Rachel Dickinson

I made it back to the states yesterday and by midnight I was in my own bed. That meant I had been up and either traveling or in airports for 24 hours (I live in a place that is centrally isolated). The past 20 days have been wonderful, and in an odd way I'm grateful to the volcanic ash cloud which keep me trapped in Ireland for almost a week beyond when I planned to be there. By being stranded I got to drive along the beautiful northeast coast and visit The Giant's…… More »

Today, which I believe will be my last full day in Belfast, I decided to head to the Ulster Folk & Transport Museum, which is, conveniently right next door to The Culloden. I am a total sucker for the folk part of this kind of museum -- a collection of buildings gathered from around Ulster, reassembled to create a faux village. This village is interpreted to about 1912 and consists of a number of shops, churches, a bank, police station, houses, and a pub. This…… More »

Belfast is a city of less than 300,000 and really has the feel of a big town. The city center is a hodge-podge of architectural styles but I like it -- glass domes mix with over-the-top Baroque stone piles mix with 19th-century brick buildings. The city has pumped a lot of money into refurbishment and revitalization and the waterfront area -- once the site of an enormous shipbuilding industry (they built the Titanic here and as everyone is fond of quipping, "She…… More »

This morning, while waiting for the volcanic ash cloud to push on, I met Gearoid Millar who is editor of the local edition of the Daily Mirror for a birding trip to the Belfast Hills. Gearoid grew up in West Belfast and spent a lot of time roaming through the hills with his brother when he was a kid. Like many birders I know, his love of birdwatching came from these forays into the hills, which he knows like the back of his hand. When he picked me up at The…… More »

In the past five minutes I've heard three planes overhead. These are the first planes I've heard since I landed in Belfast almost five days ago. I've been following the volcano news of the BBC -- they have a page called Volcano Cloud As It Happens and I love it because it's like reading a teletype. I have to get the sound of Tatoo yelling, "ze plane! ze plane!" from Fantasy Island out of my head. Help.… More »

Rather than spend all of my time today obsessively following the movement of the volcanic ash cloud (it's a little like watching paint dry in real time) I got in the car and headed north -- through the city then out into the country along a drive to rival the Ring of Kerry in the south. The Causeway Coastal route (A2) winds along the coast through the spectacular Glens of Antrim area and on up to the Giant's Causeway. I figure I must be half-Irish at this point…… More »

Taking a Black Cab Tour seems to be the thing to do in Belfast. The cab drivers are all trained and certified as guides so they do more than just drive you past the murals. But this is what everyone wants to see. And wants to hear about. My driver guide was Billy Scott and he was terrific. When I went to meet him he was reading a book by an Irishman who took a train across the states. We talked a lot about travel books, which he was very keen on. We also talked a…… More »

Driving north from Dublin to Belfast is an easy, uneventful drive. The Irish are in love with their motorways -- four-lane highways -- that cut travel time considerably but bypass the little villages. There are only a handful of these big roads in the country. I say beware of what you wish for because these little towns who depend on selling petrol and pub lunches to people passing through will be hard hit by being bypassed. This has happened all over America and…… More »

As a geology major in college I completely appreciate the irony of being trapped on the ground by volcanic ash spewed by the Eyjafjallajoekull volcano in Iceland . I still marvel at the magnitude of what's happening -- here's the latest list of European airport closings reported on by AP minutes ago. It's just incredible. I'm lucky because I am trapped in a 5-star hotel -- The Culloden in Belfast -- with a rental car at my disposal. I'm in a beautiful part of the…… More »

Dublin is so rich in artistic and literary traditions that it's tough to even scratch the surface. The hotel I stayed in -- The Merrion -- is in a fine Georgian building (several, in fact) with soaring ceilings and exquisite plaster details. On every wall are hung primarily original pieces of Irish art. They do an afternoon Art Tea where you're introduced to several of the pieces from the collection by the chef who recreates elements of the artwork in his beautiful…… More »

