ireland and the continent: overdue

Lisa and I were traveling from April 7th to 17th on our whirlwind tour of Europe. Well, it was only a little tour. And compared to what everyone else was doing, it wasn’t even particularly whirlwind! That said, I wish we had time to do so much more, and without stressing out about money. I can only conclude that a) I must become filthy rich before I am too old to go hiking around beautiful places, and b) I must learn about hiking/backpacking/taking care of myself in the wild from Katie.

I’m getting way ahead of myself here. Before we went traveling, Lisa and I went back to her parents’ house in Kerry (they live just outside of Tralee, right by the water, it’s superb). Before we went back to her house, we played the intervarsities, which is a big college rugby tournament (women’s, this time). Before that, there was the end of college classes (thank god!). And who knows what happened before that. Our teams played each other in Waterford, so we drove through Dungarvan on the way back, which is where our Fitzgeralds are from, way back when. It was nice, very small and on the beach, and Lisa said her family went there on holiday once. And before that! I finally got to go back to Ballycotton and go for a nice long hike. Mmm.

All I really have to say about the above events is that during the weekend at Lisa’s family’s house, I accidentally won 250 euros betting on the Grand National horserace. Woohoo!! I wasn’t going to bet, for obvious reasons, but her father insisted, and I used the pin-sticker’s guide to literally point blindly at a horse. I put down 2 euros each way (2 that my horse, Mon Mome, would win, 2 that it would place), and at 100 to 1 odds, I won! Yeah, it was pretty nutty. Anyway, wish I could have kept the money longer, but Europe was calling, and anyway, money you make like that isn’t meant to be kept unless you really get a lot. 250 euros goes awfully quickly over here.

Oh, and we went down to the beach by her house, which is beautiful every time I see it, and she tried to teach me how to drive her left-handed stick-shift car. That was exciting. I don’t even think my dad was as nervous when he taught me to drive when I was 15, and then I had never been behind the wheel! In any case, I guess that’s what they do here, learn to drive on the beach. If we go back maybe I can have another lesson! We had to leave because some guys were doing donuts, and apparently people will call the garda if they see that.

We managed to plan a trip to Europe that involved staying only with friends (minus one night in a hostel in Barcelona): a few nights in Florence with Kayla, a few in Marseille with Sasha, and a few in Sitges with Patrice’s friends Ellen and Arthur (and their two super cute sons and their niece, Emma), just outside Barcelona on the beach. This was my first time really planning a trip on my own, so I was generally pleased with how everything worked out. I imagine that months ago I would have freaked out a lot more about getting to bus stations early, etc, which is horrifying given that I was already very grumpy, tired, and once, massively hungover while searching for our booked transportation.

This was my third time in Florence, so I had no real agenda beyond seeing the David (Lisa’s agenda) and hanging out with Kayla. We managed to go to the Boboli gardens and San Miniato as well, and we have some great photos, but I broke Lisa’s camera in France and I don’t know how to get the photos off yet. Well, I haven’t tried. Check back next week and maybe I’ll have worked it out? We ate dinner at this restaurant called Mamma Gina’s, which is funny because there’s an exco at Oberlin based off this book, Mama Gena’s School of Womanly Arts. Kayla managed to seduce the waiter with her Italian skills, and as we left he pressed a cork lovingly into her hand and asked her not to forget him. Hmm. We proceeded on to this fantastic chocolate drink shop, Hemingway’s, and had these slightly overwhelming but really great chocolatey after-dinner drinks and 75% dark chocolate nutella with fresh fruit. Delicious, but I should have known that too much chocolate will only upset my stomach; we went home after that. The next night, though, we went up to Kayla’s friend Jade’s magnificent apartment (Kayla definitely got a bad deal on her apartment, even though it is vastly nicer than mine) and sat on the roof while the sun set. For dinner, we had apertivos at a bar nearby, which according to Wikipedia is supposed to include finger food and a drink. However, since it was about 7 euro for a drink and said finger food, we had these massive plates of really delicious Italian food along with our one drinks. It was a good idea. As much as Kayla wanted to take us out to a club and prove to us that Italian men were sleazy enough to stick their hands down our pants, we didn’t end up staying out quite late enough to hit up the clubs, instead checking out a few more bars and then heading to bed so we could get on a train in the morning.

