#6 Some cool things we did Norway

I'm trying not to write a travel blog that is only "and then we did this and then we did that" but part of travel is doing this or that. Here is some of what we did last week.
On Monday we left Stockholm and flew to Ålesund via Oslo and arrived late afternoon.  Someone we met who lives in Norway was surprised we were going there since it's not really on a lot of tourists' radar. It's where Norwegians go to vacation he said.  With good reason I see.

Tucked into the coast of the Norwegian Sea, it's a beautiful waterfront town.  On our first night there, we walked, had a nice dinner, and then walked along some of the hills and down a few winding narrow streets.  It was a beautiful night and the sun doesn't set here until a bit after 11:00 and the sun sets in long, lingering, lovely ways.

We were up fairly early the next day to do a bit of a hike.  We climbed the Aksla mountain (418 steps) and it got us a very nice view of the city and area.

I should mention the prices in Norway were/ have been/ are alarmingly high. We ended up looking the other way and paying the Kroners for a beer and a coke at the restaurant there just so we could sit and take in the view. Dale called his beer 'the prettiest beer ever' and it might well have been.

For lunch we grabbed a sandwich at a grocery store and ate at a bench by the water and watched the boats come and go.  It was a lovely sunny day and after Stockholm, I'm not taking those sunny hours for granted (sidenote: I'm writing this in Røros as it pours). In the afternoon we went to the Art Nouveau museum (Jugendstilsenteret). One of the reasons we went to Ålesund was its  Art Nouveau architecture.  The town burned down entirely in 1904 and, rather amazingly, it was all rebuilt in an Art Nouveau style. The museum was quite lovely and it featured a 'time machine' -- basically an elevator with audio visual cues to take you  back in time to the time of the fire. Once through the time machine, they had a very interesting audio visual presentation where historical accounts of the fire were narrated by voices while videos of modern people's faces made them seem alive and real.

It was a powerful exhibit and I'm not doing it justice at all.  I love Art Nouveau so it was a real treat to see the buildings and go to the museum.. The rest of the day was spent wandering and taking in the lovely scenery. We went on a 6k walk along the water and then had a great dinner overlooking the harbour. We had bacalao (which we'd also had in Portugal-- they used Noregian cod, I recall them telling us) and after dinner we walked and had ice cream (people seem to eat a lot of ice cream here) and watched the sunset.  This is really one of the nicest places I've ever seen.

On our last day in Ålesund, we hopped a city bus that took us to the base of the Sukkertoppen mountain which seemed high and challenging but clearly no Croagh Patrick.

 The air here smelled so nice-- sea breezes and warm pine-- it was a wonderful walk and the views from up top were otherworldly and seeing them permeated our sense of joy for the rest of the day.

We found a good and reasonably priced place for dinner and then closed the long evening on the deck at our hotel.  We paid a crazy amount for a beer and cider (still can't quite bring myself to pay the kroner for wine) but it seemed worth every cent to sit outside and watch the sun set late into the evening,    It was hard to leave the deck to pack up to get ready to leave early the next morning. 
The next morning (Friday), we left the hotel to catch the Hertigruten cruise ship go travel through the fjords and see the famous Geiranger fjord.

I know I described this somewhat in the last post. All I can really say about this is that I've hardly seen anything so beautiful or done anything as wonderful as sailing through this landscape. I'll let the pictures do the talking there.  More tomorrow about Røros. Thanks for reading. 

#5 Norway and a Childhood Card Game

When I arrived in Norway on Tuesday, I was, for some odd reason, reminded of a card game I loved when I was about 6 or 7.  It was a pair matching game in a little blue box and it had a boy and a girl from different countries around the world. It occurs to me that this card game came to mind because it was likely the first time I would have heard the word 'Norway.' I remembered vividly what the Norwegian boy and girl looked like: blond with little blue and white outfits.

I also remember looking quizzically at my dad when he collected both sets of children from Turkey and Greece and chuckled 'I have Turkey Greece!' I remember filing that away in the 'I'm sure this will make sense when I'm older' file. A belated chuckle, Dad. Sorry it took so long. 

