Barg'in Ireland

Last weekend, Daniel, a co-worker of mine invited me an Anna for a weekend boating trip on his father's barge. A barge for all those who don't know is a long flat boat used for transporting stuff. The barges that exist in ireland were used to move goods around the country using the system of canals that were built by the english back in the day. They, of course, have long been replaced with trucks, and the 100 or so barges that have survived are all now in private hands. A community of barge-lovin people have emerged who spend weekends barging around the country with no real purpose; daniel's family own the oldest irish barge in existence at 160 years old...that's a few decades older than canada! Speaking of old things, the evening before embarking, we visited Ireland's oldest pub which has dated back to 800AD! The weekend was great...we played Risk, drank lots of beer and ate lots of food.

That was last weekend, this weekend was spent in Belfast. Yesterday we visited many sites...the coolest was seeing Hotel Europa "The World's most Bombed Hotel". On Sunday, i was actually working in Belfast...we launched the newest version of the software that my team is working on! Woohoo!


A barge

Ring of Kerry

This post is a little late, but better late than never. This past weekend, anna and i took another road trip driving to the very south west part of ireland...county kerry. This is the wild and remote side of the island...the largest mountain range, a national park and lots of great little towns. We had, and currently have, a "heat wave" in ireland...temperatures breaking over 30C. We spent our entire first day driving around the ring of kerry...180km of winding roads, green valleys and mountains on one side and the dramatic irish coast and beaches (yes ireland has beaches) on the other. This is the kind of place where they film for Irish Tourism commercials...i really felt the urge to listen to some Cranberries. The following day, another clear-skied, warm day, was the highlight of the trip for me. We hiked up ireland's highest mountain Mt. Carrauntuohill (1041m). It was a very enjoyable hike which finished in grand style with a swim in a lake at the base of the mountain. I hadn't felt that alive since hiking in patagonia.


Pausing for a photo on the Ring of Kerry


Top of Ireland

Chavez

A couple nights ago i went to a socialist meeting :) Not cause im a socialist but because there was a speaker from Venesuela's Chavez government giving a speech. There are lots of really interesting political movements happening right now in south america, one of them being the "Bolivarian Revolution" (named after Simon Bolivar who helped many south american countries gain independence from Spain) in Venesuela. The meeting hall was packed with people, hot and very humid...i think they wanted their south american visitor to feel at home. The speech was fairly interesting, i tried my best to understand the spanish (although everything was translated to english). There was a couple of young irish anti-chavez communists that were initially not allowed into the meeting, but after putting up a big fuss were allowed in. The highlight of the event was the Q&A session at the end. A very attractive vensuelan girl got the microphone and with almost tears in her eyes rejected most of the claims made by the speakers...she was boo'ed by some, others were very keen to hear what she had to say...that there isn't a clear division be between poor and rich, between Chavez supporters and the others, and it's wrong to paint the picture that chavez is this hero supported by all the normal people. This was followed by an old venesuelan lady who spoke passionately about how chavez is a humanist and has brought literacy and medicine to poor people throughout venesuela. I need visit this country soon :)

The Good Old North

Me, Anna and 8 other spanish friends rented a couple cars and explored Northern Ireland for the weekend. The weather was fair (at best) but we still managed to see everything we wanted without getting too wet. On friday night we drove north from dublin, past belfast until we were too tired...so we found a national reserve by the water, pitched tents, partied a bit and when to sleep. The following day we followed the coastal highway around the top of the island visiting all the major sites including the Giant's Causeway and a cool suspension bridge linking the mainland with a smaller island. I had the liberty of driving (on the left hand side of the road, changing gears with my left hand) the whole time...it was 2 days of non-stop windy roads...the kind that make your mouth water if you're into driving. I even had the opportunity to take the car onto a huge beach and since it was raining at the time, it was empty and the sand was packed very hard...lets just say Collen McRae would have been proud. The last day was spent in Derry...a town know for it's Irish/English (or Protestant/Catholic) troubles. This is serious business and although the IRA have recently given up arms...there's lots of hatred in this city and it can be felt everywhere. I found the locals to be very strange...friendly but i never got a good vibe so i always felt on edge (something i've never felt in any other city i've been to). We visited the main catholic and Protestant communities...everything was draped in flags, the curbs and lamp posts painted in the appropriate colors (green/white/orange or red/white/blue). The most interesting (or frightening) to see were huge murals depicting past acts of violence and various other hateful things painted on buildings. This coming wednesday is the anniversary of when an English war ship came and liberated the citizens of Derry from an Irish King who had sieged the city walls for 100 days. Im sure it'll be a gay old time.


I think Megadeth used a similar image to promote their albums


But-her-face