Glendalough

The technical issue which was due to delay all of RyanAir's flights this morning was somehow resolved and Fiona's flight arrived in Dublin on time. Dad and I collected her and then after breakfast, headed back up to the airport to get the hire car for the next 2 days. On a whim I decided to get a satnav with the car. I had only used on before in the States (Michigan, Nov 08) and was curious if they had really caught on in Europe. I know route mapping was popular but when we were in Midland we were able to enter things like "toy store" and get results. When I got back to Scotland I tried a machine at the local Dixons but very few businesses had been googled by then, so the feature didn't really work and there wee few categories apart from address. I entered my mum's house and the route suggested was the same one I would take anyway, so I headed off with some confidence.
 After checking the paper map (M50, Junct11, N81, R756: I work with IT, I'm not stupid) we headed off with our packed lunches for Glendalough. So far so good the sat nav brought us out of Swords and headed south towards the airport and the M50. It wouldn't let us on the M50 though. I figured the maps were out of data as some of these roads are very new, the tarmac still warm. But no problem, it would eventually catch up. But no. Despite knowing we were on the M50 it was not happy about us driving on it, attempting to direct us off at every junction, ending in a desperate cry of "Recalculating" once it realised we still weren't going its way. Finally we made it to J11 and we decided to let it have its way. It immediately brought us through a housing estate but eventually we ended up on the R115. This would have been a lovely road to take had the weather been anything other than what it was - pouring rain, with low cloud. Sadly we were climbing in the Wicklow Mountains with poor visibility. I was quite disappointed - I knew the scenery was amazing but you just couldn't see that much. As we crawled along the road passing sodden cyclists it finally began to lighten. By the time we came across Glenmacness Waterfall I had to stop for a photo as it was finally clear enough to get an idea of the entire region.

Glenmacness Waterfall, Wicklow panoramic made from 35 photos

Once we arrived at Glendalough (and ate lunch) the weather did improve. We headed into the Visitor Centre where we were told that we could pay to see the exhibition and film, or just go outside and see the Tower and other monuments for free. He then suggested that as it was dry, to just go back outside and come back when it started to rain. Finding it hard to fault his logic we headed back out and into the "Monastic Village".

The tower and the buildings are quite impressive. The remaining structures are estimated to have been built in the 10th-12th century, but the site had been active since the 6th century. From a teasing point of view, it has a very good example of the early Irish space programme with turf fired granite rockets. As we walked through the site we were really taken with the cemetery. Some of the graves were quite old while some were surprisingly new - I hadn't appreciated that the cemetery was still active.
We then started on a half hearted walk to the lakes which are further up the valley. We didn't get too far before the rain started and we felt compelled to turn back, which did seem to appease the rain gods since the rain more or less stopped.
After visiting the visitor centre and watching the film we again turned on the sat nav and headed back home. The trip home still wouldn't let us use the motorway but since we knew where we were we didn't feel to bothered.

It's a light and tumble journey...

From the East Side to the park;
Just a fine and fancy ramble
To the zoo.
Simon and Garfunkel - At the Zoo

 Michele took all six of us out to the zoo today. It was great fun. I haven't been to Dublin Zoo in absolute ages.
The weather wasn't great, but really only rained hard on us once and that was while we were in the Gorilla house, so we just hung about there a little longer. Some of the showers were a bit on the damp side, but you just gotta bear it. As usual Ciaran played to his audience, but I suspect neither Bobby nor Ava seem that impressed with what he had to say, certainly they look dubious in this photo.
They really have done a lot of work around the zoo with new enclosures being implemented all the time. The new enclosures seem to mean less visibility of the animals but its better in the long term for their health.

The real clever thing is the family pass which meant it was at least the 4th time that Michele had brought the children into the zoo. They would come in and fo0llow different paths, in different directions so that they wouldn't get bored with seeing the same animals in the same order.Yet in all that time they had managed not to see the Red Panda. This is related to the giant Panda but is only the size of a cat, coloured like a fox, with a big bottle tail. Its also know an the fire fox though the browser uses a red fox as its mascot.

