Dingle

It took a day and a night for me to fall in love with the Dingle peninsula. They followed two nights and a day, but I know Tuesday - from morning 'til night - was the turning point.

A leisurely drive with wonderful company, that aimed only to see some stone age monuments and the coastline, became a pilgrimage. We stalked some basking sharks around the Slea Head drive. The sharks lured us in, and we took the bait for ninety minutes at one point, gazing at their sleek forms as they fed at the bottom of the sea cliffs.

Delicious hake for dinner, followed by the pub, and a brief liaison with a lovely girl - all combined to create a most magnificent day.

But there is something in the very air of Dingle that pleases the soul. An infectious bliss. The abundance of cafes. Pubs with character (and snugs). The sea breeze carrying the cries of Fungie... okay, that's mostly my imagination.

Though it's full of tourists and day-trippers, the town retains a reserved air - calm, enduring, unflappable. With my current position on the Iveragh peninsula, I cannot help but draw comparisons to traffic-choked, noisy, expensive Killarney. I suppose the Ring of Kerry offers better value to tourists with limited time.

Portmagee is reminiscent of Dingle town though - quietly observing the coming and going of fisherman, visitors and locals. People the years particular houses were built, so little has it been expanded.

Belgrade

Serbian drivers are nuts, but the people are the friendliest I've encountered. A day with my niece's godfather, desperately struggling to remember my Leaving Cert German. An evening on the terrace drinking beer and schnapps with Sneza's father, whom I had previous essentially snogged. I'm sure my quite nature is sometimes mistaken for aloofness, but everywhere I was greeted by smiles and the warmest hospitality.

The city itself is perhaps in a state of transition still. The museum is being renovated, the national assembly and the massive St Mark's are both clad in a cocoon of scaffolding. Communist era façades dominate the centre, but elsewhere glass-fronted offices vie for space beside ailing apartment blocks. One failing bridge over the Danube contrasts with several modern spans on the Sava. Maybe the Sava is thought of as Belgrade's, and the Danube is in shared custody, and only given attention once in a while.

Capitalism has not become a scourge yet. Stalls are abundant, but hawkers do not impose. Only one street has the air of a tourist trap, with maître d's hovering outside, tempting passers-by. Muscisians plays by the tables, romancing couples with renditions of Sinatra.

365 Project

Candlelight

I've always been slightly obsessed with taking photos of candles. Something about a single flame... isolated and alone, yet warm and welcoming; beautiful, but dangerous.

 

This one was in the Cellar bar in Galway city. I'm most impressed that it turned out so well, considering it was taken with my phone camera.

Dublin sunset

Twilight beyond the Samuel Beckett bridge.

The Hills

Out for a bit of a hike with some American students, showing them a bit of the other side of Dublin.

 

Odd watercourse, beside the Chemserve building on Edmondstown Road - slows the water down. Just before it is what appears to be a mill race, but modern. No idea what the overall purpose is though.

 

Archway in the old Kilakee gardens in Lord Massey's.

 

Hellfire Club overlooking the city.

 

Pink ribbon fluttering in the woods of Tibradden. There was a second one nearer the summit, out among the heather on the bog.

Glendalough

 

Slightly over exposed, taken on my phone you see. Eastern end of the upper lake.

 

Lunch among the ruins of miners' village at the other end of the lake.

 

Ascending the waterfall that feeds down into the lake, looking back east.

 

Fun with position - lying on my back looking up.

Dollymount House

 

"A building popularly known as "The Long House," originally called "Dollymount," and at a subsequent period "Mount Pelier House" - a name which has caused it to be confounded wit the ruin on top of the hill. The original heavy gate pillars and stone walls along the avenue still remain, as also a couple of stiles constructed for the use of foot passengers when the approach was closed during the absence of the proprietors. The house is two storeys high in front, with six windows on each side, and over the hall-door are the arms of the Ely family, surmounted by a coronet. The rooms had marble chimney-pieces and stuccoed ceilings, some portions of which yet remain; and the windows commanded a beautiful view of the County Dublin, the city and bay, with Howth, Ireland's Eye and Lambay. On each side of the house was a large arched gateway, from which extended a long wing of out-offices, servants' apartments, stables, &c., terminating at each end in a square three-storied tower with embattled top and pointed windows. Over the door of the left hand tower was, formerly, the date 1763, inscribed on the keystone of the arch - probably the date of erection or commencement.

This establishment was built as a hunting residence by Henry Loftus, Earl of Ely, the Count Loftonzo figuring so Prominently in Baratariana, whose wife, Frances Munroe, was aunt of the celebrated beauty, Dolly Monroe, after whom the Place was called "Dollymount." It was originally surrounded and sheltered by a fine plantation of trees, some of which, mostly chestnuts, may still be seen to the left on approaching the building, and on the slope of the hill above it was a splendid wood of firs and larches, as dense as a tropical forest, not a trace of which now remains, the trees having been cut down and sold by a tenant who occupied the place after it had been abandoned as a residence by the owners."

From "The Neighbourhood of Dublin" by Weston St John Joyce, 1939.

River travels

 

My very wonderful hostess in Germany brought me on a small tour of part of the Rhine-Mosel valley. Day one was Tag der Deutsches Einheit, or Day of German Unity, celebrating German re-unification in 1990. We took in the Germania, a monument to the creation of what was essentially the first 'German' nation, after the Franco-Prussian war in 1870. After that we visited the rock of the Loreley.

 

Spent the night in Koblenz, under the shadow of the Kaiser at the Deutsches Eck. In the morning I toured the Ehrenbreitstein, a Prussian fortress at the Rhine-Mosel confluence.

 

As we headed toward Trier, we stopped off in Cochem to visit the Reichsburg, an impressive castle. We didn't quite make it to Trier though, camping on a site in a village called Pünderich.

 

We did manage a lightning tour of Trier the next morning though, the highlight of which were the extensive Roman baths, the largest north of the Alps. Trier also boasts a basilica, an amphitheatre, a huge Dom, as well as a few more bath sites and the Porta Nigra.

Heidelberg

 

Heidelberg, famed for it's scenic castle. The whole town really is quite pretty, in a slightly unremarkable way. I think I this point I had become desensitised to Germanic beauty. The town is fabulous really, but we had only a few hours, so we concentrated on the Schloß.

 

This I thought was quite spectacular. I couldn't take a picture that did it justice really. One of the rear towers of the Schloß had split in half, probably due to subsidence. The broken off half sits on the ground, a little lower than the still attached half.

 

The sun setting was quite brilliant, blinding us as we retreated down the main street to the car.