I am writing this now from the Hurtigruten cruise ship, travelling through the fjords. I am writing this while sitting in a tan and peacock blue tapestry chair reminiscent of a different era, something Miss Marple might declare as 'splendid.' The fjords are like nothing else I've ever seen: a stunning, magical, serene, stately beauty. They defy words and comprehension. Standing at the edge of the ship earlier today, my brain was still trying to process the fact that I'm in Norway.  Norway. I kept repeating 'Norway' to myself when suddenly the name of the card game I'd been remembering popped into my head: Twin Kins! A quick google search and there were all the cards I knew, and knew very well.  (Side note: free Internet on board. North America, you really need to get on this). I realized I had studied the details on these cards with what now seems like a strange intensity. 

I remembered I liked the Italian girl's dress. I remembered the girl from England: I had been to England and also had a similar outfit. 

My mum's family was Scottish and Irish so they seemed like friendly girls, especially the Scottish girl who had red hair like me. And I liked that the Irish girl was dancing. My all-time favourite card was the Swiss girl because I was named Heidi. I think I might have pleaded with my opponents perhaps more than persuasively on numerous occasions to discard the Swiss girl so I could have her. 

The object of the game seemed to me to get the Swiss Twins. Sorry, about that former Twin Kins players. I also recall a family discussion about the absence of a Canadian boy and girl (early moments of nascent nationalism, I am sure).

I think I've been thinking about that card game this week because it likely was the first occasion in my life that I had to wrap my head around the concept that there are other countries in the world and that the world wasn't Canada or Edmonton or my street. When I played the game with my parents, they tried to teach me about the different countries, often showing me and my brother where the countries were on our world globe. I visualized countries full of dancing, differently costumed boys and girls. But none of them seemed very real: they were like characters in a storybook that were only real in my head. I still couldn't wrap my head around the fact that everyone in the world didn't live in Canada. But I tried.

When my adult logic looks at the cards that I loved, part of me recoils at them: reducing nationalities to troubling stereotypes, emphasizing the western world, and a particularly Anglo view of the world etc. But I also remember the intrigue I felt looking at the globe before bedtime and thinking there were boys and girls around the world living very different lives from the lives my brother and I had. I imagined them looking at their families globes and maybe running their fingers across Canada. 

As I looked at the cards today, I was reminded that there was also a Wide-World Travel card. I can't recall what it did but I think getting that card was the main object of the game-- it, not the little Swiss girl, was what you were supposed to want. Staring at the fjords and thinking about why Norway is so amazing (which is, gentle reader, the subject of my next blog post, I promise), I do wonder if hours spent matching twins and seeking the world travel card worked its way into my being in ways I'm slowly starting to understand. 

Having seen actual Norwegian children, I can attest to the fact that they are nothing like the children on the cards. They're very similar to North American children, but they're also very different. Maybe the goal of the card game is to teach you that there are many countries in the world besides our own and to remind us that not everyone lives in our same countries or on streets like our own. It's a simple thought idea but one that is incredibly easy to forget. Travel, whether near or far, is a powerful reminder of those differences. Maybe that's why that one Twin Kins card was so sought after.

#4 If You Count Only The Sunny Hours, What do you Do with the Rainy ones?

In my second year of university, I took an 8 AM French class in the Old Arts Building. On the south side of the building was a sundial that had "Count only the sunny hours" inscribed on its surface.   Twice a week I passed that sundial, mostly in the dark non sunny hours, and I'd spend the rest of the walk trying to figure out what that meant. Is that a directive for a good life? Directions on how to read a sundial? Some Keatsean thing I should have read? Do hours spent in French classes taken in the non sunny winter dark count?  Count toward what? I spent a lot of time thinking about that sundial that semester. Apparently I am still mulling over this phrase because it kept coming to mind while in Stockholm this week. 

