed the line for viewing the Book of Kells, which is a
9th century handwritten and ornately illustrated Latin text of the four Christian
gospels, housed in Trinity College’s 16th century Old Library. The Old
Library houses many ancient and rare manuscripts. We have learned that we
should bring maps with as much detail as we can find, if we are going to
explore on our own. We went to a nearby
Information Centre and created our own route. We took photos of the courtyard
at Trinity College founded in 1592 and in its present location since the 1700s.
It is oldest university in Ireland. Today it is in the heart of Dublin. Then we made our way to Dublin
Castle passing City Hall and the larger than life size bronze statue of Molly
Malone, a 17th century fish monger from an Irish ballad.
At Dublin
Castle, in the historic area of Dublin, we took photos of the Chapel Royal and
Record Tower and the Treasury Building then entered the large Upper Castle courtyard
which is based on the 1204 courtyard layout.
Churches in this area were attacked by Vikings in 837 and within a few
years they settled here until 1171 when they were defeated by the Normans from
Wales. There is a section of state apartments which were lived in by the
English Viceroys from 1680 to 1830 and are used for ceremonies today. In the
courtyard is the Bedford Tower dating from 1761. We exited onto Dame Street
across from Temple Bar in the Arlington Hotel. As we walked along Christchurch
Place, we passed one of two medieval Gothic style Church of Ireland cathedrals,
Christ Church Cathedral, in this location since 1030, when it was a Viking church;
in 1300 the pope consecrated it as the Archbishop of Dublin’s seat. There were some repairs being carried out on
its tower. The Roman Catholic Holy See, recognizes Christ Church Cathedral as
the rightful seat of the Archbishop of Dublin, but St. Mary’s church is currently
the acting (pro-cathedral) seat. St. Mary’s Pro-Cathedral is located on Marlborough Street
on the other side of the Liffey River. The combined choirs of Christ Church Cathedral
and St. Patrick’s Cathedral premiered Handel’s Messiah, in 1742. Both churches
were transformed to Church of Ireland during the Reformation. We continued a
few more blocks to the other Church of Ireland cathedral, St. Patrick’s
Cathedral, the national and largest church of the Church of Ireland. There is no
bishop in the Church of Ireland. Parts of the cathedral were completed in the
1260 and the Lady Chapel added in 1270. We took a 45 minute guided tour of the
interior and learned that the author of Gulliver’s Travels, Jonathan Swift, was
the church dean from 1713 to 1745. In the choir section’s back row is one seat
for each parish’s visiting clergyman. The front two rows are for choir members.
Also above these pews, there are helmets and coat of arms banners for the
Knights of St. Patrick which was formed in 1783 and met in the cathedral until
1870, when they moved to Dublin Castle. The north transept is a tribute to the
Irish regiments of the 19th and 20th centuries. The floor tiles are replicas of
the original 13th century ones. There are beautiful stained glass windows. With
some advice from the cathedral guide, we headed toward the House of Parliament
through St. Stephen’s Green Park, passing its duck pond, where swans were
swimming. Then we walked along Kildare Street to cross the Liffey River on O’Connor
Bridge, built in 1880, and along the north bank street of Eden Quay changing its name to Custom House
Quay, viewing the James Gandon designed Custom House that was constructed in
the late 1700s. It was constructed on reclaimed swamp land from the Liffey
estuary. In May 1921, the interior of the Custom House, including the collapse
of its dome, was completely destroyed by fire, burning for five days, set by
the IRA. The Custom House was reconstructed shortly after the Civil War ended
by the Irish Free State government. Another restoration occurred in the 1980s when further deterioration,
caused by the fire, was discovered. We crossed the Liffey River, on the three
span Talbot Memorial bridge, seeing the 2009 rotatable Samuel Beckett Bridge down
the river to the east. On the south side we could see colourfully painted buildings
housing a pre-school. We were a five minute walk from Tara Street train
station. Steps 12,289. It was about 2, the sun was shining for a moment through
the clouds, it was quite windy and the temperature was 12 C. We had a few minutes to wait for the 20
minute train ride back to Dun Laoghaire.
Back in Dun Laoghaire , we photographed the building in
Harbour Square across the street from the train station, then walked to Lower
George’s Street and looked in the windows of the shops and cafés. We stopped for
coffee at the Natural Bakery and ordered a dessert slice each as our lunch.
Steps 14,705. We finished the walk back
to the pier to catch the next tender of at least seven rotating to and from the
ship and took a photo of the interior of the lifeboat. The return trip was
smoother than the morning ride. In the Piazza, before dinner a pianist played,
but it was not dance music. We joined Ed and Linda at our dinner table, then
Ken and Evangeline arrived. Neither Brendene and Brian nor Trish and Dave appeared
for dinner. Both couples were on tours that arrived back later. Trudy and Eisa
dined by themselves at their neighbouring table for six, having arrived when
our appetizers were served.
Appetizers Grilled Chicken Salad, Strawberry
Smoothie, Italian Sausage Chowder or Cantaloupe, then for entrées we both chose
Seared Scallops. Dessert was Coconut Dark Chocolate Mousse or Pecan
Butterscotch Pie. Today’s entertainment
in the Princess Theatre was singer, Paul Stone. We looked for Peter and Karen on decks 5,6,7
and 16 but couldn’t find them, so went back to the stateroom to read. We
ventured back to deck 16 for popcorn and soft ice cream from the “Movie Under
the Stars” snack bar, before calling it a day. Total steps for today 21,771,
almost 16 km!
