I'M GOING TO THE CHRISTMAS MARKETS!!!

I’ve done it. I’ve roped EDP into going to the German Christmas markets with me. This is one of my greatest achievements. What’s even more amazing is he’s excited for them now, too, because he found out there’s a lot of food at them.

Originally, we were thinking about another trip to Italy for this year’s fall travel. San Marino has been on my list for years and there are still a couple of places in Italy we haven’t seen, particularly Milan. So we started with San Marino and Northern Italy. Then we decided to add a couple of days of snowboarding in for EDP. But once we pushed into winter, I wasn’t as keen on San Marino. I think we’d enjoy it more in the spring or fall. After a couple of days, EDP suggested we do 1 or 2 Christmas markets and I nearly died. I think he knew I’d try to steamroll him into dropping Milan entirely and JUST doing Christmas markets if not presented with a specific plan so he came armed with 2 markets that weren’t too far from where he wanted to snowboard AND are some of the best in the world - Munich and Nuremberg. Obviously, I suggested we add at least 15 others. That motion was denied. But we started building a plan around the Munich & Nuremberg markets, a couple of days in the Dolomites, and a few days in Milan.

The best part of this whole thing is that I’ve turned 2 markets into 7.

How did I manage that?

• From the beginning, the plan included Munich and Nuremberg because they aren’t far from the Dolomites and they are both pretty famous. That’s Market 1 and Market 2.

• We originally were going to fly through Rome but we were able to make it work to fly into Munich and out of Milan (who knew Milan had a bigger airport than Rome?!) And Munich has a Christmas market IN THE AIRPORT. That’s Market 3.

• It turns out, Bolzano is a hub for most of the travel in to and out of the Dolomites. Most folks will travel into Bolzano and then get regional transportation out to their particular village. That’s Market 4.

• And once we get into Val Gardena, the area of the Dolomites we’re staying in, there are 2 more small markets in the little towns. That’s Market 5 and 6! But the timing on Market 6 might not work out for me, we’ll see.

• And guess who else has a Christmas market? Yup. Milan. That’s Market 7.

Are we going to spend significant time in any other than Munich & Nuremberg? No. I think you have to walk through the Munich Airport market to get out but we want to spend our time at the proper market so we’ll be beelining for Marienplatz. Once we’re in the Dolomites, I’ll check out the Bolzano and Val Gardena markets on my own while EDP snowboards. The Milan market has a bunch of stuff going on while we’re there and we’ll probably wander through but it won’t be the point of our time in Milan the way the markets are for Nuremberg & Munich.

I’ve wanted to go to the Christmas markets for SO LONG. I’m so excited that I’m pretty sure I’m about to be given a limit on the amount of time I’m allowed to spend talking about them. We’re currently deep in negotiations on our arrival & departure time for Nuremberg. Obviously, I think we should be on the first train out of Munich and the last train back. EDP heartily disagrees. The talks continue.

In the meantime, we’ve got almost everything planned out:

• We fly into Munich on an overnight fight. We’ll get to our hotel as quickly as we can and spend the afternoon & evening at the Munich markets. hitting up the main market for gingerbread, the medieval market for bread, mulled wine & wurst, Rindermarkt for flame roast salmon and the Christmas Village for general Christmas frivolities.

• The next day, we’ll head up to Nuremberg. We’ll check out the castle in the morning, take a food tour of the market in the late afternoon and then stuff ourselves with more gingerbread, bread, wurst and most importantly, Feuerzangenbowle.

• The next day, we’ll head for Val Gardena in the Dolomites. EDP will snowboard. I’ll Christmas market and read. And eat the snacks I bought at the Christmas markets.

• We finish up in Milan where we’re going to take in the Duomo, a couple of museums, see the Last Supper and try to get to La Scala for a performance (I’m not holding my breath. The only performance while we’re there is the opening night of the entire season… Tickets sell out in minutes.)

• Finally, we’ll make our way back home again, with my Christmas market bounty taking over every bag we have and our lives, in general.

I’m so flipping excited.

Galway

Where did we leave off? Right. Sligo. Very cute town, great fish & chips, no time to look around.

It was definitely an early start as we headed out of Sligo. Not like… 5am early but early enough. We had a 2 hour drive to get to Connemara National Park where we were going to do some hiking. It was another morning without breakfast before we got going but there was a little roadside shop/cafe where we were able to get some hot chocolate & I had a scone that was fine but nothing like that really good one from Derry. We got into the parking lot, into our hiking boots, had a bathroom break and off we went.