Most of Sunday was anything but sunny.  When we arrived in Stockholm on the boat, it was beautifully warm and sunny. After checking into our hotel and settling in, we changed into shorts and tshirts and took an ancient creaking lift to the main floor. When we got outside, it was cold enough that we went upstairs to change into warmer clothes and fetch a jacket. Down the creaking lift again. This time when we went outside, it was raining. Avoiding the lift, I ran upstairs to get our rain jackets and down the stairs to see it was raining harder. We started walking and within a block we were wet. Within 2 blocks, we were soaked. What do you do?

Well... I had an inner dialogue that went something like this. I'm cold. It's not that bad. I'm cold and wet and the wind's picking up. But it's pretty and gosh darn it this rain jacket is pretty waterproof. True but my jeans aren't waterproof and they're soaked. What's a little water? My feet are wet... oh why, oh why did I wear Mary Janes? Well, the Mary Janes will dry faster than your other ones. I feel like Eeyore. You sound like Eeyore-- you really need to buck up, you're in Sweden! Enjoy it. You're right. Yes I am. But I'm really cold and wet. Yeah, you do have a point. What do we do?

Dale and I had just two days in Stockholm and one was getting devoured by the unpleasant rain. I was really trying to make the most of it but the rain was making that quite difficult.  seeing more than a few feet ahead was difficult and we just kept dodging umbrellas. We finally decided to just go into the closest museum and get out of the deluge. I'm not sure it would have been the museum either of us would have picked but it was right there and it had a cafe for lunch. The museum was interesting enough and the lunch was quite nice. Still, I think we were both regretting we couldn't do our favourite thing:  walk in what looked like a great city.  My brain kept reminding me 'make the most if it, make the most of it....' But i needed constant reminders. After a few hours in the museum, we left and found the deluge was over and it was just a steady rain. 

Walking seemed a little more do-able and we ended up covering a lot of ground. I took a few photos ( I discovered later they were all quite badly composed and out of focus) and convinced myself that I'd had a nice time in Stockholm. And I did. The deluge started again about 45 minutes away from our hotel and we sloshed silently back. We went to what turned out to be a great Thai restaurant in part because it was close to our hotel. I didn't want to admit defeat and confess I was disappointed with the day but I was. Or maybe more accurately with myself. I wondered if I could have done better with the rain. A true traveller, it seems to me, should have been able to rise above mundane things like deluges and wet shoes and, to quote the Mary Tyler Moore theme, "suddenly make it all seem worthwhile." Had I done that? I'm not sure I did. And that bothered me.

The next day, sun started pouring into our room about 4:30. We started walking early and proceeded to walk and walk and walk. We covered some of the same terrain as the day before yet today it was glorious. We were able to stop and look at details, have a coffee on a sidewalk cafe, wander winding streets, linger beside the gorgeous arrangements of tulips, see and follow the magical majestic horses on their way to the changing of the guard, look at colours of buildings, pause and take well-composed shots of the beautiful city views and just walk and walk and walk. Even after walking for 5 or more hours, we walked to a different island for dinner and loved every minute of it. It was a wonderful day in part because it was beautiful and sunny and we coukd walk. Suddenly our rainy Sunday didn't seem as disappointing. 

"Count only the sunny hours," the sundial tells us. But what does that mean for traveling? What does that mean for those inevitable rainy days? Do we not count those hours? It's easy to have a wonderful traveling day when the sun is out and the sky is halcyon. Maybe the real test for travelers is how you deal with the not sunny days, how you turn disappointments into something bigger and better, how you make those non sunny hours count. This is something I'll work on.

Below are pictures from the sunny day in Stockholm since the others are a blurry rainy mess. 

#3: Night Boat to Stockholm

Travel can be a very logical and predictable thing: we make plans, book tickets, show up at the airport or train station and off we go. Even though most of our brains know where we're going, there's often a moment when a slow moving part of the brain-- maybe the reflective part-- catches up to the plan making part of the brain and says 'how did we get the middle of the Baltic Sea?' The logical part of the brain sighs and says, 'How do you not remember? We talked about this. We bought tickets.' 'Yes, yes, I know,' says the reflective part, 'but it doesn't make it seem any more amazing to find ourselves watching the sun set on a ship in the Baltic Sea.'  

