Re: I'm gone
Posted: Wed Aug 31, 2022 11:28 am
Got home last night. Will have pics up soon.
General reflections on where we visited....
Ireland....beautiful green country. Fascinating history steeped in victimization. The Irish (for some reason) were the some of most persecuted people (except for Jews) in Europe for thousands of years. The British, vikings, British, Romans, British all had their go. Now very parochial.
-Fairly small country with 5 million people in it but influences throughout the world.
-Many if not most Americans have some ties to Ireland.
-The "troubles" in Northern Ireland are inexplicable. Goes back to the 1670s
-You can tell people have been in Ireland for thousands of years. Not only are there old castles and buildings going back to the vikings and Romans everywhere but every road is paved. There is not a dirt/gravel road anywhere in the country except for farm roads. We traveled by private driver all over the back roads, nope...not a unpaved road anywhere.
-The whole country is like Disneyworld. Picturesque, well groomed, well kept, packed with tourists.
-Being an island, cost of living is fairly high. Gas was $6/gallon, diesel about $5/gallon.
-Guinness is the national drink. It's everywhere and about the price of any other beer, though not cheap...about $8/pint. Which is cheaper than most bars in the US for a Guinness. The other stout is Murphy's which is popular in some of the small villages. You are either a Guinness man or a Murphy's man. I tried Murphy's, I like Guinness better, so I guess I'm a G man.
-We tried to eat Irish food while there. Most of the B&Bs we stayed at had a full Irish b'fast i.e, toast, eggs, bacon, sausage, hash browns, black pudding, biscuits. Not too different than an American b'fast except for the black pudding which is made from blood. It's actually pretty good. Fish and chips (french fries) with mashed peas is big there and very good. Irish stew etc. Restaurants are expensive. We usually ate b'fast at our B&B, skipped lunch and ate simple in the evening. Celebrated our 43 wedding anniversary in Dublin with fish & chips and Guinness and shots of Jameson.
-Speaking of Jameson...we went to their Distillery for a tour. It's been around for a a couple hundred years and you tour the old historic distillery not the place where it's made now. They do give you a tasting and free samples. The tour isn't cheap however. And you would think a bottle of Jameson's would be less expensive at the distillery than elsewhere. Nope. A liter was $32 US. We bought one in a local liquor store for $30 (which we drank) and did find a full liter bottle of the "distillery reserve" in the duty free shop at the airport to bring home for $28. It's about $25 for a 750ml bottle (aka a fifth) in the US where I live.
Iceland...basically a big volcanic rock sitting out in the north Atlantic. Again a relatively small country, 350K people.
-Very parochial attitudes. I had a conversation with a tour guide who tried to tell me what was wrong with America. I had to explain that the US was 1,000 times larger in both area and population. Not to mention the extreme diversity culturally and geographically. Iceland is tiny with a 98% common ethnicity so WTF did he know about the US? He kind of shut up after that.
- Being on a island that doesn't produce much the cost of living is very high. Gas is $7/gallon. Food is expensive. Beautiful country in a rustic, rugged kind of way. Lots of mountains, waterfalls, volcanoes. They basically heat the country and run power off of geothermal and hydro power. If you want to know about Iceland watch the movie Eurovision:The Story of Fire Saga. It's a comedy starring Will Farrel on Netflix. Much of it was filmed in Iceland. Kind of makes fun of their culture but is pretty close. We went to some of the locations in the film.
-Food is expensive in Iceland. We went out for hamburgers and a beer one night. Cost was about $66 for two hamburgers/fries and beers. Beers were like $12/ea. We had Dominoes pizza twice while there. A large pizza cost us $26. We usually have coffee in the afternoon. A small 6 oz cup was $4.
-Oh, and they don't use cash in Iceland. Everything is done by credit/debit cards. So it's good to pick a credit card that automatically converts your money from the local currency at no charge.
Greenland...The only place in GL that isn't perpetually covered in ice is along the southern coasts in the summer time. Inhabited by Inuit people (a very handsome race) it is fairly independent though governed from afar by Norway. Very beautiful country. Very small population, sparsely inhabited. Main industry is sustenance fishing. We were only there for 2 days but pretty much saw everything GL had to offer.
More later...
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