La Dolce Vita and the Vagabond

Rome. What a wonderful wonderful city. I’ve just come back after 3 days from the Eternal City and I can’t get it out of my veins. I keep thinking of the magical images that I encountered as I strolled lazily around the ancient streets. Rome has always been high on my list of places to visit but for a combination of reasons I have decided not to until now. The prime reasons for not visiting have been:proximity and prioritising other places first. I now believe that this thinking was an error. I should have went earlier so I could have used it as yard stick to judge other cities architecture,food, fashion and overall spirit and personality.

I’ve always felt a special connection with Italy and now after this trip I know why. Ever since I worked in Zomax I was surrounded by Italians on a daily basis and we got on really well. People like the ever smiling Benedetta and constantly laughing Anna had infectious personalities. There stories about growing up, football, food and family were brilliant to listen to. If you collected all the stories through them in a meat dispenser they’d always come out with with strings of minced meat labeled: art, history, laziness, motor racing, cars and soccer, love, fashion, pasta, ice cream, giant sun glasses, furry coats and vespas. And pretty much I got a bit of all of that in the small amount of time I had there.

The trip started with a 120 euro flight (all in) with Ryanair to Campino airport which is about 25 minutes from the city center and a 30 euro taxi ride. I was going over to see the beautiful Camila as she journeys around Europe with her Mum. We all stayed in a small cosey 3 star hotel called Edera a 5 minutes walk away from the Coliseum.

I arrived 5pm on the first night and we quickly made our greetings and started a walking tour around the main sites in the city center. In the space of a few hours we saw the outstanding and unforgettable exterior of the outside of the Pantheon. Big and proud it stands formidable and commands attention. It must have been awesome in its prime laden with gold and bronze with all of it Corinthian columns in tact. When we visited it’s massive entrance doors were closed but I inquisitively went to them anyway and tried to peek though the small gap near the lock. Suprisingly it was a vent. A gentle cold breeze greeted me from within and tickled my right pupil. My natural reaction was to pull back immediately but i didn't. A strange but enjoyable sensation like someone blowing into your eye. I also was able to see the alter on the for side of the room which looked ornate and beautiful. The inner circular chamber seemed wide, vast and tall. We then made ou way past Largo de Torre Argentina and towards Monument to Vittorio Emanuele II. What I loved about this stop was there was a cacophony of noise overhead beside the monument where there was some very tall trees that housed thousands of small excited birds that looked like robin red breasts except they were brown and a little bit bigger. For 10 minutes we stood in amazement with a small crowd of smiling people watching the birds take turns darting from one tree to the other in small battalions of one or two hundred at a time. The distance between the trees was about 20 meters and the birds playfully chirped at each other as they flew from one tree to the other in a set of very skillful mesmerizing creative dives, ascents and curves. I really enjoyed it. They were definitely communicating and acting out some kind of ritual or exercise that the humans below couldn’t decode. I couldn’t help but try imagine what they were doing. Maybe it was a dance of appreciation for the joy of being allowed live in the eternal city. It was like to break dance groups meeting and egging each other on to out do each other with a new more creative and daring flight show. Brilliant entertainment. Just how I imagine birds play on some far away pond, doused with trees on the plains of Kenya or Tanzania when they sense the rain season upon them After that it was a glimpse of the lengthy Forum and a quick hello to Cesar’s statue on our way to the Coliseum. I never thought my introduction to Rome would be on a late Wednesday evening but it was and it was perfect. Hardly anyone in the city center! The weather a very pleasing 14 degrees for January and the buildings beautifully lit up by light with a beautiful purple and blue sky dotted by some straggling grey and white fluffy fast moving clouds whispering to the birds as they went on there way.

The next day was the tour bus. It cost 19 euros, included a guide book and a free headphones that you were allowed take with you after the tour. The idea was like most others in big cities. Get on and get off and set of preordained sites with buses coming every 30 minutes to whiz you away. The buses took off right beside the Coliseum right behind Constantine’s arch so we went there first and decided to have a look inside before we got on the bus. The history of the Coliseum is well know and is barbaric. It was fascinating how cruel the Romans were to Christians, criminals, deserters and prisoners of war. Very little mercy was dispensed to these poor soles that were quite often sreaded to little pieces by very hungry predators denied food except the flesh of man. A big cross is erect inside on the west side as a sign of respect for those slane. Next we went around the city on a winding sinuous route through mainly cobblestone streets with Smart cars and vespas roaring about us. Each street seems to have a spectacle in it. Either a fantastic old baroque building, a statue, a monument, a fountain, an obelisk or an arch. Churches abound. If people say Dublin is full of churches well then the same could be said for Rome in relation to churches. I wasn't prepared for the number of churches the city had. They are everywhere and there simply is too many to visit. My advice would be to take your chances and pop in to one or two randomly and take a little break in a urban oasis to contemplate life and the cornucopia of spectacles surrounding you.