On Saturday, Dale and I had most of a day to wander Helsinki and we wandered the areas I'd found on Friday and found a few new areas to explore. We had coffee at the Kappeli cafe which was glassy and gazebo-like and prettily historic. Around 4:00, we headed to the ship that would take us overnight to Stockholm. I had no idea what to expect but I appreciated being greeted by a giant Moomin as we got on board (I was sad to see he did not take the journey with us). We had a very pleasant afternoon watching the waves from the deck and enjoying the sunshine.  It was around this time when the reflective part of my brain started to catch up to the logical part and marvel that we were floating on a sea that I know I had mislabled in a Grade 7 social studies exam.  I watched the sunset at nearly 11:00 pm and then watched the moon rise. It was incredibly peaceful and beautiful and I fought falling asleep for longer than I should have. I woke up at 4:30 when the sun rose again and we got up early to see the new scenery. It was a lovely way to travel and a nice way to arrive in Sweden. 

#2 Helsinki Serendipity

Since the last week of February,  I have spent 13 days at home and not consecutively. We didn't plan to spend that much time away but events happen as they will. I didn't quite realize how tired and spent I was until I tried on Friday to transition into holiday mode in Helsinki. Monday and Tuesday were travel days, Wednesday was a jet lag acclimation day where we did some preliminary reconnaissance walking in the pouring rain. Thursday Dale gave his conference paper and I worked on a writing project. Friday, Dale was at the conference and I thought I'd spend my day alone enjoying and exploring a new city. I expected I'd wake up early and be dashing out the door to start my adventure.  After breakfast, I went back to our room to gather my things for the day and found I could hardly get off my bed.  The weeks had really caught up with me in ways I had not anticipated. As much as I tried to rally myself, I started toying with the idea of staying in my room and reading a novel until I had to meet Dale at 7 PM.  But then I remembered something my mum told me my aunt (her sister) said on a trip: 'It doesn't matter to me what we do, just as long as we do something.' I think of those words often when I travel and Friday I used it to get me off my bed. My favourite things to do in a city involve walking, art, and lunch so I looked up the Helsinki Design museum, plotted the directions on my phone, and was out the door of the hotel in 5 minutes. I think it took about 10 steps for me to feel myself waking up and feeling excited about a whole day to myself in a new city. And right about then, the sun came out for the first time.

I set my course for the Design museum and walked briskly and happily in the nearly sunny streets of Helsinki. I walked up a street with a very long name and many ks and toward the Esplanade where I saw a crowd gathering in the park.  A crowd of women, mostly. I saw a stage area with marimekko signs on it. Interesting, I thought, but  I was feeling a bit like the March Hare 'can't stop, on my way to the Design museum' when it hit me: there is no place I have to be for 8 hours and the world is my oyster in ways it has not been for many weeks. I ambled over to the park and found a place to stand. A buzz was developing. Women of all ages were smiling in anticipation: some with friends, but many alone like me, smiling to themselves. I had no idea what was coming up but I looked over to the sidewalk where I had been walking and was suddenly grateful I'd stepped off my planned path. On the half hour, the bubbling ambient music stopped and 3 people came out. One explained in Finnish then English that this was the marimekko summer collection fashion show. Cool! And then she introduced the man with her who was the director of the Finnish National Ballet and who described how his dancers would be performing pieces choreographed to highlight the clothing and the Company. I nearly laughed aloud. One of the first things I did when I learned we were going to Finland was to look up if the Finnish National Ballet would be performing while we were there. I was disappointed to find they were not yet here I was 5 feet away from the Finnish National Ballet dancing in a park on a gorgeous spring day.  I wanted to give myself a high five: if I had left the hotel earlier or later, I would have missed this.  If I'd kept on my original path, I would have missed this. The dancing was fantastic and I loved every second of it. 

