Ireland

We wanted to see as much of Ireland as possible in our short week long trip, so we only stayed overnight in Dublin, which is a large city full of old buildings and churches complete with Griffins on the towers.

The next morning we hopped into our little rental car and headed for Galway on the west coast. We passed through a number of small towns, and no matter how small, there was always at least one pub. And yes, the sign does say Budweiser, which is readily available, but Guiness and Hard Cider seemed to be the drinks of choice.

Galway is a pretty, college town which makes it a cultural center and a tourist destination. We also met people from all over Ireland who come to vacation here. In the center of town whole streets have been turned into walking malls where street musicians, human statues, sand carvers and jugglers were in plentiful supply.

When the tide is out, the boats in the harbor are left high and dry.

Most pubs in the town have some great live music, though most of the sessions are for the tourists, and not open for jamming.

From Galway we made out way up the coast to Sligo, where we had a beautiful, though busy, campsite overlooking the water.

Char heard some accordion music in her wanderings, so I looked up this fellow and shared a few tunes with him.

Of coarse, no trip to Ireland would be complete without a pint or two of Guiness.

Summer fun

Since this is really a blog about our adventures in India, I won't spend much time on our summer break, except to give our friends and family a brief overview. We did manage to connect with many of you, and it was great to see you all!

Our friends Pam & Larry were gracious enough to put us up for a week in our home town of Coeur d'Alene, Idaho.
Here is Char catching up with some of her fellow teachers.

Following that we were able to spend a week doing nothing but playing music and dancing our feet off with our good friends Mo & Melody at the Lady of the Lake dance camp on the beautiful shores of Lake Coeur d'Alene.
Here's Mo showing off his TGIF (Thank Ganesh it's Friday) T-shirt we brought for him.





Since traditional Irish and American folk music is a rare thing in India, I took advantage of every opportunity to play. Here I am with Arvid at a local Coeur d'Alene Irish pub.








More music with brother Billy at his unique handmade home in St. Maries, Idaho.

It was a real treat that my mother from California was able to spend a week with us in St. Maries.

From there we were able to spend a mostly relaxing three weeks visiting with Char's family at their beautiful property in the lower Hudson Valley in New York.

Char and I on the Riverwalk on the Hudson River.

It is a short hop on a commuter train into the city, where we met up with my niece Jessica, who is now living in Brooklyn, and working in the city. We spent a day walking around Manhattan, and were very impressed at how clean and alive the city has become. The waterfront that was once a place where you would not want to wander has become a vibrant center for cultural activities.

The next day we were able to show Jessica some of the sights on the Hudson, including Philipsburg Manor, which is a historic restoration where Char had once worked (in full period costume).

Our next stop was a week stopover in Ireland, which I'll catch up with in the next blog.

Summer Break

For friends, family and others who may be following our blog........ We will not be posting any updates while we are back in the US for the months of June and July. I hope you are enjoying the blog, which I will resume when I get some more pictures together in August.

Untill then, enjoy the summer!

Dave & Char

Swayambhu

Swayambhu is one of the oldest Buddhist stupas in Kathmandu. It is part of a large complex that covers the top of a hill overlooking the city. These visitors were sending off their prayers.

The gold topped Stupa is surrounded by smaller temples, many with intricate stone carvings.

Stray dogs seem to be everywhere in Asia. Typically they are not at all aggressive and just want a garbage pile to rummage through, and a comfy bed where they can escape the heat of the day.

Swayambu is also called the Monkey Temple, because of the large population of Monkeys that inhabit the grounds.

This temple that is under renovation shows the typical bamboo scaffolding used at construction sites, though they often look much more precarious than this set up.

A woman spinning the prayer wheels as she walks around the Stupa in a clockwise direction.

We were able to drive up close to the top of the hill, but many worshipers climb the steep steps, (365 I'm told).

If the smog is not to bad, there is a great view of the Kathmandu valley.

Many prayer flags strung from the trees flutter in the wind.

Endless steps

Much of our last day on the trail was spent climbing up and down newly made granite steps that went on and on, until we began to wonder if they would ever end.

I've always liked rock work, so these steps really intrigued me because of the workmanship that went into building them. Some of the stones were very large and had to be extremely heavy, and they were all shaped into perfect right angles for the risers. The builders had dry fit everything without the use of mortar.

From this picture, taken from the top of one set of steps, you can see the trail leading up the ridge to the summit of the hill we had just come down, steps all the way.

We couldn't help but wonder how all these steps had been made out here in the middle of nowhere, thinking it must have been done by the military.

We soon found our "military", which turned out to be a crew of a half dozen men armed with a couple of chisels and some rope.

And here's the quarry crew working on the hillside below the stair builders. I still don't know how they managed to get those heavy rocks up to the building site.

It is always a bit of a shock for a person like me from the US, who is so used to everything being done with power tools and earth moving equipment, to even consider a project of this size to be done with nothing but a few hand tools. But here labor is cheap, and people need jobs, so everywhere you look you see laborers like these guys (and women), with primitive tools, taking on large construction projects one step at a time.

Rural life

Outside park boundaries we were able to get a glimpse into life in rural Nepal. The small villages we passed through were sometimes no more than a couple of houses clustered on the hillside. The largest community we walked through consisted of 50 or more houses scattered about. These are farming communities, where families grow crops on land that has been handed down for generations. One store owner in Kathmandu, told us that many like him have to leave the villages for the cities because the family land is divided up so many times among the offspring, that there is often not enough acreage left to a family for subsistence. The hillside farming methods we saw have also been passed down from ancestors.

Here's a family out cultivating a terrace with an ox drawn wooden plow.

Every bit of available land is terraced and farmed, even in the larger villages like this one.As in much of Asia, many things are done by hand. These people are threshing grain with a stick. Another man cuts firewood on a tool that looks like a paper cutter.
We passed these colorfully dressed children playing on the dirt road. They were more than happy to comply when I asked if I could take their picture. Of course they promptly asked me for 10 Rupees. More often the kids would ask us if we had any chocolate.

On the trail

We had another day of trekking through Shivapuri park, while the last couple days took us through more small towns and villages, where we were able to get a glimpse into village life.

The weather continued to be perfect, though the mist continued to obscure our views of the high Himalayas. This area of Nepal is semi-arid, reminding me of the Sierra Mountains of California.
Outside the park, the most notable feature of this very steep terrain are the many terraces. It was not unusual to see entire mountains completely carved up with neatly stepped fields, newly planted with potatoes and corn.

This picture of our guide (Ganesh) and Char, gives an idea of just how high these terraces are, typically ranging from 5 to 8ft. in height. I was surprised that erosion did not appear to be more of a problem, seeing that they are simply dug into the hillside without any kind of retaining walls.
We had to hightail it to our next stop as a late afternoon thunderstorm caught up with us just before we reached our lodging.

In the morning we were greeted by a beautiful sunrise as the sun rose above the mountains.