Its amazing how much fun the zoo is and no matter how wet and unhappy you seem, its always a good time.

Kilmainham Gaol

Ciaran and I took the advice of my cousin and headed into town to visit Kilmainham Gaol. It was our first real trip on the Luas and we were well impressed, though felt the signposting at the far end could have been better. This is a major tourist attraction but there were no signs from the Luas stop, only a general map of the city that had not been vandalised.

The jail itself is a scarily impressive early Victorian one. The original plan was that prisoners would be reformed, so the emphasis was on silence and solitude. The acoustics are remarkable. Single cells and no contact with anyone for the majority of the time (at least the first year of a sentence). However reality overcame design and like other prisons it was overcrowded. The limestone walls held moisture keeping it cool in the summer but damp and cold in winter. Gas heating was fitted later but only used for about an hour a day. Some of the crimes committed to get in seemed pretty tame (stealing potatoes or an apple) but once you realise that, especially for destitute children, it was a better option than the workhouse. In fact the governor of the jail campaigned to have the children's food allowance cut by 4 ounces to more closely match the workhouse and discourage children being sentenced just to 'beef up'.

Apart from being a real jail, it played an significant role in the fight for Irish Independence, especially the 1916 Easter Uprising. As the second city of the empire, many Dubliners did not support an independent Ireland and were not happy with the Easter Rebellion, spitting at and throwing waste at the prisoners as they were eventually marched to Kilmainham. However it was the cold execution of these prisoners over the following weeks which turned public opinion toward the rebellion. Perversely, during the Civil War the Irish Government also used the prison to house and execute Republicans, further cementing a dislike for the jail.

The main thrust of the restoration of the jail is in recognition of the role the jail had in the various uprisings. Cells where prominent leaders were held are all noted. Its certainly worth a visit.

One of the problems of creating panoramic photos is shown here. Can anyone see it?

Airshow 2010

Fiona and I headed out to East Fortune for the 2010 Airshow. Its the first airshow I've been to in ages and I had a really good time. In all honesty, it wasn't Fiona's thing and I'm sure I'm going to have to owe her something.
It was a pretty good day though. Having been out for her cousin's 21st, we started out form her mum's house, which took at least an hour off the get-up and go time, which made things much easier. The forecast was for clouds with light rain as the afternoon progressed, but we hoped there was enough margin for error to allow us to see the planes. The drive to East Fortune was quiet enough with not much traffic, even once you got near the airfield. The parking was simple. They were using the old runway and we were put into the first row of the second half (the intersection of the 2 runways) where the car would be easy to find on the way out.
We had two hours before the flight programme started so we looked around at the 'static' display. In a sense it was a little disappointing. Apart from vendors, there were no new static displays for the show itself, only the usual museum displays. That being said, there was still a lot to see in the various hangers and store rooms, including the first operational Concorde, lots of info on the R34, the first transatlantic airship which flew from here to Mineola in Long Island, and the usual array of restored planes. After wandering around for the 2 hours we headed down to the main display arena, bought folding chairs and settled in to watch the show.
In all, there were 17 displays over the next 3 hours, including an intermission where Fiona and I managed to get something to eat.
The displays ranged from a plane towing a glider which was performing with another plane, to the glider on its own, to the tug plane and the glider pilot (in a tug plane); to early jets displaying on their own; old and new biplanes with and without lycra clad wing walkers; and restored war veterans.

It is always amazing to see the control that these pilots have over the planes. Two of the planes, the Mustang and the Skyraider both developed mechanical faults which limited their performance, but in both cases they managed to adjust the show to accommodate this. (Both plance did actually fly and display, but restricted their actions to fairly simply passes - the Mustang had a generator fault and the Skyraider had an open landing carriage bay). Most of the other planes (with the exception of the Catalina and the Douglas) put on an impressive display and the wingwalkers went for a handshake - they just barely missed each other

Visually, the most impressive had to be the Wingwalkers (even without being able to see them close up). The idea of standing on your hands while travelling at up to 150 mph on the wing of an air plane is not my cup of tea. Even the noise of the biplanes - as the pitch of the propeller changed the wingtip would sometimes go supersonic with tiny sonic booms adding to the noise. Sound wise it was between the awesome roar of the Hunter's jet and the emotional Merlin of the Spitfire.

