Off to Catalina

When a man of leisure needs to get away from it all for a while, he can always turn to the sea. With that in mind, Cooper and I set out for a week of relaxation on Catalina Island. Only 26 miles south of LA, Catalina is a hidden jem that everyone knows exists but rarely visits. A smart man will capitalize on this fact and take advantage of the quasi-paradise just across the San Pedro channel.

Our trip over was complicated only by the direction of the wind, which was coming straight from the Island around noon. Even with more than 10 knots of breeze, it took us 2 1/2 hours to get to our first waypoint only 7 miles away at the edge of the Santa Monica bay. . . A velocity made good (VMG) of less than 3 knots was not going to get us to safe harbor before dark. However, once we left the bay we enjoyed building breeze and a nice lift that brought us right into the Isthmus with having to tack again. This was good news for Cooper who was swaddled in a blanket on the cockpit sole (floor) to keep warm and didn't really like having to readjust for every tack.

About 7 miles out it started to appear that we were finally closer to Catalina than Palos Verdes. Of course, those are the miles that seem to take forever. Without GPS I had to rely on dead reckoning for my position in the channel, and without a knotmeter I could really only guess how fast we were sailing on a close reach in 15-16 knots of wind. It turns out that we were averaging just under 5 knots across the channel which was just enough to get moored safely before the sun dropped behind the mountains.

About 3 miles out we passed through a flock of birds clearly feeding on the surface of the water. In the same spot the dolphins were working furiously as well. This was the only sign of marine life we'd seen all day. Not that Cooper would have noticed while passed out on the floor like a drunken teenager. A few hundred yards past the brids I noticed a pod of dolphins lined up in a row that easily stretched fo half a mile. There had to have been hundreds of them, all swimming side by side and frequently surfacing together in a very impressive display. A few of them swam alongside the boat for a while but then left for more fishing.

After the dolphins we navigated past the rocks at the entrance to the harbor and picked up a mooring. By this time Cooper's patience for a shore trip was getting short. He waited quietly while I spent the next hour inflating our borrowed dinghy with the foot pump. The next time I borrow a dinghy for just the two of us I'll be sure to find one smaller than 11 feet. Pumping on that thing for an hour can hardly be described as leisure.

After a brief walk around shore in the dark we returned to the boat for a beer. There's nothing quite like the first beer after a long day of hard leisure. Tomorrow we'll explore the island a bit and maybe stretch our legs on a few trails. Cooper's happy enough sailing, but he's already run out of new things to sniff aboard, so we'll have to expand our horizons a bit.

Right about now

There comes a point during every trip away from home where the longing for the familiar, for the things you’ve left behind, for the comfortable outweighs the excitement of being in a new, unfamiliar place. For this trip, that point is upon me.

Having the lovely wife out for an all-too-short weekend served only to remind me how much I like it at home. How I’m missing snowboarding season, and the sailing season is getting started. How it’s nice to not be cold all the time. How it’s nice to have a cozy place to sit when all you want to do is snuggle with your best friend in front of the TV.

Never fear, dear reader, I have at least six additional Ireland-related posts to make to capture the essence of these adventures. Keep an eye out for them in the coming days.

Not to wish my life away, but Friday's going to be great. Dublin and Ireland have been a blast, but the year-round playground of Southern California beckons.

Addicted to Craic

On our way home from the Guinness brewery, we stopped in for dinner and pints at Ireland’s oldest pub, The Brazenhead. The Brazenhead dates from the 11th century and is regular host to live traditional Irish music. Our plans to arrive early to secure a good seat being foiled by the server at dinner, we were faced with 2 choices: 1) take the 2 empty seats at an already occupied table, or 2) stand. This being Ireland and Brad being lazy, we went with option 1.

After a bit the gentlemen we had joined introduced themselves. Two of them from Coventry, England, two of them from Wales, and two of them from Dublin. For more than 20 years they’ve been meeting in each city at least twice a year to keep in touch. We happened to catch them in the middle of a weekend in Dublin. They were both highly intoxicated and delighted to meet us, although I’m not sure to what extent the two were related. We had a great time chatting and drinking with them, and they laughed at us while I recorded a couple of minutes of the band’s version of a Tom Petty song for my buddy Mike. We had truly found a good craic.

When we took our leave of them, they insisted that we try a pub called Darky Kelly’s the next day between 4 and 8 pm for the best live traditional Irish music. And so we did.

We arrived at Darky Kelly’s around half four (4:30 in American) and were surprised that there was no music and a relatively small crowd. We were able to find seats at a table with a good view of the “stage” so we settled in and ordered pints. The music started and was definitely more low-key than the night before, as the musicians were all sitting around a table in the corner with their instruments. After a couple of songs, a younger kid sitting near us (probably early teens) pulled an Irish flute from his bag and started playing along with them. He was good enough that they invited him over to properly join them for a couple of other songs.

