Today was a gem of a day.
Morning saw the refugees from tomorrow's Dolphin wedding sadly checking out of the hotel and having a last breakfast
. The hotel people held onto our bags for us and were very sympathetic, but sure they're doing well for themselves.
A few of us walked to the school together where Leo tried to hide the fact that the elite flower group were getting cake, by hunting everyone else off to see possible dolphins (they turned out to be ACTUAL dolphins, but I've seen dolphins before. And to be honest, I haven't forgiven them for the porpoise yet). We actually didn't get cake in the morning, just a third talk about how you can eat plants, in case any of us missed the previous two talks.
We were allowed to go and join the dolphin hunters very soon after that, but I decided I wanted to walk out to the Fort myself. It's called Cromwell's Barracks, though I don't know that he was ever there himself. It's pretty much as far away in Connacht as you can get, so why would he have bothered. It was used as a prison for catholic priests in the 16th century, and there's a story that they used to chain bishops to a rock out there and let them drown as the tide came in
.
The walk out to it was GREAT. It was through fields and across beaches and over rocks, and it was sunny and just great fun. I really enjoyed myself. Plus, at the beach before I started walking, I chatted to an old man repairing a currach (no, Apple, not a "curry house") and he gave me the rundown of differences between tar and hessian, versus fibreglass currachs. He also figures he could row in to Cleggan in about two hours, and he plans to do it some nice day. And his sons run the island ferry.
Back out at the barracks, I had a nice walk around, a pleasant conversation with some sheep, and had my photo taken by a load of passengers on the incoming ferry. Felt pretty famous, with them all waving to me.
The walk back was just as nice, and I had plenty of time to go into the little museum and have a look around AT LAST. It's full of typical old Irish stuff, like statues of Holy Mary, horn rimmed glasses, banjaxed radios, and all manner of teacups
. But it also has laminated photos and newspaper cutouts of the 2014 storm damage, the 1990s murder of three sisters on the island and probably every book that has ever been printed about Inishbofin. I ended up with a load of little books about sea life and fossils and maps of the island, and of course, a bar of chocolate.
I went back to the hotel then to move my stuff across the road to the hostel. I'm in a six bed dorm, but there don't appear to be any other inhabitants....yet. I mean, that's a surefire way to jinx something. The hostel people were worried I'd missed the course, but then horrified that I had paid so much for a hotel room, when they'd had beds over here. However, over here I don't intend to have a shower (it's out through the conservatory, up a stairs and around a corner), I probably won't casually wander around in my pyjamas snacking, and there's a gale blowing through some unseen crack in the room. There are also loud teenagers that have one ukulele and only know how to play 'Wagon Wheel', as well as a pervasive smell of other people's food
.
It's a nice hostel! I got clean sheets and a good tour round, and it's super cheap... But. I miss my dolphin room. :(
Next was lunch, and it was in the Dolphin, so I popped back over and had a rub with my favourite dog on the island. She totally loves me, and we had already played 'chase the seaweed' on the beach on Tuesday ('chase' not 'catch', because she had too much sense to eat anything that slimy or salty. Sketch would probably have a buffet, the mad yoke.) Leo rounded us up fairly fast, so that the elite plant people could get back to the school. I gobbled down my sandwich and ploughed off through the rain.
FINALLY, the flowers came into their own. I had my say about 'cleanse the blood', and I told the annoying short lady who always stands in front of people to move back, and that really helped cure me of my angry strop yesterday. The plant lady was also a lot more down to earth about the magic of plants today, and instead we all agreed that foraging can be fun, and if you do your research it's not bad for you to eat either
. Which is a lot more sensible than the one lady who insisted to me that blood has toxins, lady DO NOT get me started. You got a liver and kidneys, you fine.
The plant lady's niece has a baking business, and she only used the word 'paleo' once, and not in direct relation to what we were doing. Plus she was very nice. She had made us some flower drinks - honeysuckle was one, and elderflower the other - and baked us some flower cakes. They were simply delightful. They were clover, honeysuckle and rose, dandelion, and rhubarb and elderflower. Leo made us some tea, and we had a pleasant afternoon eating and drinking and not letting ourselves get worked up about stupid people.
There was still art going on when I left, and there's apparently a table quiz tonight, but I'm just taking a rest from the gale and the rain for a little while in my bunk bed here, with no wifi. :(
----
It was fu-huh-huh-REEZING in the hostel in the evening! It reminded me of one of the places I lived in college that was so cold that everything felt damp
. Oh my goodness. I closed all the windows and sprayed my perfume, but it didn't help. Another guy came in at some point, but I had dozed off so I didn't really see him. In the end it was just the two of us in the dorm, and he didn't snore. It's possible I snored, because I was so cold that my nose got completely blocked up during the night.
I went out to the table quiz, and we ended up recruiting the ecologist, and had a hilarious time all round. The picture round was recognising gemstones, and the rest were all sorts of mixdy-uppy questions. It was great. We called ourselves "The Boffins" and when they called out the scores halfway through, it turned out our arch-rivals at the table next door were called "Boffins" and from there on, the competition was intense.
I didn't recognise the winning team but WE TIED SECOND PLACE!!!!!! "Boffins" did not place, and were very put out, to the point of analysing the scores intently, and questioning how we could have beat them on round 5. The zoologist didn't know that "ophidohobia" was a fear of snakes, but I had. He had assumed the ecologist had given us that answer, but no, he hadn't. So he asked if I was a zoologist too. I said no, I wasn't, and he gasped in horror: "But how did you know that answer?! How did you beat us?!"
Mwahahahahaha!!!!!
There was a raffle - €1 for 1 line, €5 for three lines. We pointed out that that was a pretty bad deal, but everyone was too drunk and happy and deafened by the session music to really care. The time flew, and I didn't get back to the hostel til 2am, where my new roomie was already fast asleep.
Oystercatcher
Thursday, July 07, 2016
Inishbofin, Connaught, Ireland
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2025-02-11