Our destination was Peter’s Basilica and center piece of the Vatican. After about 45 minutes we got there and were presently surprised by the small number of tourists. Bernini was a magician when he designed the entrance to the Basilica and its almost complete circle of columns stretched out like welcoming arms given all those who come in and embrace Christianity a tender hug. The fist thing I noticed was the 140 saints that are all around the arch on the columns above then the huge statue of St Peter on the way to the basilica. After passing some Swiss guards and then going through the airport like security we were allowed in the church. It is massive. The biggest church in the world. Inside there is all kinds of beautiful art including masterpieces from Raphael, Bernini and Michael Angelo. We received a free tour by one of the studying priests in the Vatican and if you can do the same I would recommend it.

We spent a lot of time in the church and in the square itself and then went for some food in a restaurant on the main road to the Vatican which turned out to be a scam. 6 euros for a can of coke and 14 euros for a small plate of pasta. What ever you do no matter what religion you are go and marvel at the Saint Peter’s but do not eat in any of the nearby restaurants. Next stop was the Pantheon again this time to see its inside which wasn’t half as impressive as its outside and then we went to one of the more famous gelaterias or ice cream parlors beside the stunning Trevi fountain. I got a very nice scoop of coconut and vanilla and proceeded to toss some coins in the water ensuring that as the tradition goes I am guaranteed to visit the city again.

The third day I was due to fly home on a 4.55pm flight which gave me enough time to see the catacombs or the Vatican museum and the Sistine Chapel. I decided for the latter and for a fairly valued 14 euros we went in to see one of the most huge museums in the world. Massive does not do the collection justice. They say that if you looked at every piece of art in the Louvre in Paris it would take 7 years of your life. It would take 12 years of your life in The Vatican. A few hours wasn’t enough to see the museums so I saw what I could in an hour and a half and then headed straight for the Sistine Chapel. After corridor upon corridor laden from top to bottom in gold including the roofs with all kinds of maps, statues and frecos I eventually got to the chapel and it was worth all the effort. Mistakenly I thought that Michael Angelo’s masterpiece depicting the start of the world was at the top of the arch in St Peter’s. For those that like me make the same mistake let me explain. St Peter’s and the Sistine chapel are two different places. The first very huge and overbearing at the front of the Vatican the second very small and petit a little like a small county church you’d find in the Irish countryside at the back of the Vatican. The Sistine if covered like the corridors from top to bottom with art with the famous almost touching fingers in the center of the roof over head. What was most impressive to me of all the art was Michael Angelo’s amazing painting of the apocalypse at the back wall beside the alter. I listened twice to the audio guide explaining what it meant. For me the finest painting I have ever seen bar none!

Rome. La dolce vita. For those who haven’t gone yet. On your bike and Go.

Hunting Taranchalas and Rats

Over Christmas I got the chance to edit some of the video footage I shot when travelling aorund the world in 2004/2005.

The first video is my good friend Chief getting over his fear of spiders in the Amazon. The second the famous day I went hunting joint rats in Bebadora in the middle of Brazil 400km west of Sao Paulo.

The Christmas Swim

The Christmas swim is something I look forward to and something I dread about this time of the year, every year. It's mind over matter. 40 degree water. Some times lower! Screams. Shaking limbs. See your breath air. Shouts of encouragement. Camera stills and flashes. Mpeg recordings and avi files. Lounges, dives and panicking strokes. Pink, smacked skin faces and bright glowing smiles of satisfaction.

In Waterford, we have a very small beautiful cove off Tramore beach where hundreds of people go between 9.30am and 12.30pm every Christmas day to have their annual dip before they let themselves go for a day of gormandizing on meat, crisps, chocolate, wine, beer, Coca-Cola and the rest. It's great and fun and well worth a try?

Crepes and Cocktails in El Borne

One think I really love about Barcelona is the hallow cobblestoned streets of the El Borne district. I've been spending a lot of time there with my girlfriend and all the friends and relatives that have been visiting while I live here. There are two places I want to call out in El Borne for a quick bite and drink. The first is the amzing Taller de Tapas with their mouth watering fillet steak and perfectly cooked patata de bravas, at about 25 euros per head for very filling high quality meal you won't go wrong. But don't have desert there. Not that they don't have nice desert but just around the corner, beside the catheral and close to the eternal flame that lights up the entrance street into the square is a beautiful, quaint, but super-fly creperia called "Crepes and Cocktails". There are two waiters inside one Brazilian and the other Mexican and there is a charming French women. All love life and are full of chat when they are not crazy busy. The menu is a mixture of crepes, teas, beers and cocktails. For me the must have is the cinnimon crepe for most of my friends its the nutella. For 4.50 euros its great value and with a caipirinha going for 6.50 euro everyones a winner.