I slept for the first part of the trip, but the train ride to Marseille was gorgeous. Getting off the train for an hour in  Genoa there were these massive trees with very dark green massive leaves that looked kind of tropical, and there were palm trees everywhere. The houses were colorful with wooden shutters and kind of elaborate white trim all over the place, if I remember correctly, and if I had known anyone there I think it would have been nice to get off and at least stare at the houses for a while. I couldn’t help thinking, though, that the whole Mediterranean coast we saw looked an awful lot like Southern California, and it might be worth just going there for a cheap vacation… We had a stop in Nice, as well. I hear it’s very lovely, and I would like to agree, but again the stop wasn’t long enough for me to do much but eat some dinner and break Lisa’s camera.

We had kind of gross and cloudy weather in Marseille, but it wasn’t too cold, so I didn’t mind. Sasha’s host family there has a beautiful house and we got to sleep in their sweet poolhouse, so I was pleased on the whole. It was fortunate that we had Sasha and Fiona, another girl from Oberlin, around, since I speak no French and knew pretty much nothing about Marseille. We managed to go up to Notre Dame de la Garde, an impressive church on a gigantic hill with a big golden statue of Mary and Jesus on top. Apparently the baby Jesus’ wrist is like 1.1 meters in diameter or something like that. Cool.

We also went to the Palais Longchamps, which is an entirely useless 19th c. palace that was apparently built for no reason and now houses a museum in one wing. We sat in the park and watched some people juggling and doing poi (reminded us of Oberlin) and then a little kid hazardously using the park as the racetrack for his tiny tiny bicycle. It was pretty cute. The bull below is from the front of the palace; there was this funny statue of these bulls and some super super buff women. Okay.

oh sweetie i just can't meet you at 3, i'm at the spa until 4:30!

The next day, we went out to the Chateau D’If, which is where Dantes is imprisoned in The Count of Monte Cristo. Every cell had names of people who had “lived” there, and there was so much stuff about the book that I basically expected to see where he escaped and his chains, or something. It wasn’t the weirdest of prison museums I’ve been to (see: Cork Gaol, or any Irish musem, filled with very lifelike wax figures… still deters me from indoor tourism here), but there was this one room with a symbolic piece of art without any real explanation, only a list of the things in the artwork. On the island there was also an exhibit about the way people used to holiday on islands around Marseille and the local flora and fauna, which was kind of cool. Two fun things that happened: I accidentally handed the ticket-seller my UCC id and was too lazy to explain that I wasn’t Irish so I got in for free for being an EU citizen (cool!), and Sasha almost got attacked by a seagull. We also saw a seagull nest.

this is the courtyard

you can see the corner of the island and notre dame de la garde behind

trapped!!! lisa wasn't as worried as i was about that.

After some delicious Moroccan food and a visit to a pub that was definitely not Irish, we got on a bus and spend the day driving to Barcelona. More California-type landscapes, more obnoxious language insufficiencies. Man, I wish I spoke Spanish. No matter– it was a lovely drive, and Barcelona is a lovely city. Unfortunately, we saw virtually none of it except for the part we walked from the train station to our hostel and then where we went for dinner, but I think I will have to do Spain properly at some point, and as always, I’ll want more money so I can do it right. For the amount I was willing to spend, we had a mediocre hostel and some totally delicious vegetable paella, though. Food only improved from this point on.

In the morning, we took the train to Sitges, which is a big gay (man) destination in Spain. Also a big English holiday spot. Hmm… the beaches were beautiful, Arthur and Ellen and their family were great, and we did basically nothing for three days on the beach. The water almost qualified as frigid, but I insisted on swimming and I am very glad that I did. I have definitely been low on my vitamin D for a long time! Again, no photos– I only have the France ones because Sasha sent them to me from her camera! But that’s real vacation for you. My phone is in the shop right now, and I kind of like that. Kind of. Just imagine two story slightly French houses, and then a long (narrow) sandy beach with clear water and a promenade… an old, sandstone brick church at one end… That’s pretty much all there was to see in Sitges, and I didn’t mind. I like beach holidays.

And that was it! We flew home on a pretty miserable but very cheap RyanAir flight, and Lisa’s mom picked us up at the airport and brought us back to Cork. The weather here sucks, but that’s nothing new.

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