Connemara has several different trails with none of them being particularly long so I decided we’d do the red trail, a 3.7km loop that leaves from the blue trail, which is a 3km loop from the starting point. Easy Peasy. Not easy. Not sure I know the definition of peasy to say on that one. If it relates to peas, it was definitely not peasy. We started out on a very easy trail, passing a lovely pasture with a couple of horses. We headed up some gentle slopes, enjoying the countryside until we reached the turn-off for the red trail. This took us towards a mountain that I assumed we’d be going partway up and then around. Uh, wrong… we went to the top. And yeah, I checked (after-the-fact, not in advance...) Diamond Hill counts as a mountain with a height of 442m. Good thing I carry my Ativan. The trail stayed amazingly well-groomed for our entire climb with paths and steps made of rocks. And it did end up being a gorgeous hike, it just wasn’t what we expected we were doing! It was a fairly foggy day so we weren’t able to see too far but we got great views of the lake we travelled along to get to the park and I got another photo for my new photo series featuring EDP that I’m calling Staring at Stuff with Binoculars (still workshopping that title.) Anyway. You go up one side of the mountain and down the other on a one-way trail and there is an escape point before you head towards the absolute top - there were a fair number of people who definitely either overestimated their abilities or perhaps just had no clue what they were getting themselves into and so the one-way trail wasn’t really one-way as it should have been. There were also some VERY smart people with thermoses, enjoying their coffee at the top of a mountain (note to self: definitely do this next time…)

It ended up taking us about 2 1/2 hours to do the two trails and the parking lot was PACKED when we got back. Not only was the lot full but the sides of the drive into the parking lot were also lined almost entirely to the entrance so it was good we made it an early day. Let me tell you - the woman in the car that I stopped was incredibly happy when I told her we were leaving and she could follow us to our spot. We had a long drive down to Galway, our base for our last 3 nights in Ireland, which was lovely drive and we were glad we had some car snacks to tie us over until we could get something more substantial. After a very long drive into Galway (with the last part taking FOREVER with traffic), we headed off into town to see the Spanish Arch (that’s IT?!) and get dinner. Dinner was the far superior of the two and I broke from my obsession with fish & chips for a beef & Guinness stew. So good and was the right kind of meal for after you climb a mountain. And so was the whiskey we stopped for on the way back to the hotel. And the hot chocolates we took for the walk back. I deserve a LOT of treats for climbing a mountain that I didn’t know I was climbing, despite being the person who planned the hike, okay?

Saturday was another day of hiking - it was time for the Cliffs of Moher and my last chance to see puffins. It was supposed to be the clearer day between Saturday & Sunday but when we got up there (after another early start since it’s 1 1/2 hours from Gayway), the fog was insanely thick. Like… Couldn’t see a thing thick. The cafes were still closed so we made due with car snacks and as we started off on our 10km hike to Hag’s Head, we could barely see where we were going. We could maybe see 20ft in front of us? But we were hopeful some of it might burn off as the morning marched on and so we did, too. Well, I wouldn’t say things cleared up but we did seem to hit a few little spots where we had more visibility and we were able to see some lovely little birds (not puffins) all snuggled up in the cliffs. It ended up being a really lovely walk (definitely more walk than hike) and we were often the only people around on our way out to the Hag’s Head. It was much busier on our way back but we had already done our exploring and the visibility wasn’t any better so it didn’t take long to get back at all. I’m disappointed in the lack of puffins and I’ve warned EDP that I will be planning a puffin-centric trip in the next few years so that he’s prepared for what’s coming. Given his new situation with the binoculars, he’s pretty keen on the idea. We’re really showing our age…

Anyway. We headed into Doolin for lunch, where we decided that we’d skip out on our afternoon plans for the Burren. I had been really struggling to figure out where the heck someone parks at the Burren and the trails were all quite long. With the fog, we weren’t going to be able to see anything and while there’s a small national park with the trails, the entire area has the same type of landscape so we were driving through what we would have been able to see. So we scrapped that idea and headed back to Galway, stopping at a lovely chocolate shop on the way (chocolate > hiking in the fog.) Then, it was off to dinner - and it was starting to rain just as we left the hotel and rain, it did. It was coming down pretty heavily so we ended up ducking into a pub for a drink before heading to a wonderful Spanish tapas place for dinner (TWO kinds of croquettes!) On the way back to the hotel, we stopped for one last ice cream at Murphys.