After the show, I made my way to the Design museum-- a great museum-- had a nice lunch and coffee there, allowed myself to wander around that neighbourhood where the mood took me. I also stumbled upon a beautiful dress shop made up of dresses inspired by vintage pin-up girls. Fell in love with a dress or two but bought none. Then I made my way to the botanic garden-- one of my other favourite things to do. I lost myself there for a while and then walked some more. I bought a coffee and sat by the water and watched dogs go for their walks and thought how this was one of my nicest days ever and I almost spent it reading in a hotel room. Travel is a funny thing: you never know what you'll see or find. You just have to be open and also kind to yourself. And, as Eleanor Lavish said in my favourite movie of all time, you must allow yourself to 'simply drift.' 

#1 Icelandair: an Airline. Or, an odd topic for a blog post yes but here it is anyway for reasons you will see

In this past year, I've been on 11 or 12 different airlines and it occurred to me while flying Iceland Air for the first time last week, that this is unlike any other airline I've flown with. One might think that they're all pretty interchangeable with a few differences. Some have better cookies (Aer Lingus), some serve you ice cream between London and Edmonton (Air Canada), some like to change your gates and make you run through airports at the very last minute and blame you for not hearing the gate change announcement (Delta), some have flight crews that are impossibly good looking and know it (Air France) and some have planes that are very, very orange  which is a little tough to take after an overnight trans-Atlantic flight (Lufthansa). But aside from these fairly minor differences, they're all pretty similar because their main function is to get you from destination to destination safely and efficiently with only minor damage to your luggage. They'd also like you to feel loyalty to their airline but they know we're fickle and easily swayed so they don't really push it.  Icelandair also has this agenda but they have something else they want to do: they want you to fall in love with Iceland. They want you to visit it, learn about it, and love it.  And they want you to tell your friends about how amazing Iceland is.

Here's what's brilliant about Icelandair. This is, I should add, the airline for a country with a population smaller than many Canadian cities. You can fly Icelandair out of Toronto to a remarkably wide range of destinations. People on our flight were heading all over Europe: we were going to Helsinki. Their prices were reasonable but the big draw is this: for no extra charge, you can add a stopover of up to a week in Iceland.  This has always struck me as an ingenius way to get people to visit a small island country in the north Atlantic that most people know little about. When I flew Icelandair last week I realized the stopover is just part of their brilliant plan. From the minute I stepped onto the plane, I was suddenly intrigued with Iceland. Suddenly, it wasn't the bonus stop on a different trip, it was a special, magical, intriguing destination.

The marketing of Iceland wasn't an add on: they worked it into all elements of the flight organically. As we walked onto the plane, we were each handed a bottle of Iceland water with a label telling us about Iceland's water. The headrest covers had Icelandic vocabulary lessons. The coffee cups told you that there are 14 different words for cup in Icelandic and listed them. The napkin mentioned the Icelandic word for napkin and explained why 'serviette' has become the preferred term. The creamers had pretty cute Icelanders on them. 

The TVs showed a montage of images of Iceland interspersed with Icelandic trivia (did you know 30% of Icelanders have university degrees and that 60% of the population believes in elves? It occurs to me to wonder what percentage of the population believes elves have university degrees).  TV programming had shows about Iceland and it made you excited about going. On the plane, you could purchase tickets to the attractions you just learned about. It may seem heavy-handed in a Disney-esque or Graceland-ish sort of way but it wasn't. They've created for me a mystique about the place. They taught me just enough about their country to make me want to know more, see more, do more.  Already I'm regretting that we booked a short, few days stop and I have been thinking 'hmm... maybe next year...' This might be the first time I've thought about booking a second trip to a place I've yet to visit based on a flight and an airport. Well done, Icelandair, well done.

