HAPPY SAINT PATRICK'S DAY!
Our Galway, Ireland, B&B host was a carpenter. He had traveled to Russia with a group to teach them how to use certain power tools and equipment. First they had to show them how to put the wheel on the wheelbarrow. They were using the 'barrow' without the wheel.
Breakfast options included porridge, eggs, thick bacon, black or white pudding, toasted or fried bread and tea. We bid our farewell and headed for a drive through the Connemara, one of Ireland's thousands of years old peat bogs. At other Irish bogs we watched locals cut brick-sized pieces to heat their homes and cook stoves. No one was cutting here. In fact, we didn't see a soul or a native Connemara pony.
The road is a wavy ribbon. Left, drive left. It feels spongy, as if it has shock absorbers. The terrain is rough, rocky, mountainous, desolate, spooky, timeless, and was saturated in gloomy, damp weather: a blank canvas for life. Only the names change, but it was a field day for our imaginations. Who would come over the rise: medieval warriors, star wars characters, giants or "the little people"? An oasis. We needed and oasis of 'still' mineral water, rhubarb & ginger preserves , teacakes, Galtee cheese, and Cadbury's chocolate. In our imaginations we had it all.
Here at home I'd like to have a brick of peat to make a little fire to roast marshmallows, but if I have to wait for my landscaping to turn to peat, the marshmallows will be too hard. Peat is like sauerkraut, it isn't made overnight.
WE LOVE IRELAND!!!
copyright 2007 Red Convertible Travel Series
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