Old Midelton Distillery

One of the highlights of the weekend for me was the tour of the Old Midelton Distillery in Midelton, where Jameson's Irish Whisky* is Distilled. The tour begins with a short movie about the history and the impact that Prohibition in the states had on the industry in Ireland, which was facinating. Next we were taken through each of the stages of production, right from grain delivery to finished product.

The "Tasting Plate" Another round please!

Sniff Sniff... Smells GOOD!

Bottoms up!

At the end of the tour, the group was asked for some volunteers, and I didn't so much volunteer as hurl myself at the guide... I was "selected" (I say selected loosly because I think at this stage I was holding the leg of the tour leader and refusing to let go...) to taste a series of different Irish, Scottish and Amercian Whiskies (Bourbon Whisky - made with corn rather than barley) in a sort of tasting session, followed at the end with a full glass of my preferred tipple! I even got a "Special Certificate" that verifies me as a Certified Irish Whisky Taster! Apart from the different ingredients, bourbon is only distilled once, Scotch is distilled twice and Irish whisky is triple distilled, to be sure, tobe shore, tobeshuurrrr...

*Whisky, Whiskey... Either spelling is acceptable. What isn't though is confusing Irish Whisky with Scotch! The processes are very different, with Scotch's main ingredients being smoked Barley and Malt, whereas Irish Whisky Barley and Malt (Malted Barley) dried using odourless anthracite as a heat source! See! I did learn something! To be sure!

Irelands most South-Westerly point?!

The weekend rolled around and we decided to up-stakes and go exploring again! This time we decided to head out to Bantry, which according to the tour books is the site of a lovely Historical house, built arond 1700, with impressive gardens and a good place for tea with scones! The area, Bantry Bay was also the location of a failed French landing in 1796. A little museum had some parts of one of the scuttled French vessels and an old canon which was recovered in the early 1980's. The gardens were also great and made a good spot for some photos!

After the tour of the Bantry Gardens we headed out to Mizen Head, the most South-Westerly point of Ireland. There was much debate about what it really means to be the "Most South Westerly Point"... Not the most Westerly, not the Most Southerly... Umm... So? Still, the view was impressive and watching the weather roll in was really great!

Makeup...Like

Two things today... The first is Makeup. I think the best way to make money in Cork is to sell makeup! It seems the reason the shops don't open up until around 9:30 or 10:00 is that all the girls need to spend hours putting on tonnes of makeup! This morning I was having a coffee waiting for the library to open and a girl wearing more makeup than a Klingon from an episode of Star Trek walked passed! This is actually the norm! I walked passed the Cinema and there was an advance screening of X-Men III and I thought people had dressed up in the outfits and done their makeup like that of the X-Men, but no, they were just walking by on their way to work... Like.

Which takes me to the second bit. The Cork Irish use the word "like" at the end of almost every sentence! Its very confusing because you are expecting something to follow. For example, when you order a coffee you will be asked "Do you want sugar like?" Umm... Like what? The McDonalds (refer the previous post!) advertising campaign at home was "I'm lovin' it" Well, without a word of a lie, in Ireland the posters say "I'm loving it, like" I think it was just that they didn't know how to pronouce a "full stop" so they decided to say "Like" instead! Just for the record, one more advertising campaign is the Murphy's Irish Stout advert, which is "Smooth, Like." Interesting.

One other turn of phrase here which gets used in every second sentence is "Well to be honest, like" which means "I'm about to tell you a fib but you're supposed to let me off the hook".

The cost of McLiving in Ireland

All of the guide books like the Lonely Planet and so forth say that Ireland is one of the more expensive places to live in the EU, not quite like London, but on its way. They say one of the best ways to work out the cost of living is to use the BigMac as a relative guide.

According to sources in Perth, a BigMac costs around $3.80. Well in Cork it costs around E3.40, which works out to AU$5.80! On the face of it that sounds expensive (and it is!) and a good reason not to eat McDonald's, but the truth is its a tax on the people who eat Fast Food! There is a movement in Cork called the "Slow Food Movement" which is a return to appreciating cooking and eating. For that same E3.40, you can buy 1.5kg of fresh chicken or 2 dozen fresh eggs!

