Irish Holiday Part 3 - Cork City

 Our next stop was Ireland's second city, Cork. We started our stay here with a visit to the Elizabeth Fort, a seventeenth-century star fort.  There are some great views of the city from the ramparts.

In later years, the fort served as a barracks for the Royal Irish Constabulary, in particular for the Black and Tans.  These buildings around the parade square date from those days.  

A view from the street outside the fort.  

We found IRA General Tom Barry of the West Cork Flying Brigade outside the Cork City Museum.  Alas, despite the sign, we did not find pancakes :(

There are many lovely foot bridges across the River Lee.  I particularly liked this one.

And a nice view of the Lee.

We then visited the second prison of our trip, the Cork City Gaol. Another Victorian-era gaol, it has many similarities to Kilmainham Gaol in Dublin, although the exterior looks more like a castle.

The interior followed the same sort of layout as Kilmainham.

The former gaol hospital, looking otherworldly.

And the exercise yard.

Arthur wanted to find this statue of Michael Collins, based on a famous photo of when he eluded capture, riding his bike around Cork as if he was an accountant going about his business!

After our visit to the suprisingly interesting Cork Butter Museum, we stumbled across Widderling's Lane, which hosts an open air art gallery!

And to finish up our Cork City visit, a couple more shots of the River Lee!

Irish Holiday Part 2 - Howth

 We spent most of our Ireland trip in cities, so it was nice to take a few opportunities to get outside built up areas.  During the stay in Dublin, we took local commuter rail out to see Howth, located on a little peninsula on the edge of Dublin harbour.  Our primary activity was the 14 km cliff walk!

Finding the start of the path was a bit tricky.  It turned out to be this small gap in the wall on 

the side of the road!

Once we found the path, it turned out to be quite pretty, first with fields, then atop the cliffs.

Using goats grazing to keep the gorse under control!

A Martello tower, the first that we saw on the walk.

Starting the cliff part of the cliff walk :)

Very cute little cove.

Selfie with lighthouse.

Ferry heading to Dublin.

Another view of the lighthouse.

Coming into Howth we got to see another Martello tower!

After the hike, feeling footsore (at least I was, Arthur was fine), we enjoyed some fish and chips before heading back into Dublin.

Irish Holiday Part 1 - Dublin

 In August, Arthur and I had a two-week holiday in Ireland.  The holiday came together very quickly as some other plans fell through, so for a good part of the time we were pretty much winging it.

We started in Dublin, as we were able to take a direct flight from Vancouver with Air Canada.  

History was certainly a big part of the tour, which should be no surprise to those who know us!  Arthur in particular is interested in 20th Century history, so there was a bit emphasis on seeing locations associated with the Irish War of Independence, Irish Civil War and the Troubles.  So we started our tour near our hotel at St Stephen's Green, a lovely park in the centre of Dublin that was one of the focal points of the 1916 Easter Rising.  The Easter Rising is full of bizarre stories, that would be laughable if not for the large number or people killed or maimed.  The Irish Volunteers, being aware of the newspaper stories about the Great War, knew that trenches were the most important feature of the Western Front, so obviously they would be needed in Dublin.  As a result, the Volunteers in St Stephen's Green started digging trenches, with no idea of the actual purpose of trenches in modern warfare.  When British soldiers arrived, they occupied the upper floors of multi-storey buildings around the park and fired down on the men in the park, so the trenches they'd dug ended up having no particular value.

Anyway, the modern park is very beautiful :)

We carried on straight to the GPO, or the General Post Office, which was the headquarters for the Easter Rising.  The GPO is on O'Connell Street.  There used to be a grand pillar with a statue of Royal Navy Admiral Nelson in front of the GPO.  This has since been replaced by the Spire, which was installed in time for the millennium.

The GPO is still a functioning post office, but it also has a great museum of the Easter Rising, as well of An Post, the Irish Postal Service.

The Irish are quite keen on supporting human rights around the world, and there are public expressions of their support such as this eternal flame for prisoners of conscience sponsored by Amnesty International, which we found near the Custom House.

We weren't able to visit Dublin Castle.  Here is one of the entrances though!

One of the museums we visited was called Dublinia, with a focus on Viking-era and medieval Dublin.  They had replica armour to try on! 

And lots of carefully researched replicas.

We went to Kilmainham Gaol, the first of a surprising number of museums based on former prisons that we visited in Ireland.  It was necessary to book this one in advance, so be aware of that if you ever want to go there!  Kilmainham is quite historically significant, with many Irish patriots having been interred there, including most of the participants in the Easter Rising, 14 of whom were executed in the Stonebreaker's Yard.

This is the 'modern' east wing of the Gaol, built in the nineteenth century.  It introduced modern concepts like light and direct supervision for prisoners. If it looks familiar, it may be because many movies were filmed here!

After visiting the Gaol, I finally indulged in a pint of Guinness!

In the eastern part of Dublin, there is the gigantic Phoenix Park, where we found the 62 m tall Wellington Monument, apparently the tallest obelisk in Europe.

I was very surprised to see a deer less than 10 m from me in the park, completely chill and unbothered.

We found the Magazine Fort in Phoenix Park.  It was not open to visitors when we were there - shortly after we returned to Vancouver I received a notice that the renos were complete and we were now welcome to visit!  D'oh!

Dublin is a city that celebrates its literary scions.  One of the most famous James Joyce, and his famous work Ulysses.  So it was fun to find his own statue.

As well as little reminders of Ulysses like this plaque in a sidewalk in front of the statue of Moore.