I decided to spend yesterday doing all the touristy things I could think of in Dublin. That meant starting with a full Irish breakfast (hold the black pudding). Sausage, bacon, poached eggs, grilled tomato, grilled mushroom, and warm toast provided the fuel for the day. I really like the Irish food -- love the grilled tomatoes and mushrooms, and love the porridge, then it's on to soup and brown bread with an occasional piece of fish thrown in. To properly get my…… More »

It's just like me to be in the middle of a volcano crisis. Here's the headline from the BBC: All flights in and out of the UK and several other European countries have been suspended as ash from a volcanic eruption in Iceland moves south. Up to 4,000 flights are being cancelled with airspace closed in Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Denmark among others. This is like being in the states during September 11th, only this time without the terror except in the eyes of…… More »

Many people keep lists. Sometimes they're for mundane things as in reminders of what to buy at the grocery store or what to pack for a trip. Other times they're lists that are made over time -- life lists of birders, "bucket lists" of things to do before you die. Even magazines and books perpetuate our love of list making with shouting headlines and titles like 10 Easy Ways to Lose Weight and 100 Best Colleges and Universities. I have a list in my head of things I…… More »

A couple of days ago I drove through Kilkenny, a small medieval city in the middle of Ireland with a big castle and narrow streets that snake through buildings built centuries before. Just the week before they had switched the road system so that now there were several one-way streets going through the center of town whereas before they were all two-way. I can honestly say that even the locals didn't know which side of the road to drive on, which made me feel --…… More »

A bit more about the driving because it figures so prominently in my trip. Mind you, at this point I drive almost like a native and don't think anything of huge pieces of farm equipment headed my way on what is listed as a national road on a map but is really a country lane. Now I can dodge tractors and sheep, read signs, and take in the scenery all while moving forward. There is remarkably little road kill here. So far I've seen two badgers, one fox, two red…… More »

On Sunday -- a day so beautiful that the Irish were emerging from their homes in droves and squinting at the sun as if to say "what is that big round thing in the sky?" -- I took a drive to Cobh (pronounced Cove), formerly known as Queenstown to commemorate when Queen Victoria first set foot on Irish soil in 1849. Cobh is the place where literally millions of Irish said goodbye to their homeland -- many for the last time -- as they headed for the United States,…… More »

Etienne Van Vrede is from South Africa but has lived in Ireland for the past seven years. General Manager of the Hayfield Manor, Cork's only 5-star hotel, Etienne has enormous responsibilities for someone who's barely thirty. As the person overseeing an 88-room hotel and a staff of 102, Etienne feels he needs to be ever-present to set the tone for the rest of the staff. A tall, lanky man who looks like he'd be equally comfortable on the soccer pitch and in the…… More »

Cork's English Market was started in the late 18th century and is one of the oldest markets of its kind in Europe. It's a covered market with tile floors and permanent stalls offering a wide range of things from fresh fish, poultry, produce, breads, cheese, and meats, to espresso, snacks, and sandwiches. Upstairs, in a balcony that rings the market, is the Farmgate Cafe that serves amazing food from fresh local ingredients. A 19th-century painted cast-iron fountain…… More »

I made my way to the city of Cork in the south of Ireland this morning. Although I traveled on the main road from Killarney, I did encounter several signs warning of "severe bends ahead" which for some reason made me laugh out loud as I imagined a deep-sea diver contemplating his return to the surface rather than a road filled with twists and turns (and massive pieces of farm machinery). On this fine Saturday morning many of the little towns I passed through had…… More »

Those who know me, know this about me: I don't go for spat treatments. I am a self-identified spa-phobic. There is something about people fussing about my person that kind of kicks up an ick factor in me. But every now and then I get brow-beat into having some kind of treatment. I usually try to cancel -- feign an illness or something -- but this time the spa manager was so lovely that I couldn't bring myself to do that. Plus, I would see her everywhere I went in…… More »