What a pity Ireland is stook in a time warp when it comes to embracing these type of small trendy niche eateries and bars. Are we doomed to be driven by a the super-pub culture or will this change in the future. In my opinon it will defintiely change of that I am convinced. My only wish is that in my life time I get to see it.

Also some more snaps of Barcelona life.

Garlic in Amsterdam

The last 3 days have been in Amsterdam attending a recruitment conference run by ERE exchange. The conference itself has been a bit of a let down with very little interesting content being presented so far. However, the city and the restaurents I've had a chance to visit have lived up to expectations as ever. This time I got to visit the highly interesting Ann Franks house again. The first time I visited it was in 1990 on my first ever trip outside Ireland with my primary school. It's changed a lot since then but I had some deja vu moments one in particular when I was climbing the stairs to the hidden loft. It's hard to believe its 17 years later.

Two tips I have from the gastronmical side of this trip has been the finding of two very cool eateries that I highly recommend: Five Flies and Garlic. The first a 5 star up-market posh dutch/french excellently decorated set of restored dutch canal houses the second an explosion of very interesting garlic based dishes targeted at the mid house range.

Hotel: Hilton hotel * - possibly the worst hotelling experience I have had. And for 350 euros a night with no internet or breakfast included I'd keep very much away.

Gaudi's Le Pedrera

There are many many many buildings to gaze at wonder at in stylish Barcelona. Gaudi's Le Pedrera off Passeig De Gracia is just one. A very unusual mansion with no straight lines symbolising Gaudi's belief that in nature there are very few straight lines but more sinuy bends and curves line the vain structure of a leaf. Inside the building is an interesting introduction to the architect's work but the best part is the roof where you get a wonderful vista including some of the cities most prominent land marks. Check out the video for an idea of what I mean. My wonderful apartment is 15 minutes walk from Le Segrada and 7 minutes walk from the Mapre tower and the amazing 4km of beach fronts.

The Vagabond and learnin' Spanish

Month 1 is down of 4 in Barcelona and I'm having very interesting times... part of which is getting the old brain around understanding the language. I'm at about the same level as this funny dude in the video!

More photos from BCN.

Bicing in Barcelona

There is a very cool new environmental project in full swing in Barcelona that I like a lot which is helping people get healthy while helping the environment breath. It’s called Bicing. Residents of Barcelona can for €6 a year purchase a card which allows them rent a bike for no more than 30 minutes at a go. During this 30 minutes the individual pays 1 cent a minute for the amount of time they use the bike. The idea behind the program is you borrow the bike for no more than 30 minutes which should be enough time to get you from A to B on a short trip. The system is based on multiple ‘pick n drop’ sites where you take and leave your bike a little like a car park. The whole idea is to get people using bikes for short distance travel a lot more thus helping to alleviate the amount of traffic in the city. It works beautifully and the people in Barcelona love.

Let’s take an Irish example for illustration purposes. Let’s say all the Dunnes and Lidl stores in the Dublin are bike ‘pick n drop’ sites that can hold at least 50 bikes at any one time. Now let’s say there is a long rack at each site on which a bike can be hoisted onto and electronically locked or lifted from. Now put a device that looks like a car metre beside each rack that you can swipe an identity card in. That’s how it works! Cool isn’t it! The idea is short journeys. You can’t use the bikes for the day or for a 3 hour ride to Dun Laoighre for a swim. If you do that for every minute you go over 30 minutes your card gets a hefty fine and ultimately your credit card takes the hit.

The bike is the cross between a High Nelly and a cool Chopper. It has a beautiful red frame, with back pedal breaks, chrome handle bars, a very nice spacious space for a carrier bag and very cool white mudguards.

To find out more go to www.bicing.com

Golan Heights and Tiberius

Today started really badly and almost finished in the same way. It was one of those days that was easily two days in one. I arrived in Tel Aviv on a business class from Paris Charles De Gaulle after missing my flight from Dublin to Paris but fortunately had been able to get on another 3 hours later which allowed me catch my connection to Israel. The worst think about the whole thing was the fact that I had to dash for the gate and missed it which left me sweating with no change of clothes which meant a visit to the men’s room to try cool down. The flight itself was great in the sense that I read the whole way through the thoroughly enjoyable ‘Long Way Round’ featuring Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman and also partly due to the very nice Bordeaux wine and fillet of steak consumed on route! When I arrived in Ben Gurion airport it was 12.40am and that’s when the fun started. Surprisingly, this time, unlike the last I swept past the immigration very quickly. But 2 hours later I was still waiting for my bags – which never came. Eventually after watching the local airport staff running around like blue arse flies trying to troubleshoot a broken carousel and an angry mob of tired people hunting their bags I resigned myself to the fact that I had to go to ‘Lost and Found’ where I was given some paperwork to prove I lost my bags and was told I’d get my bag sent to my hotel at 4pm. Haifa were I was staying was 1 hour away. I fortunately got a decent taxi man who charged me face value at 465 shekils to get to the Meridian hotel (75 euros approx). On the way I asked some very direct questions about why the Palestine’s were treated so bad and how the Jews could prove they were the first people in these lands thousands of years ago. I received in a very nice way but very firml response the history of Abraham, Sole and David. I was told all about Sala Kaheem and his destroying of the temple of Jews and its replacement by the Rome of the Rock. I was also told about how the Palestine’s just sponge off the Israeli state and do very little for themselves and constantly plan war. While thankful for the contorted one-way diatribe and slushy history lesson by the time I got to the hotel I was very glad to get into bed.