For our last full day in Ireland, we headed out to Inishmore, one of the Aran islands. It was a bit of a drive from Galway but we caught the first ferry over to Inishmore. After bolting up to the grocery store to get something to eat (seriously - why can’t you get food before 9am in this country?!) we decided we should maybe take one of the tour buses that take you around the island so we could see more. I vetoed the idea of renting bikes, though EDP would have been delighted to do that, but with the size of the island, we wouldn’t be able to see much if we just walked. And so, we found a hop-on-hop-off. Who said we’d leave in 10 minutes. Great! Just enough time for a bathroom break. A half hour later, we still hadn’t left. We finally bailed when it was clear the driver was trying to wait out a family that was indecisive about whether or not to take the tour. And we headed out on foot to Dún Dúchathair, the black fort. It was the closest of the 2 things I was hoping to see (the other being Dun Aengus.) We took the only road out of town and then headed up a side road that grew increasingly rocky and I started another new photos series called Abandoned Bikes I’ve Seen. A fair number, which was unsurprising. We saw some of the famous Aran sheep as we walked along and soon enough, we got out of the pastures and onto the cliffs. And it was stunning - we absolutely made the right choice in getting off the tour van. I have no idea how it would have gotten you up there, where it would have dropped you off, etc. This was one of the highlights of the trip for me. The sky was clear and the water was crashing and the rocks were so interesting. The ruins of the old fort were interesting but really, the cliffs and the promontory stole the show. After wandering for ages, we headed back into town for a seaside meal of cider and goat cheese salad (it sounds like the adult choice but Inishmore is known for its goat cheese and also, it may have been the only thing on the menu I could eat other than the fish and chips.) We stocked up on fudge from the Man from Aran, were delighted by a crew member from our ferry who is also a poet and wanders around selling his book to unsuspecting tourists, and soaked up the last of the Irish sunshine. With how long we spent exploring Dún Dúchathair, we didn’t have time for anything else but I didn’t even mind. It was a quiet ferry ride back and we were back in Galway, heading out for our last dinner. I wanted one last fish and chips so EDP armed himself with a list of places - happily, we were able to grab one of the last tables at the place at the top of the list, which happened to be the same place we stopped on our first night for a whiskey. It was an excellent meal to close out the trip!

With a mid-day flight home, we had a lazy morning with a long drive back to Dublin. After dropping off the car, we got through security, found a bottle of the whiskey we enjoyed at Teelings that you can’t get in Canada, got something to eat and boarded the plane. It was an uneventful flight home (always the best kind) and now it’s back to regular life. And laundry. Why is there always SO MUCH laundry after a trip?!

(Part of) The West Atlantic Way

This morning, after grabbing coffee from a little shop just around the corner (including the most delicious scone with clotted cream and jam for breakfast), we headed off for the most northern point in Ireland - Malin Head to see Banba’s Crown and Hell’s Hole. The Irish really know how to name things. When we first arrived, we headed out for the short walk to Hell’s Hole. It’s a chasm between two cliffs where the water rushes in. It was cool but I think the name overhypes it a little. We continued walking just a touch further and found another little spot that I enjoyed more than Hell’s Hole, though they were very similar. Then, we walked up to Banba’s Crown which is just this old tower but has beautiful views of the ocean (actually, I think it’s called the Inner Sea off the Coast of Scotland or something incredibly descriptive like that…)

After taking in the scenery for a bit, it was back in the car to head to Glenveagh National Park to check out its castle and nature trails. The drive was easy enough, taking us through some sweet little villages with charming high streets, though we didn’t stop at all. In the early afternoon, we made it to the park, got parked and started the 3.6km walk up to the castle grounds. We took a few minutes to go through the castle, which actually isn’t a castle; just a hunting lodged that looks like a castle and tucked in around some of the gardens. Then, it was time to start our 8km nature walk. 16km, actually, because that is just one way. We walked along the Lough for a good amount of time (right to the end, actually) and also saw two small houses and a little waterfall. Eventually, the landscape got pretty repetitive and because we didn’t want to get back to the car too late, we turned around just shy of the 5km mark. When you add on the walk up from the car park, we did about 17km total in the park, which was a pretty good amount of km.