May 11, 2015
Today has some
cloud, a west wind 18 mph and a 10 C morning temperature in Cobh (pronounced
Cove), Ireland. After breakfast, we went to the Princess Theatre 15 minutes
early to collect the sticker for our excursion and we were ushered out to the
waiting buses. We were on bus # 3, out of 8, which hold 48 passengers on the
Best of Cork countryside tour. We were on the road by 8:30 but shortly pulled
over with a mechanical problem. Within 30 minutes another bus arrived and we were
transferred and we were on our way. Our first stop was to be at Kinsale which
is 23 km from the natural deep harbor port of Cobh. Passengers boarded the
Titanic on April 11, 1912 at one of the docks in Cobh. The building housing the
White Star Lines offices is still located in Cobh.
We noticed
fields covered with huge swathes of clear plastic used to protect the maze
seedlings from frosts and to encourage early germination. The town of Kinsale
is not far from the point of land off which the ship Lusitania was torpedoed
during the afternoon of May 7, 1915. The
RMS Lusitania had left New York City on May 1 and was headed to Liverpool, but
there was a warning that U-boats were in the Celtic Sea area. Over 1,100 of
1,900 passengers and crew died when the Lusitania sank in less than 20 minutes.
There were rumors that ammunition was being secretly transported in the ship’s
hold and that a second explosion was due to the ammunition and caused the quick
sinking of the ship.
Kinsale was
founded in the 7th century when a monastery was founded and by the
12th century it was walled town. We were allowed an hour to wander
Kinsale on our own. After getting a map at the Information Center, we walked a
few blocks to St. Mulrose Anglican Church of Ireland. It is a Norman style
built in 1190. Then we walked a few streets over to the 1832 built St. John the
Baptist Roman Catholic Church. It was
erected as soon as Irish laws were relaxed and the Roman Catholics were allowed
to build churches.
Our last visit
was to Desmond Castle, an example of an Irish Tower House, built in the 1500s
and used at one time as a prison, but is now a Wine Museum which shows where
Irish people have emigrated and established vineyards around the world. Steps
5,255. We returned to the meeting place by the harbour, to continue to the
nearby Fort Charles. The fort was built to protect the entrance to Kinsale
harbour. Close to its location on December 24, 1601 a combined Irish and
Spanish navy was defeated by the English protestants. Several kilometers away
you can see the point off where the Lusitania sank.
Our next stop
was lunch at the Rochestown Park Hotel where we were entertained by Irish
folksinger, Michael Kennedy, playing Celtic music and two teenage girl Irish
dancers. The menu was Cream of Vegetable soup, roasted stuffed chicken breast
with mashed and roasted potatoes, plus roasted carrots, parsnips and squash.
The dessert was Pavlova with whipped cream and berries. You could order several
Irish beers including Guiness and Murphy. The afternoon started with a tour of
Cork City in County Cork where we passed City Hall, a Roman Catholic church
built in 1830s, the gates of the Old City Wall, crossed the Lea River and
passed the Heineken beer complex. Also noticeable were signs for the
constitutional amendment referendum to legalize gay marriages in Ireland on May
22.
On the way to
Blarney, there was a short rain shower. By
the time we arrived in Blarney, a town with buildings from the 1700s, to visit
Blarney Castle, the rain had stopped. Blarney Castle is a ruin now, but was
built in the mid 1400s as the stronghold of the McCarthy tribe chieftains. There
is a watch tower 100 meters from the entrance to the castle. We took many
photos of the castle exterior and grounds. We walked some of the castle walls
and wandered the park and gardens, including the Rock Close with the Witch’s
Stone and the Wishing Steps beside a small waterfall. We bypassed the 90 minute
line to climb 100 steps of the tower to kiss the Blarney Stone. Also in the
grounds, is an 1874 built house that has been restored. By the parking lot is the Blarney Woolen Mills
store which has an extraordinary selection of Waterford Crystal; Irish linens;
Irish knit sweaters of a variety of patterns, weights and styles; Donegal
tweed; bone china; Celtic brooches; scarves; men’s, women’s and children’s
clothing; mittens; gloves and souvenirs of Ireland. We ended our 2 ½ hour visit with a coffee
stop at Insomnia Café. Steps 11,523. The ride back to the ship was 45 minutes
and we arrived 4 minutes before the “All Aboard”, but were not the last tour to
return. As we returned through Cork City, we took photos of Trinity
Presbyterian Church and St. Patrick Roman Catholic Church.
Tonight our
whole group of 14 was treated to a specialty restaurant meal at Sabatini’s
Italian restaurant. We all enjoyed ourselves. We went to the Vista Lounge
(seats around 400) to watch George Casey’s comedy show, standing room only.
After we went to Club 6 for Latin dancing with a DJ playing the fast paced loud
music, but left to go to deck 5’s Piazza for the party band, New Deal’s one set
at 10:45 to dance before going to bed. Total
steps for today 18,301.
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