6 hours later I was up and in the local shopping mall buying some clothes which I fully intend claiming back on my travel insurance. I got a pair of Nike runners, some flip flocks, a pair of shorts and a few t-shirts. The guy selling me the clothes was about 27 and asked me was I Irish because of my accent. I told him I was and we went on talking for about 20 minutes. He asked me about the North of Ireland I explained very quickly where we were with it and he explained that he hoped Israel and Palestine could be at peace some day but he feared it would never happen. He volunteered that he was in the army for 4 years and he said he had been fed hate everyday but he admitted he did not know the full-story and sympathised with the terrible conditions the Palestine’s lived in. I admired his objectively and the sincere way he told his opinion. As I left the shop I shook his hand and wondered to myself how many more were there of him in the country.

An hour later I was on the road with one of my work colleagues on the road to Tiberius with a taxi driver than had hardly any English and kept ringing his taxi office when we asked him questions and they duly translated for him. The journey consisted of taking in Tiberius, Capernam, a wine tasting treat and visited Badem Mountain and an old vacated watch tower looking out of the Golan Valley.
Tiberius is situated on the sea of Galilee and is in close proximity to a large number of sites were Jesus conducted his miracles. The walking on the water, the wedding in Caina, etc and was also the place he gave the ‘Blessed’ sermon on the mountain of Beatitudes. Nowadays it’s a little city which modern western life has consumed with pubs, McDonalds, cafes and shops. The first stop was Capernam which is where Jesus went to live after he left Nazareth and where he recruited Peter and some of the other disciplines. Luckily, when I was there I saw a local priest giving a sermon to a very well English spoken group of Japanese tourists. I learned all about Jesus curing Peter’s stepmother and all about Peter’s church and the old temple. The sun was beating down at 34 degrees as I listened to the beautiful positive words coming out of the priests heart and it filled me with joy. It was a very peaceful reflective experience and one I look forwarding to telling my Dad more about who I think would really have enjoyed it.

Next was a real brucy bonus and a visit to the Golan Heights Winery www.yardenwines.com. We got a chance to try three wines and by a bottle before we left. We tried a semi-dry Gewurztraminer white for starters, a Carbernet Sauvigon for dinner and my favourite a beautiful smelling floral, fruity, sweet Muscat dinner wine. I ended up buying a bottle for my cabinet back in my apartment it was so nice. I also bought a contraption for taking the air out of half wine bottle you haven’t finished so you can keep it in the fridge for 3 or 4 weeks without going off.
After this it was the amazing tower on the Golan Heights. For me it was a very educational visit, with amazingly beautiful scenery that looked like Tuscany meeting El Calafate in Patagonia. From the empty patrol bunker which was 1,100 metres above sea level I saw Lebanon, Syria and Jordan. To the left was Mount Hermon were the Israeli’s ski in winter. Also on our left but more in the foreground was a kabutz and The Valley of Tears where a raging tank war took place in 1973 during the Syrian invasion. In front of us was the UN town that protected the one entry point into Syria between the two countries and to the right and back was wide sweeping vineyards, a massive army control tower that has some serious antennas and satellite bubbles and dishes, some wind generators and a mountain in the distance which was a part of Jordan. What I like about it was the beauty. Golan is a very very beautiful one where the numbers of soldiers almost match the number of grapes. While surrounded by such beauty which was magnified by an extravagant sunset. The place screamed of pathetic fallacy.

The Golan Heights in a clear reminder that man is still very much at war and has a lot to learn before it can walk in the light of our Lord who preached in this beautiful land. It wil be very interesting to see the reaction of the Israeli people who love this land when they have to give it back to Syria which probably will happen sooner rather than later.

So my day started shitty, was great in the middle and then went to shitty again when I arrived back to my room at 10pm and there was no lost bag sitting beside my bed like i hoped. I went down to the reception in the hotel and tried to ring the airport to find out where my bag was but no response. I then drafted and sent a fax to Air France so they could get my disgruntled feedback the next day. At 11.30 I got a phone call and the bags had arrived!

A very interesting day indeed!