In Ireland there is a 21% VAT on goods, much like the GST at home (only BIGGER!) so fresh food is a fair bit cheaper then it may first appear.

We have had to make some changes to our lives over here, not having a car and having to carry everything we buy back home has made us shop smarter. One very good thing the Irish have here is on every price tag in the shops, they not only have the price, but the cost per unit weight, so you can compare everything (apples with apples so to speak!) Something that would be good at home!

Kinsale

Sunday Morning - We decided to head to Kinsale, the lovely little village south of Cork on the coast. It is the home of fine Irish dining according to the tour book and has been graced with the presence of such notables as Rick Stein on his Seafood Feast Tour. There is a magnificent 17th Century Fort watching over the bay, and the town plays host to some international sailing events in the bay.

Judging by the number of Porsches, Ferrari's and the occasional Bentley with UK plates, it seems it is the playground for wealthy Poms on holiday!

We toured around the Fort and visited a very old Church, first built in the 12th Century on the site of a Norman church from the 7th Century... amazing history that's for sure!

After sampling the local fair, we found on a pub in the main street a "Boutique Beer List" of foreign fine ales which they served... among them was Victoria Bitter! It described it as having a strong mid pallette with fruity overtones and a fine bitter finish for the most discerning Lager drinker... I must have missed that as I shotgunned them down at uni in my mis-spent youth! Hilarious! Even funnier still was the price... E4.60, or about AU$7.80 a pint!

Smoking...

It seems the Irish national passtime is not drinking Guinness, Murphy's or Beamish, it is in fact smoking. Since smoking was banned inside (including pubs and clubs!) the smokers have moved out onto the streets in a silent smoky protest. In order to get into our out of anywhere (and I mean ANWHERE!) you have to brave a wall of tobacco! Now, I know its a bit of a bug bear of mine and I do go on, but I just think smoking is anti-social, especially when 10 people are crammed into a tiny bus shelter away from the rain and someone decides to light up...

Tracky-Dacks!

The fashion in Cork has an interesting element. There seem to be oodles of lovely dresses on display in the windows of the fashion outlets, but no evidence of the same clothes inside! Instead you are greeted with pastel coloured tracksuits-a-plenty! We thought after our first few weeks that the number of bright pastel pink or yellow tracksuit wearing girls were the exception, but it seems they are the norm!

To wear a two piece matched fluro tracksuit takes a certain kind of person, normally wearing ugg-boots to finish off the "oops, did I forget to get dressed before I left the house again!" look. Now the reason the lovely clothes in the windows don't feature inside is its just too damn cold and wet! Well, we decided to join the masses and buy tracksuits, but only for lazing around at home! For now...

The Ring of Kerry

The Ring of Kerry is a spectacular region in County Cork in the South-West corner with lovely walks and quaint little towns along the way. We trekked around 15 km on foot along some excellent paths and admired the view and serenity. We started with the Lakes of Kilarney with an amazing waterfall and lakes.

Torc Waterfall at the start of the Ring of Kerry

View near Kenmare looking out from the bay

In the little town of Kenmare...

Hmmm... I'll have what he's having!

It really was a great day of hiking, laughing and exploring. We had such a great time with Alice we hope all our friends get to come and spend some time with us at some stage so we can show you all around!

Our first ever visitor!

We've just had our first ever visitor and house guest, not just in Ireland but ever!

Alice came from Dublin to spend some time with us during her extended travel experience. We were able to show her our favourite little pub and do some touristy things like do the audio tour at the old Cork Gaol, which although a little cheesy was quite good. The most hilarious thing was part way through an video presentation, a man dragged a massive cherry picker half way across the room, got in and proceeded to take it about 8m in the air. Alice was worried if was part of some gallows like hanging display and we all burst out laughing during the movie!

We left to go and pick up the hire car for some exploring only to find a real deluge outside. We decided to brave the rain and ended up soaked. We picked up the car, went home and dried ourselves out!

We set off early to explore the Ring of Kerry in the West...

Irish Telecom and how to get things done!

As part of our lease agreement, the owners arranged for a phone line connection. We were told it would take around a month for the phone to be connected which I thought was a bit much.

