Northern Ireland - on the trail of St. Patrick

Well, we were not expecting to find St. Paddy in Northern Ireland, and truthfully we weren't actually looking for him.  We just sort of stumbled across his trail when we were at Castle Ward.  First, we happened to see this cute little church with the round tower.  This is called Saul Church, or Down Cathedral.  The story goes when St. Patrick felt called to return to Ireland (he had been a slave there before and escaped to France) to win the people to Christ, he first landed in this area.  A local chieftan gave him a barn for shelter, and the Anglicized version of the Irish word for barn (Sabhall) is "Saul".

Just down the road from Saul Church is the largest statue of St. Patrick in Ireland.  And here he is...

Apparently the statue was constructed to appeal to both Catholics and Protestants--it is wearing Catholic vestments, but the face was made in the image of the Anglican Archbishop.

So we thought we were done with St. Patrick after this, and were headed off to explore the little village of Downpatrick--where we found the St. Patrick Center.  And a short hike up the hill led us to the purported burial site of St. Patrick.  We wondered why St. Patrick was buried in the grounds of a Protestant church, but found out that the site was once a Benedictine monastery dating from the 1100's.  A stone was put over his grave to stop early pilgrims from taking handfuls of soil.

St. Patrick came across the Irish Sea in a little boat like this.

Northern Ireland - Game of Thrones Sights

OK, I admit it.  And I'm not even ashamed!  I am checking out some of the Game of Thrones filming sites while I'm here in Northern Ireland.  First up, Castle Ward, or the erstwhile "Winterfell".  Castle Ward is located in Strangford, County Down, and the 820-acre estate lies on one shore of Strangford Lough.  And the wind whistling in off that lough would put Chicago to shame.

OK, this doesn't look like Winterfell.  It's actually the 18th century neo-classical home on the estate.  This side is the Palladian-influenced side, while the back side is more Gothic looking.  

Ah, this is more like it--there's the tower that Bran fell from, dating from the 16th century.

Bran, is that you?

We hiked around and followed a sign that said "standing stone".  Yep, it's standing.  I held onto it and called out to Jamie....oh, oops.  Outlander--wrong series!

This little dog did not leave our side for the whole hike.

This cute little bird almost looks fake, but he was the real deal.

Closer view of the tower...

Pretty dafs were in bloom

Another GOT filming site we stopped at on our way up north to Giant's Causeway was the Dark Tunnel.  Lovely planting of trees that make a tunnel over the road.  This was the King's Road in GOT.  Alas, I am still looking for Jon Snow.

Northern Ireland - Belfast

Belfast -

Now why on earth did it take me so long to get to Belfast? I lived in the UK for three years, for crying out loud.  But I finally made it, and it is a lovely little city.  I would call this a perfect sized place, plenty of restaurants, shopping.  Not sure about the night life, but then those days are pretty much done for me!

Stayed at a great little place in Belfast called The Gregory.  About a 15 minute walk to downtown activities, or of course an easy taxi ride away.

Our first day we booked a Black Cab tour with Paddy Campbell's.  Our driver took us to the main areas where the 30-year conflict, called the Troubles, occurred.  We first drove to the Protestant side of the giant wall, dividing the two sectarian groups.  The driver explained things in a fairly unbiased manner. While people refer to the Catholic and the Protestant areas/neighborhoods, as I understood it, the conflict is more along political divides.  The Loyalists, who supported the English take-over of Northern Ireland, and the Republicans, who would like to see Northern Ireland reunited with Ireland.  Further complicated by what basically sounded like racketeering by both groups, who built a lucrative trade collecting "protection" money from local businesses.

Our first view of the divide--we were in front of the Anglican church and the street just sort of dead ended into this wall.

While we were out snapping photos, the Anglican priest came out and invited us to come have a look around inside his church.  He was lovely and told us some of the history of his church.

Rev. Jack Lamb of the Townsend Street Presbyterian Church

William of Orange, Protestant King of England.  In the background, the Clonmore Cathedral on the Catholic side.

A memorial on the Protestant side, to a militia man who killed many Catholics after the peace agreements.  The driver told me he had been found dead of suspicious causes, possibly killed MI-5.  Live by the sword, die by the sword...

Next, we drove by the 40 foot wall separating the homes on both sides and viewed some of the murals on the Peace Wall.  Parallels were drawn with various oppressed groups around the world--Palestinians, Kurds, and African Americans.

When I set out on this little tour, I imagined it would be an interesting view of some recent history that I recall hearing about on the news as I was growing up and as a young adult.  I was not prepared for how profoundly sad I would feel seeing the memorials to those killed in this conflict.  Seeing homes with cages on the back windows to prevent gasoline bombs from being thrown in, seeing the pictures of the victims, and the mural of Bobby Sands was especially poignant.

Clonard Gardens memorial; wall and cages on houses visible in background

Clonard Monastery, where Bill Clinton came to broker the peace agreement.

Bobby Sands mural.  I remember hearing about his hunger strike on the news each night--a grueling 66 days before he died.

One interesting thing about the Catholic, or Loyalist side is that the streets are named after places the British have "colonized".  We saw a Sevastopol, Bombay, and Kashmir streets.  And with this being the 100 year anniversary of the 1916  Easter Uprising, Irish flags were everywhere.  I highly recommend taking this tour as a step towards understanding the Troubles and what happened in Northern Ireland in our recent past.