The photos here are (from the top) a Vampire, the Aerostarts in Yak 52s and Yak 50s, the Mustang, the Skyraider, the Spitfire, the Catalina, the Wingwalkers and the Hunter. Not showm are the Swift Team (the Glider and Twisters), Tigermoth, Pitts , Dakota DC-3, Kittyhawk p-39, the Starduster, the Bulldog, and the Tutor.

At the end fi the flight programme we thought we would have an opportunity to continue looking around the museum displays, but sadly everything was closing at the same time. In fact, in a remarkably short time the traffic was clearing the car park. So we never got the opportunity this time to see Concorde (although I have seen it here a few times already) Perhaps we'll have to make another trip back?
We did get the chance to shop with another few models being bought, though not of anything on display today - Ciaran tends to prefer Russian modern fighers.

We made it back to the car, now sitting alone, facing the wrong direction for the flow of traffic with streams of cars passing on the drivers side, making it hard to simply get back into the car. Taking the road less travelled "Local Access Only" brought us down the quiet roads into North Berwick where we had a nice Italian dinner before heading back to Strathaven to collect Fiona's car.

Scotland's Secret Bunker

I took Ciaran and Cameron up into Fife to Scotland's Secret Bunker. This is the Cold War remnant that would have housed to Secretary of State for Scotland and about 300 other troops in the event of all out nuclear war. It was a bit of an eye opener.
The location was proper Hollywood - the opening scenes from Matthew Broderick's War Machine. This Scottish farm, with its remote out buildings, looks similar to any other one.

Nowadays you can see that the shutters are metal and not wood, but that would not have been noticeable while operational. You then go into the farmhouse (you don't see much of the farmhouse actually - you go in the door into a gift shop with a small staircase heading downstairs, behind a turnstyle), through the turnstyle and down the flight of stairs. Its a deep set of stairs, certainly more than typical in a house, with a long doglegged corridor heading downward in front of you.
The corridor ends in a large blast door. Once inside the space is quite impressive, though with a full complement of over 300 people I'm sure its not that big really. All in all, there are two levels, completely isolated from the ground for both electronic and shock protection, each level being the size of a football pitch. Total depth is 40 metres with accommodation, medical, broadcast on the upper level and the real operational stuff on the lower one.
With dorms operating on a hot bed policy - you climb out and someone else climbs in - it was good to know that even at the end of the world class was noticed - the more senior officials slept 4 to a room with SecStateScotland having his own room.
The staff had an 18 hours duty shift followed by 6 hours sleep with closely monitored and chaperoned interaction between male and female staff.  Though, with no water for bathing I'm not too sure how difficult a job that would be.
I think the lack of people actually working (there were a good number of visitors so the corridors all looked busy) makes the rooms seem bigger than they need be. With more bodies pressed in I think a greater sense of the scale would be obvious.

As it was, the few mannequins which were present always looked understaffed for the job.
Some aspects are quite odd -on the whole the bunker looks like something out of the cold war (which makes sense) but this bunker was operational until 1993, yet the tech is very 1960s or even earlier, making it look much more like a 1950's show. I appreciate that the tech is donated and there are still national security issues - there are some rooms which are still off limits due to national security issues -but it seems hard to understand this bunker being used in the late 80's, again comparing it to War Machine.

