Enjoying Dublin
26oct07
Dublin Ireland, home of Guinness dark beer and the leprechaun, was a highly anticipated port by the Class Afloat students onboard and was well enjoyed by all, providing us with our thus far most popular port program. The Concordia was docked in the heart of the city next to the trendy area of town known as "temple bar" and within walking distance of Trinity College.
Dublin was a perfect port to be at heading into Halloween, because it is one of the few countries that we have visited that celebrates the holiday. All the students were appropriately geared up for the event that was to happen a few days later onboard by the festive decorations that surrounded the farm where we spent our port program.
Causey Farm, was about an hour and a half away from Dublin by bus. We were greeted by the owner of the farm with a warm welcome and were immediately steered towards a nearby barn to learn a traditional Irish line dance. The dance was cause for much laughter and aimless hopping about. Our group was proudly awarded the "most fit" to have taken part in the dance as we requested to do more after finishing an entire rotation between 40 or so people. From here we proceeded to split up into two groups, and moved on to play a traditional Irish game or Hurling that resembles field hockey and bake soda bread from scratch. Hurling turned out to be a much more intense and injury inducing game (not through first hand experience) then any of us had predicted. As our bread baked, our entire group partook in the entertaining task of herding sheep by way of creating a human pen.
From here we went on a tractor ride to see a nearby peat bog which is a brown soil like material consisting of partly decomposed vegetable matter famous for its ability to preserve things. In fact, about 3 miles from where we were the book of Kells, an illuminated manuscript of the gospels created in the 8th to 9th century was found preserved in the bog. The book is now kept at Trinity College, which a group of students made their way over to see.
The last activity that we participated in during the day was some traditional Irish drumming. Everyone thoroughly enjoyed their day at Causey Farm, and we left with two donated pumpkins under-arm to spur ahead our Halloween celebrations.
Dublin
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Sarah
Dublin was a perfect port to be at heading into Halloween, because it is one of the few countries that we have visited that celebrates the holiday. All the students were appropriately geared up for the event that was to happen a few days later onboard by the festive decorations that surrounded the farm where we spent our port program.
Causey Farm, was about an hour and a half away from Dublin by bus. We were greeted by the owner of the farm with a warm welcome and were immediately steered towards a nearby barn to learn a traditional Irish line dance. The dance was cause for much laughter and aimless hopping about. Our group was proudly awarded the "most fit" to have taken part in the dance as we requested to do more after finishing an entire rotation between 40 or so people. From here we proceeded to split up into two groups, and moved on to play a traditional Irish game or Hurling that resembles field hockey and bake soda bread from scratch. Hurling turned out to be a much more intense and injury inducing game (not through first hand experience) then any of us had predicted. As our bread baked, our entire group partook in the entertaining task of herding sheep by way of creating a human pen.
From here we went on a tractor ride to see a nearby peat bog which is a brown soil like material consisting of partly decomposed vegetable matter famous for its ability to preserve things. In fact, about 3 miles from where we were the book of Kells, an illuminated manuscript of the gospels created in the 8th to 9th century was found preserved in the bog. The book is now kept at Trinity College, which a group of students made their way over to see.
The last activity that we participated in during the day was some traditional Irish drumming. Everyone thoroughly enjoyed their day at Causey Farm, and we left with two donated pumpkins under-arm to spur ahead our Halloween celebrations.