My Top 5 Travel Experiences...

So after a long winter's nap, here comes round two of this list and my top 5 travel experiences so far:

5.  Incredible India!  My friend Gioia and I met up in New Delhi over our Christmas break one year.  We hired a driver and took a tour through Rajasthan, staying in former palaces along the way for very reasonable prices.  The absolute highlight was getting up at about 4 am in Agra.  We took a taxi as close as we could get to our destination, and then had to walk the last several hundred meters in the pitch black.  A bit scary as we'd been told Agra was so unsafe.  All to experience the sun coming up on the Taj Mahal.  Yes, another one of those so-overwhelmed-I'm-weeping experiences for me!  Other fun parts of the trip were shopping for salwar kameez (Indian pants/tunic), riding camels through the Rajasthani desert, visiting the crazy Bikaner rat temple,  and New Year's Eve spent at another palace, being adopted by an Indian family and feasting on Indian food and dancing to Punjabi music!




4.  Siem Reap, Cambodia.  This was a hard choice between Siem Reap and Luang Prabang, Laos as they are both architecturally amazing places with friendly locals.  And both places I traveled with friends who made the trip so much fun.  But just from seeing Angkor Wat in a National Geographic as a kid and vowing I'd go there one day, I have to give this one to Siem Reap.  We stayed several days at a hotel in Siem Reap, and hired a tuk tuk driver who picked us up each morning and off we went to one of the many temples in the area.  Low light--falling off one of the temples from a height of about ten feet.  The guard came running over and said, "so many people fall in that exact spot every day!"  Um, you might want to think about a sign?  My ankle swelled to double but I wrapped it up and kept going!  (I found out later I tore a ligament and chipped the bone)  But seeing Angkor Wat--so worth it!  I would love to go back one day with my Nikon.

Strangler fig has taken over this temple!

See this pose?

I don't think we quite mastered it! (at Angkor Wat)

3.  Provinces in China -  Living in China I got to take trips to places few Americans experience. And since I can't choose between Sichuan Province and Yunnan Province, I'm just calling this one "Provinces in China".  Yunnan featured the gorgeous Li Jiang, a lovely little stone city lit with red lanterns, dancing with the Hua Hua girls, drinking yak butter tea in Shangri-la  (Tibet ) and seeing several groups of China's "minority peoples".  And Chengdu--holding a baby panda, of course!  And the Le Shan giant buddha, Mt. Emai, and gorgeous Buddhist temples--some of the most peaceful places on earth!  And getting to do these things with my lovely friend, Karen..one of the most peaceful people on Earth and fellow dancer!

Definitely a highlight of my life!

Hey, this minority woman looks familiar!

  

2.  Tromso, Norway.  My friend Cindi and I headed here in the Arctic Circle on February break for a possible view of the Northern Lights.  Mother Nature did not disappoint!  Highlights of this trip include dog mushing in a blizzard in the dark!  I could not see a thing and Cindi was shouting "trust the dogs!"  After a couple of hours, we made it back to the tent for some reindeer stew.  Another night we took a ferry and saw the best aurora activity of the trip.  And our chase trip with Guide Gunnar also turned up some Northern lights.  And I got to see an old and dear friend, Grete.  Norway is beautiful, but probably the most expensive place I've ever been!

With Roald Amundsen

A warm fire while awaiting the Aurora Borealis.

Trust the dogs!

So fortunate to have seen this!

1.  OK, this list is becoming like Sophie's choice!  How can I choose when I haven't even included "Mother Russia" on the list?  But since I'm currently living there, I'll leave Russia off for now.  I suspect #1 gets its rank mainly because it's one of my more recent experiences. But spending New Year's Eve on a boat in Sydney Harbor was definitely a top life experience!  Did it beat holding a baby panda?  Dog mushing in the Arctic Circle?   Hmmmm....Sophie's choice!   Once again it has a New Year's Eve, once again with my friend Gioia.  And of course don't forget there's 'roos and koalas!  And Christmas with my dear friend Diana and her family featuring Christmas Crackers and vanilla slice.  So #1 of this list gets to be....Australia (followed by a jaunt to New Zealand)!

In looking back over this list, I see that most places feature light--a beautiful sunrise, a gorgeous sunset, blazing fireworks or glowing candlelight.  It seems that I am a creature of light, and I can only hope I let a little of my own light shine wherever I go.  And it also features beautiful nature and wildlife--for what can compete with that made by the hand of God?  And of course dancing!  Because life is too short not to dance!  But there was a revelation for me in making this list.  If you'd asked me, I would have told you that I love to travel on my own.  It opens you up to meeting new people, being contemplative, and not annoying your friends when you want to spend half an hour getting a good shot!  But it seems that my top experiences are the ones I've made with friends.   So thank you to all my friends and family who have made these journeys and others with me!  I think you gave them that something extra that made them all the better--you gave them joy.  And I think the same can be said about the friends and family who accompany us on this journey through life...the one that-as the title says- I'm celebrating.  Wishing all of you love and light and peace this Christmas and in the New Year.