We headed for the hotel, which was on the edge of Letterkenny and near absolutely nothing. We ducked out of the hotel to a pizza truck to get a couple of pizzas and some cider from the off licence. It worked out well enough because we were tired and needed to have the feet up for a bit. Also, now we can say we’ve been in Letterkenny.

This morning, we started making our way south by starting with a walk in the Poisoned Glen. The rain has been holding off and our luck was almost definitely going to run out today but there was a chance we’d drive through the rain instead of hiking in it. We found the Poisoned Glen easily enough but I should have done a bit more reading because we were in runners and it was definitely more of a hiking boot situation. We ended up bailing out of the 4km round trip hike before the 1km mark because there were a lot of marshy spots and we were having trouble discerning the trail. Of course, almost immediately upon turning back, I made a bad choice with where I stepped and went into a mud puddle. That was super fun. As we were getting back, about 12,000 seniors were arriving to hike the glen - all with walking poles and head-to-toe waterproof gear. I hope they enjoyed themselves… This was also when it started to rain. We did manage to spend a couple of minutes at the Dunlewey church ruins, which looked pretty spectacular in the gloomy day, before the rain got to be too much and we headed on our way to Maghera Strand beach.

This is where the rain really got us. It’s a good thing it was just a beach to explore versus a hiking trail. We did put on the hiking boots (and fresh socks for me, too) and got all zipped into our rain jackets and headed into the beach. It was a beach - with the tide way, way out - so we were able to wander quite extensively and get right into one of the caves along the side. The wind was whipping up the waves and the rain was coming down and it was a rather desolate experience (although we were far from the only idiots who showed up today.) Even with the rain and wind, it was worth the stop. As we made our way to our next stop, Sliabh Liag, we took the Glengesh pass, which took us through some of the nicest countryside in Donegal county (as per the guide book.) It was pretty good but the highlight was definitely stopping to talk to some sheep. They had a LOT to say. I didn’t understand any of it but I think they wanted snacks. Same, sheep, same.

Eventually, we came out at Sliabh Liag’s parking area. Specifically, we thought it was the upper parking area, which is what we were aiming for so we could start our 10km hike. Turns out, it was just the lower parking area. We did get sent up (it’s very limited parking up there) with a warning that visibility was awful but we might be able to do a bit of walking into the mountains. So up we went. And it was pretty foggy. But there was a coffee truck so we got hot beverages and some insight from the fella running the show that shortly before, you couldn’t even see the fence, let alone any of the cliffs. He thought the visibility would be good in about an hour so we headed up to the viewpoint and then onto the trail to see how far we could get. We got about 1.5km. The clouds were lifting but we just kept climbing and after a bit, the trail wasn’t as obviously marked and we couldn’t always see the next trail marker. We didn't' think it was a good idea to get lost in the Irish mountains so we turned back early for the second time today. It was the right choice. When we got back to the viewpoint, there was way more visibility! So we looked around again (I got another round of hot chocolate) and tried to make friends with the lawn maintenance crew that was working but they were either skittish babies or too interested in eating grass (yes, they were sheep.)

Finally, we returned to the car and headed off for the night to Sligo. We only arrived at 6:30 and we have to be off early tomorrow because we have 2 hours of driving before our first hike but it’s too bad we didn’t get a bit of time here, it’s a cute city and the food seems really good (such good fish and chips!) But, alas, it’s not in the cards. Tomorrow, we continue to make our way along the western coast. down to Galway, which is our base for a few days. We are doing two short hikes tomorrow, I think? I can’t really remember but I feel like maybe I should check on that before turning in for the night…

Northern Ireland

We were up early yesterday morning to get out to the airport to pick up our rental car. Sadly, coffee shops in Dublin are only open 9-5 so we had to skip breakfast to catch an early shuttle. Soon, we were in our much-larger than anticipated rental and heading off to Brú na Bóinne, the largest of the passage tombs in Europe. These particular ones are also super old - dating back to 3200 BCE. I didn’t know anything about passage tombs or that Brú na Bóinne even existed until I was paging through the guidebook but it went on the must-see list pretty quickly.