I started calling Eircom (much like our Telstra) from pay phones straight away to get this brought forward. Soon the month before connection became six weeks as the person in the help centre (who I am pleased to report is not in Calcutta!) said "Maybe a man dug up a cable? That will take around six weeks to fix!"

At this point I was getting annoyed and so decided to play the Blarney* Card. I called Eircom and told them the phone junction box looked like it had been vandalised (well, ok, this was a long shot but all the wires were disconnected so it kinda looked vandalised!) and the call centre lady said "Oh dear, that's terrible, we'll get someone there right away!" Needless to say one hour later, we had a phone! Yay!

*Blarney - The Irish gift of the gab...

Home sweet Home...

Before we left Perth we spent some time looking at the rental market in Cork on the internet. There was lots there but the suburb names meant very little and we just didn't know what we were looking at (its amazing how with a modern digital camera and photoshop you can make a pile of rubble look just like Buckinghuge Palace!) So with this feeling of security we headed out to find a house!

Before long we realised that Real Estate companies are quick to put new rentals on their windows and web sites but S-L-O-W to remove them! "Oh, that one went weeks ago, you'll have to be quicker than that!"

So a sense of panic started to set in as we narrowed the search down and found four possibles... number one was a quaint little place approximately as big as a shoebox, only not quite as high and with less floor space... More than that is was on a main road near the Cork Oil Company refinery. Hmm... onto number two.

Number two was pretty good, on the third or fourth floor of a shared building, with offices below. It was made in around 1890 or something and so had a lot of character and I think we would have taken it had it been furnished with something other than cast offs and if it had actually featured a freezer or a fridge larger than a milk carton. The view over the city was great, but it just didn't feel homely or cared for.

Number three was a no-show on the part of the agent. We stood in the freezing cold waiting for him to show only to see what looked like a rehab clinic opposite and a stream of school-tarts* walking to school. Onto number four...

Number four is a little further out of town and was a little more than we wanted to spend but was simply worlds apart from what we had seen so far! A brand new development as part of a new secure complex. Where do we sign. Its home and is feeling more so every day. It even has a fridge AND freezer! Actually it has everything from a dishwasher to central heating so we signed and moved in 36 hours later! Ok, the water heater didn't work for the first 3 days and getting the phone connected was a pain (more on this later!) but its now all sorted!

*school-tart: Some schools here allow the girls to wear tight mini skirts, high heels and obscene amounts of makeup to school. The look they are going for is pretty much line-ball with the annoying Liverpool Lass from Heartbeat. Enough said.

Cork City (The Abridged History Lesson!)

We arrived around 4:00pm at our B&B which would be home for the next few days until we sourced more permanent accomodation. Being the true troopers we are, we showered, changed and unpacked before heading to the pub at 9:00om. Needless to say we didn't last long there, just one pint and our eyes were growing heavy!

The next day we did the usual recon of the place and found ourselves some maps and things and headed out into the drizzle (which we are becomging acustomed to now!) Cork is a lovely little city, built on what is like a small island (which forms the city centre) with the 'burbs on the other sides. The word Cork comes from the Gaelic 'Corcaigh' meaning 'Marsh', which give how much it rains is not surprising! We won't go into the history, thats what Wikipedia (http://www.wikipedia.org/) is for!

Here is a map of Cork! We live on Old Blackrock Rd, off Angelsea St, before Victoria Rd in the south-east!

Our Arrival...

After more than 24 hours in the air and in various airports from Perth, Dubai and London we finally made it to Cork. To our great surprise our luggage (quite a bit of it!) had been successfully checked all the way from home over two different carriers and was the first luggage to appear on the conveyor belt! This was looking good!

We nervously and excitedly gathered our massive amount of matched wedding gift luggage and a large box containing our special artwork from home (also a wedding gift... more on that later!) and headed to the exit gate... Little did we know this was to be our first "Irish" experience. There are three doors, one green, one red and one blue. As usual, green is for nothing to declare, red is for something to declare and blue is for EU citizens with nothing to declare. So after deciding which category we each fell into we headed forward, unsure of what awaited us...

Nothing. The three doors all led into the same empty room! From there it was straight out into the airport where Rachel's new boss was kindly waiting to pick us up!