Rain Halts Play

When we woke up yesterday the rain was beating off the windows- the sort of day when you turn off the alarm and snuggle back under the duvet for as long as you can manage. Unluckily, it was the only day where we had timed appointments to keep - check out at 1200, Gorge Walking at 1430 and the ferry home at 1920. Between checking out and Gorge walking we had decided we would do our gift shopping and we would also look at the time-shares available within the complex.
Even with the short run out to the car with our gear we got pretty wet. I should have known something more dramatic was up as there was a lot of people arriving for the pool. While checking out another guest was asking about rooms for that night - it seems the ferry currently wasn't running due to gales and no decision would be made until 1300. I checked then about rooms and was told there was no problem as no new people were arriving until the ferry started moving again. Comforted by this we headed to look at the chalets.
 The rain stopped long enough for us to walk over to the chalets, chatting with the sales rep. We told her that we were going to do the gorge walk later and she looked a bit apprehensive. Before I could ask her anything my mobile went off. The gorge walkers had to cancel due to the state the rivers were in.

The agent said she wasn't surprised as there was a lot of water dropped since last night and most was running off. She pointed out "new" rivers down into the glen.
The chalets are quite nice, but expensive. Its a much better option to simply rent them by the day when you would like to use them, but they would appeal to many people. Ciaran fell in love with the 3 bedroom style - 3 double bedroom downstairs with an open plan living room dining room and kitchen upstairs, with a balcony out. Naturally, where they were meant a lovely view.
With no gorge walk we headed down to the ferry to see what was happening.
Ciaran did his bit of shopping, money still seems to burn him, and as we could see foot passengers joining the ship decided to head down to the terminal for an update. The staff were optimistic that sailings would be back to normal so we decided to head out to Glen Sannox to see what the water levels were really like, and then head back to the earlier ferry at 1640.
Once we started out the heavens opened and completely emptied themselves. With the poor visibility and the gale force winds I was really beginning to become concerned. Everywhere had an all over grey colour and the standing water on the roads made travel difficult. Fortunately with the narrow roads you tend not to travel very quickly anyway.
We arrived at Glen Sannox and apart from another family who appeared to all be wearing wet suits there was no one in sight. The rain was coming down so heavy that it wasn't worth the effort of getting out of the car to take the picture of the river. The other family also seemed to decide that conditions were never going to improve so they got into their car and headed away. Since we had no fixed agenda, we decided to wait a while.
After about 10 minutes the rain eased off and we got out for a look around. We could hardy believe our eyes - our happy little stream was a frothing monster, with the water level easily three to four feet higher than where it was only two days ago when we walked here on Friday.
When we were here on Friday we had noticed where the water level had dropped, from the rain on Thursday so we did expect a higher level, but never for the characteristic change which we saw. We now fully understood why the Gorge Walk had to be cancelled. After a while we headed back into Brodick and the ferry home.
Sadly, it was not to be as easy as that. Arriving at the ferry terminal, there was already a good number of cars waiting for the boat. Since we were technically early we had to go into the "unbooked" lane - essentially a standby category. The ferry arrived in and quite quickly seemed to have emptied itself of the Arran bound passengers. It seemed to take quite a long time to get the mainland bound vehicles onto the boat, with parts of lanes going on at a time. However, despite us being second in the standby lane, no cars from there were allowed on, but it looked now like the backlog had been caught up, and that if the ferry did go later then we would be on it.
Less than 20 minutes late, only 3 hours later, we were on board and feeling quite nervous. We could see the way the water in the harbour was moving, the tautness of the wind sock, and the absence of any flying birds to predict an rough trip back to Ardrossan.

We sat out at the back, just in case. By some strange combination of luck and weather, it was actually one of the easiest crossing Ciaran or I have ever made. The wind seemed to come at the back of the ferry at just the pace we were moving away from it, leaving not a breeze on the deck. The strange sense of isolation gave the opportunity to watch the island retreat s we headed back across the Forth.
Finally got home at about 2120, in time for Something, something something dark side, which Ciaran had been looking forward to all week.