Some time after the music started our friend Freddie from the Brazenhead found us and subsequently moved his entire group to the table next to us. We spent the rest of the night chatting with that group again and had a truly great time. While I was told that it was a little late in the evening for them to teach me Irish drinking songs, I did make a point to take a picture when one of them joined the band for a rebel song.

Before we retired for the evening, my new friend Freddie and I exchanged addresses with the promise to contact one another should we “be in the neighborhood.” Freddie also made me promise to send him a postcard. Little does he know I fully intend to show up on his doorstep one day looking for a place to crash. After all, what are drinking buddies for?

To Mecca, then

If my time in Dublin is to be about drinking Guinness, then a trip to the St. James Gate Brewery must be near the top of the list. It’s apparently near the top of the list for most visitors to the city, because the Guinness brewery is the most popular tourist attraction in Ireland. And to their credit, they’ve done a pretty good job. It’s far superior to the Heineken Experience in Amsterdam.

The 2 mile walk from my apartment to the brewery takes you past many of the interesting sites in the South side of Dublin. We stopped briefly to check out the converted church that is now the visitor’s center, and then lingered a bit more at Dublin Castle. I enjoyed seeing the record tower, originally built in 1207, and the garden that marks the site of the “Dub-Linn” or “dark pool” after which the city was named. We also stopped to admire Christ Church, although I’m postponing a full tour until Jena comes out in a few weeks, and another less famous church that featured interesting architecture.

After waiting for half an hour to enter the brewery, we began what became a 4 hour tour through the Guinness universe. (It could have been done much faster, you’d miss too many good details.) Naturally, there were exhibits for the ingredients of Guinness: barley oats, hops vines, yeast cultures (which are descendants from the original spores used by Arthur himself), and a waterfall. The waterfall is the most important; it mixes the beer. It churns it up and makes it light and frothy. Arthur Guinness was so concerned with the quality of water for his beer, that he signed a 9000 year lease on the property before building the brewery there, which is proudly on display.

After learning about the brewing process, the pre-aluminum keg coopers, and the history of Guinness advertising, we got to the most important part: the tasting room. Admission includes one pint of Guinness, but they’ll sell you more if you’d like. How considerate of them. I made a point to taste two. Primarily for quality control and data consistency, but also because I drink beer roughly twice as fast as Gina. One could argue that I was just being polite. That’s how I prefer to think of it.

The Hairy Lemon

For our first Friday in Dublin, fellow ex-pat Gina and I headed out for the city center in search of dinner and pints. Dinner was an unremarkable affair at an Italian place called Pachino’s. Afterward we set out to find a good pub for the evening.

One of my favorite parts about Pub hopping in Dublin are the great names they come up with for them. Many are just people’s names; Mulligan’s, O’Donoghue’s, Slattery’s. But some are not. My favorite in the latter category is The Hairy Lemon. I have no idea why it’s called that, but at least it’s easy enough to remember the morning after you’ve had a pint or two too many.

The Hairy Lemon is a large pub by Dublin standards. It draws a younger crowd than many of the places we’ve been, and this being a Friday night, it drew a large one as well. It’s really a cool place, with a bar “floating” over the door as you come in, and a large upstairs lounge.

The evening’s highlight came as we randomly ended up in conversation with the 3 people sitting at the table next to us. I’m starting to realize that meeting new inebriated friends is the best reason to go out at all. I don’t even remember the guys’ names, but I think the girl is Martina. She’s from Greece and is doing post-graduate work in Biology here in Dublin. We traded stories for much of the night until the bar kicked us out. I think they were as excited to talk with American tourists as we were to talk with locals. Then again, I think in the Dublin pub scene, there’s excitement to talk to just about anyone.

Belfast, almost

After a couple of days to acclimate to Ireland, it was time to visit the client’s business partner in Belfast. Belfast being in Northern Ireland, I was excited about getting a new passport stamp and seeing something unique, such as the color-coded street curbs that denote the Catholic and Protestant neighborhoods there.

In the end, the office we visited is on the outskirts of Belfast, so I saw nothing of the city. Apparently Northern Ireland has no restriction on the travel of persons in and out of the Republic of Ireland, because there was no border control at all. If I hadn’t already been familiar with the history and geography of the area, I wouldn’t have known I was in a different country at all. Much less one that is the remnant of more than 700 years of political strife.

While that was a bit of let-down, the train ride was interesting. Unfortunately it was dark when we for the first half of the ride there and the last half of the ride back, so I only got to see the points about an hour’s ride south of Belfast. As you would expect, there was lots of green farmland. A few cottages, a bit of livestock, and not much else. I was impressed at how green everything was, especially considering the late January time of our journey. They call this place the Emerald Isle for a reason, I suppose.