Preface: for Ostap

Before I begin, a word about my typing and this blog. I had great intentions to write every day and brought my wireless keyboard for the specific purpose of doing this blog. On the second day in Helsinki I sat down to write the first entries and realized that while I'd brought more than enough batteries, I had neglected to bring what I now know is the irreplaceable battery cap needed to power up the keyboard. A few minutes on google suggests my best option would be to fashion a new one out of few obscure parts used in lamp making and a lot of tinfoil. It is advisable to have metal saw as well.  I'm really hoping it's sitting smugly and precociously at home. I will shorten my sentiments about this to a single 'blurg!' and let you imagine my brow furrowing at the company whose solution to a missing 3$ part is to purchase a new 88€ keyboard. After a few days of thinking 'blurg!' about the blog, I decided I was just going to handwrite things for myself about my trip and that was fine.  A few hours later, I got a note from Ostap asking if I would please re-open the cafe. The public, he said, has spoken.  At the Cafe, we like visitors like Ostap. So, here I sit in my cabin on the Silja Serenade somewhere on the north Baltic Sea typing up some handwritten notes. Please pardon the short entries and the innumerable typos I anticipate.  Thanks for reading. And thanks for the note Ostap.

Old school blogging at the Design Museum cafe, Helsinki

Week 6.4 Will ye go, lassie, go?

Early Saturday morning it was evident that we were needed back home so we quickly rebooked flights, trains and hotels, packed up and said a few nearly tearful goodbyes.  We caught the train around 6 PM and maybe this was the best way to leave.  As we did a few final errands around town, I had a lump in my throat the entire time.  I didn't have time to think "this will be our last time here" or "I will miss this very much."  We weren't really able to say goodbye to all the people and places we might have liked but as I was sitting in the train station I thought it might be for the best.  I couldn't imagine what an emotional mess I would have been if I'd had a whole week to process leaving.  Besides, I knew for sure that we would be back.  On Thursday, Mike reminded me-- as he had last year when we were here-- that "planes go both ways."  True. We were leaving but the plane that would take us back to Canada could also take us back to Ireland again.  I have no doubt that we will be back.  Perhaps sooner than we imagine.  As I sat on the train waiting to leave for Dublin, I said to Dale, "5 weeks ago, we arrived at this station and had no idea what our lives would be like in Westport.  What a remarkable adventure it has been."   As we pulled out of town, the landscape was drenched in that glow of sunshine that happens at "the magic hour."  My iPod randomly selected the High Kings singing "Raglan Road." And I said, let grief be a fallen leaf at the dawning of the day. 

Thanks everyone for reading and for your nice comments.  We'll be back....

Week 6.3 The Reek!

If you're one of my FB friends or if you've been looking at the photos here, you'll know that you cannot have a day in Westport where you don't look at Croagh Patrick.  Climbing it has been a goal since day one and almost everyone we've talked to offered advice: climb on a clear day, climb on a dry day.  The best advice of all  was from J: "take a stick."  We'd been waiting and watching for a clear day and Friday seemed like it was going to be perfect.  Although we didn't know it then, Friday would also be the last full day we'd have in Westport and we were grateful the day cooperated with us.

The kind D drove us out to the base and we hired hiking sticks and headed out toward the mountain.  As prairie kids, we really didn't know what was ahead of us but it all seemed quite do-able.  Well,  maybe that's not quite true.  I will admit there were three points that it didn't seem do-able.  The first was when I realized that Croagh Patrick really is a mountain, not a hill.  And that those tiny creatures climbing it were people.  "There's no way I can do that," I thought but carried on, assuming I'd get to a logical place to turn back.  I never did get to that logical turning back place.  The second time I doubted myself was when I saw a lady coming down the mountain, basically sliding down the loose rocks that seemed sort of like shells in their thin, slippery shape.  I asked her husband, "I'm torn... should I go up?"  He said, "you could turn back.  But if you make it to the top,  you feel like you've really accomplished something."  His wife (who seemed to have weathered her slip) added: "that's the worst part right there."  I thanked them and carried on,

mentally thanking J for her advice about the stick.  I looked up and it was almost straight up.  "How on earth do you do this?" I thought.  One step at a time was the obvious answer and indeed it was the only way to go.  Once I took that first step, the others fell into place.  The man I talked to was right.  Once you got there, you really did feel like you'd accomplished something and I was so glad we'd found a clear day.  Everyone had talked about how breathtaking the view was and I realize thinking back on it that there are not words sufficient to describe what it was like up there.  I'll let the pictures do the talking.  The third time I doubted whether I could do the climb was when I looked down at that loose rock.  "How on earth do you do this?"  Not going down was not an option.  Slowly and one step at a time was the only way.  Even though we didn't know it would be our last day, I think I would pick standing on top of Croagh Patrick and looking over the county we had grown to love was the perfect thing to do on our last afternoon.  We didn't linger long up there but I will remember that view forever.  