Small Circles

Another fairly easy day today.
After breakfast we headed back up the String Road to see if we could see anything more than we could on Thursday. Visibility still wasn't great, but miles better than Thursday.
This is basically the same image as from Thursday:

You still can't see the top of Goatfell but the rest is visible. This path heads out about 200m to a circular bench which overlooks Glen Rosa and Goatfell.
We continued along the String and headed off into Machie. There is an impressive stone circle but this time we headed off to see the stone circle at Auchagallon.

A little bit of forced perspective going on here as the stones are only a few feet high. It seems that these were more usually a kerbed cairn with the stones almost acting as retaining walls, but excavations during the 19th century often didn't put them back together the same way.
At this point the weather changed. Every time we would get somewhere it would start to rain. We would either wait it out and eventually give up, or just move on immediately. We did make it back up to Lochranza and had a look at the castle.

We continued along the coast, saw an outboard powered Viking long boat, and bough some cheese.
After dinner we continued the ritual and spent about 2 hours in the pool

North Glen Sannox

Had an easy start to the day. Nether of us woke up til after 0930, a bit of a problem when breakfast ends at 0930. Had to rush despite being on holiday. After breakfast we headed back to the room to plan the day. Weather wise, it not too bad a day. Its overcast but not actually raining, breezy but warm.
We cannot see the top of Goatfell yet so do not want to try something that dramatic but it does look like a nice enough day to try something else - like North Glen Sannox.
We headed into Brodick to get some stuff for lunch and then headed off through Corrie along to the car  park for the Sannox walk.
It was a nice pleasant walk with the weather getting better as we headed along. As with most paths on Arran this one was in great condition. It brought us through moorland and then forestry park, with the river running alongside us. Once we crossed the deer gate back into moorland we decided that the dark clouds coming over Arran were a little bit too ominous. We found a good spot and settled for our lunch.
While we we eating wee saw a large bird of prey. Lochranza distillery have some golden eagles as mascots - perhaps one of those?

The walk back to the car was uneventful apart from me going over on my bad ankle a few times. On the way back it threatened rain a few times but never came to anything.
Spent the rest of the day in the pools. By the time we got back to the hotel Ciaran felt he was due a swim so, after booking a Gorge Walk for Sunday lunchtime, we headed to the pool in the main hotel. So we swam there for just over an hour, headed back for dinner, once that settled, back to Spa pool for just under 2 hours.
While we were in the pool the threatening rain finally arrived. It was bouncing off the pavement  6 inches!

Drip Drip Drip...

It was quite a rough crossing this morning. Both Ciaran and I were a bit squiffy but fortunately neither of us crossed the threshold! It did slow us down though for the rest of the day.

No that there was much going on. Arran is lovely but is really an outdoor place and it takes a special sort of outdoorsy person to get out of  a nice dry car and deliberately get wet and miserable.
In between showers we went for a quick walk down in Broderick. Ciaran made a beeline for a small toy store and in among the other items found the MIG-29 he has been looking for. Then back via the Chocolate Store made him one happy boy.
We then drove South down the East coast with Ciaran practicing his orienteering skills but despite it not actually raining anymore, it never really cleared up. The drive back along the "String" the road through the middle of the island had us up in the cloud cover. Impressive considering we were walking above this last year.

Just at the edge of this picture the land falls away about 100m down to the valley floor and then rises over 200m to overlook the road by about 100m. Not visible today.

After we checked in we headed off to Brodick Castle for lunch and the tour. Its a residential castle - I prefer old ruined ones - but full of impressive items. Some of the grandfather clocks are from 1680s and still working and keeping time!
We later headed back to the hotel and dinner. We then spent the evening in the pool - 2 hours in total and came out totallly prune like.
Back in the room, eating sherbert lemons and watching Big bang Theory
I think we'll take it easy tomorrow and see what the day throws at us. Weather not supposed to be good.

Just Typical

Despite the weather being pretty good for the past 2 months, why is is that the four days I play to be away being active outdoors have a forecast of:

Our boat leaves at 0945 Thu and departs at 1920 Sun.
I think we will be staying on easy low level walks this year - is just too dangerous to climb when the cloud cover is so low.
At least we have the pool and sauna to return too...