I attempted to take some photos of the countryside on the way home. However between the speed of the train and the double-paned windows, none of them turned out very good. I have added them to my online album for curious souls.

My favorite part of the train ride wasn’t the view or even the breakfast, but the bathroom door; an electronic sliding door straight out of Star Trek complete with the “whoosh” sound. While ultimately not as cool, I was grateful it had buttons to open and close rather than automatically doing so when you approached. It was a bathroom after all.

Guinness is good for you

Dublin is a drinking town, and they’re well provisioned for it. It’s home to the Guinness Brewery, the largest in the world, and more than 800 pubs and bars. All this for a city of fewer than 500,000 people. As such, I am right at home.

Naturally, the primary drink of choice here is Guinness. I’ll admit that I wasn’t a big stout drinker before I arrived. But I’ve taken to it very nicely. On my first night here I was determined to try the beer that everyone says is better over here, so I walked into the pub across the street from my apartment for a pint. After my third one I decided that I’d better get some rest to start overcoming the jet lag. On the second night, I had a pint with dinner, but I was way too exhausted to have any more.

I believe it was on that second night that I saw the poster pictured here, proclaiming that Guinness is good for you, and that you should have one every day. And so an idea was born. I shall endeavor to have A Guinness A Day.

This ensures that I get out of the apartment and experience the city. I might even meet a few people while I’m at it. After all, when in Dublin. . .

Top o' the Mornin'

Arrival in Dublin was relatively uneventful. Irish immigration could be best described as relaxed. This was certainly not unwelcome, as I wasn’t in any shape to justify my presence in the country after spending nearly 10 hours in the air. Baggage claim and customs were similarly easy, and after getting fleeced by the airport currency exchange I was on my way to my new apartment.

The project has set me up with a 2 bedroom apartment. I question the usefulness of the second “bedroom,” however, since it is literally smaller than the bathroom, which is by no means palatial. I use it for a place to keep my luggage and dirty clothes out of site. I have a washer/dryer unit, which is really cool for two reasons: 1) it’s a single unit, so clothes go in dirty and come out ready to wear, and 2) this is a luxury that I do not have at home, so I am always excited about the opportunity to wash my clothes without having to wear any.

The landlord was unable to coherently explain the heating system to me. Fortunately I found the manuals for every appliance in one of the kitchen drawers, so I was able to figure out how to set the “day” and “night” settings, even though what actual times those labels represent is unclear.

The biggest problem was with my water heater. The landlord had turned it off while the apartment was vacant. He was nice enough to show me how the timer function on it works to heat the water overnight when electricity rates are lower and turn the timer on. But this was nearly lunchtime, so it wasn’t scheduled to come on for another 12 hours and I needed a shower then. These are all details that I came to understand only after I had unpacked all of my bags and settled in. Unfortunately there wasn’t too much time to wait for the water to heat, so I was welcomed to Ireland with a cold shower.

Some readers may remember that I was welcomed to Brazil in a similar fashion when the hotel at which I was staying literally ran out of hot water on my first day there. One might argue that a cold shower is a good way to clear your head after a long intercontinental flight. I would argue that it’s entirely unnecessary and that a good cappuccino would be a much more hospitable way to greet weary travelers.

On top of it being a cold shower, I had to attempt to learn the art of not soaking the entire bathroom floor. This may seem like a trivial skill that most people learn as children. Those people would have curtains or doors on their bathtubs. Mine has none of that nonsense. Instead it has only a glass panel that reaches back about 3 feet from the front wall of the shower. After a couple of days I got the hang of it, but I was thankful that the cleaning service came to replace my bath towels on the second day, because I had used them all to soak up the flood.

All things considered, it’s a nice little place. It’s certainly more than adequate for 5 weeks in Dublin.

Greetings and Salutations

It seems only appropriate to start things off with a proper introduction. I kept a LiveJournal for about 5 years but too often it turned into a place to vent about my frustrations with work. Realizing that is neither interesting nor appropriate, I have moved here to a medium which is less condusive to drama.

This here blog is about me. If you don't already know who I am, then you probably won't find it of much interest beyond voyeurism. Here I will share the chronicles of my adventures in recreation. I'm a simple man, really; I like a good challenge, I'm reasonably competitive, arguably hedonistic, and generally in search of little more than a good time. By day I'm an IT Consultant. For now it pays the bills, but I continually aspire to become a genuine Man of Leisure.

So in a mildy delusional effort to achieve my goal welcome to Brad of Leisure, which is basically stories of my life. . . with the work bits left out.