Week 6.2: A full and perfect day

Although we didn't expect Thursday to be our second last full day of our time in Ireland, in retrospect it couldn't have been a better second to last day.  Our friend from our last trip picked us up in the morning and drove us on the Atlantic Drive where we saw fantastic scenery and spectacular views.  As I look at the pictures I'm attaching, it all seems like a dream.  But I'm still not sure I could dream something so stunning.  It was great to see Mike again and to continue some of our conversations from last year.
The other thing we wanted to do was visit the Jackie Clarke Collection in Ballina and Mike dropped us off there.  In a strange confluence of coincidences, we happened to see a tweet from the NY Times for a story about the opening of a museum dedicated to showing and preserving a great collection of historical materials that had been assembled by Jackie Clarke over his lifetime.  Remarkably, it was just down the road from us.  It opened only a few days before and we were thrilled to be able to go to it.  It's a fascinating place and a remarkable story about history and historical preservation.  And even more exciting, both of us saw projects we can work on related to this collection.  Guess that means we'll need to return.  Here's a great video about it.  It's worth a watch and the museum is also worth a visit.

We took the bus back to Westport from Ballina and both of us felt a rush of "we're home" as we rolled into town again.  We headed back to our apartment and were soon picked up by D who took us to their beautiful house and its amazing view of Croagh Patrick.  As I mentioned before in a previous blog, I think Dale and I both assumed we would spend the whole time away by ourselves and we were fine with that.  I don't think either of guessed that we would find people who, in the course of a few short weeks, would seem like friends we've known for years.  Finding friends who took such good care of us, who made us laugh and smile, and who made us feel at home was such a gift, especially with all that was happening at home.  Every day of this trip has been filled with blessings.  It's no wonder that my dad sent me an email asking me to "Thank the folks there for adding so much to our lives and for making my daughter so very happy." 

Week 6.1: Museum of Country Life and Reconnecting

There was a lot going on in the backrooms of the Cafe this past week and we ended up needing to leave Westport a week early and go to Alberta.  But I still want to finish up the blog so I'll be posting new entries over the next few days.

Wednesday was the day the weather really started to turn around.  It was still a little chilly but the beautiful sunshine was such a treat.  Our kind friend D had once again offered to take us out to the Museum of Country Life outside of Castlebar and so we set out there in the morning.  The Irish museums we've been to have all been fantastic-- interesting spaces, fascinating content, and well curated.  

One of the first things you see when you start walking through is a collection of images that remind you of the differences between reality and romanticization of Irish history.  That seemed to be a theme throughout the museum.  This exhibit-- along with all the other things we've seen on this trip-- was a stark reminder of some of the realities that inform (and continue to inform) this country and its people.  It's the vital context between statistics like this one: in 1841, the population of Ireland was 8,175, 124 and in 1861 it was 5,798,967.  As I heard elsewhere, over a million Irish went to the New World and a million went to the Next World.  The more I read about this, the more stunned and appalled I am that the Irish famine rarely emerged in my studies of the 19th century.  I'll be working on redressing that.  I am not sure how my education missed that.
Our kind friend D picked us up and we went for lunch and while there, we got an email from the lovely man who drove us around Ireland a year and a half ago saying he was going to be in Westport that evening.  We met him at a pub we suggested (where the lovely J works) and then went for dinner.  It was so wonderful to see him, especially since it was he showed us the country we all fell in love with.   He joked to J that he thought it was funny that the visitors had suggested the pub but J smiled and said "No, they're locals now."  It did my heart good to have lovely friends from both trips in the same place.  Dinner was wonderful and M offered to drive us around to see some more sights on the Thursday.  Thinking back on that night, I'm struck by the memory of how at home I felt there and how it all feels like a dream right now.  A dream "that, when I waked, I cried to dream again.”