After driving to the wrong spot (ALWAYS put Visitor Centre into the GPS, people) we arrived right at the time for our tour to begin. Happily, it turns out that your tour actually leaves 45 minutes after your ticket time so that you can spend some time going through the exhibit and learn about what you’re going to see. We had just enough time to see the exhibit and get a cookie before heading to our shuttle bus to take us to Knowth, the first of the two sites we were seeing. It has about 1/3 of all the megalithic art in Western Europe. Just in one spot! We had a tour guide tell us what they have been able to figure out about the passage tombs (very little, other than there are no descendants of the people who built the tombs in Ireland anymore and that they do not think they were built by slaves) and what they are still thinking is the case (the most elite of the elite are buried in the passage tombs, likely only religious leaders were allowed inside.) We were allowed to wander quite freely around the site, including going right up to the kerbstones and a viewing platform on top of the passage tomb, which gave us incredible views of the area. From Knowth, we went to Newgrange, where we were able to go into the passage tomb and see a simulation of what happens on the winter solstice. Newgrange is lined up perfectly so that during the solstice, the light comes into the passage tomb and illuminates the chamber. Really impressive!

Then, it was on to Belfast. After dropping off bags, we started the walk over to Titanic Belfast where we were able to get tickets for one of the last entry times of the day. We had enough time to see the SS Nomadic, a tender that was used to take passengers to the Titanic. It was done up in the style it was originally, which matched the Titanic so that was quite interesting. Then, it was into the museum. It’s more of an interactive showpiece versus a museum, I’d say? The first half was loud and busy and frankly, not enjoyable. But then, at around the halfway mark, you take a little ride that is very much about making the Titanic - not Belfast or the ship maker or ships, in general - and then it totally switches. Not only were the crazy videos and audio clips and loud sounds done away with but people quieted down, too. There were replicas of each class of cabin and lots of info about the fitting of the ship. And then it got to the sinking, taking you through the calls for help, breaking down everything that happened and telling the stories of some of the passengers and crew, both survivors and not. There was also this massive wall with the names of all the dead, which was really overwhelming to see. Finally, there was the aftermath - the new measures put in place as a result of all the little things that went wrong and a bit of an overview of the efforts to access the wreckage.

After that, we still had plenty of daylight so we headed up to West Belfast to see the murals. It was a bit of a hike but the weather was holding and so off we went. It was an interesting walk, particularly seeing the peace line dividing Catholic and Protestant areas. Also, A LOT of Union Jacks flying in the Protestant area. A LOT. Our walk eventually took us back to the city centre where we found a pub for dinner & drinks (Such a good burger! Such a good gin fizz!) before settling into the hotel for the night to do some homework on Derry (yes, I do mean watching Derry Girls.)

This morning, we were up and out early on to get to the Giant’s Causeway (foreigners love the Giant’s Causeway, don’t you know?)  We walked up from Bushmills because what’s an extra couple of kilometres? We started with the red trail, which took us up along the top of the cliffs (are they cliffs? I don’t know…) to give us the bird’s eye view before taking us down and around to the causeway where we were able to clamour all over the causeway. It was such a unique site and we really enjoyed exploring it and we even got to see a little bit of sunshine. Then it was on to Derry!

I think it’s time to admit that I didn’t really like Belfast. To be fair, we only spent half a day there but there just didn’t seem to be a lot of the type of thing that piques our fancy. But Derry charmed me pretty quickly. I love a city with walls, for one, but it also had a cozy small town feel that I liked. After dropping bags and grabbing a very tasty sandwich, we headed up to walk the city walls, giving us some history and beautiful views. While we were on the walls, the hotel arranged a taxi tour for us with Paul, a gentleman with a very personal history and connection to the Troubles. He told us his first hand stories of growing up during that time, of seeing people shot in the streets for no reason, of friends who were killed on Bloody Sunday. He spoke so matter-of-factly about it all, but it was all he knew growing up. His belief is that there will be a unified Ireland in the next 20 years. Time will tell.

Then, it was time to find some dinner. And you’d think that wouldn’t be too tricky. But it was. There’s little open on the restaurant front in Derry after 6 - and so Derry plummeted pretty quickly in EDP’s eyes. We headed into a pub after finding our chosen restaurant closed, where we were kindly advised that basically nothing would be open and directed to somewhere the locals all go. I think the locals AND the tourists all go because there’s nothing else open. It worked out all right, though.

Tomorrow, we head back to Ireland to start our drive along the coast and my first chance to see puffins. So far, the rain has held off so we’re counting our lucky pennies and hoping for more of the same!