W B Yeats

A very odd person indeed, was our man Yeats. Into all kinds of weird and wacky Victorian symbolism and spiritualism, whose wife he asked to marry him after being refused by the daughter of a former infatuation.

But for all that he seems to have gotten his poetry out all right.

I mention him because today I went to the National Library - they have, besides copies of all his and other Irish authors' works, an exhibition on the life and loves of Yeats for the free perusal of anyone who wanted to see it. And I did, and so I did.

Yesterday, besides the Guinness storehouse (a marvelous institution!) I went to wander around Trinity College, to see if I could see the book of Kells. I couldn't - they're fixing up it's box or something similar - but what I did see was the library. Oh, deary me! Its the most beautiful room I've been in so far - rows and rows and books and books and winding staircases and little enclaves.

Somehow I don't think they'd let me take it back though.

My goodness...

My Guinness!

The streets next to the Guinness storehouse are as black as the brew, and the air smells like vegemite.

Ireland

Please forgive this terrible correspondent. I warned you that I wouldn't be as consistent as I'd like.

I caught a bus from London to Dublin last night. Normally this might not be possible, I was imagining the wheels turning into fins and the bus swimming across from Holyhead - but alas, no. Just a normal run-of-the-mill ferry crossing the Irish sea in gale-force winds. I slept through it though, goodness knows how!

Dublin in the daytime is pretty and fun. For some reason it feels like I'm travelling again, maybe it was being sick but the time I was in England didn't really feel like I was overseas. Everything was so familliar.

I look forward to any travel tips for Ireland that you, dear reader, have - but mostly I'm looking forward to looking. Those of you who have not been to Ireland before won't know how green the grass is. And wet the ground is.

London

I've found the transport in London to be alarming. I don't mean that it's bad - which it may be, but compared to Sydney seems really quite good - I mean that it behaves in a very odd way. The tube bounces - moving the same as the cartoon trains and buses at the start of Sesame Street - and no-one on it seems to notice.

Walks

One of my favourite things about England is the number of public footpaths through farmland and over and around landmarks. The signs are often confusing and a little fluid with their use of distance, but perhaps in a place where everyone has walked before that's the mystery.

Ware

I woke up this morning in a tiny town in Hertfordshire. Today I may well wander through snowy fields or in to town to see what I can see.

In the new year

I believe it might be a very good start to a year to wander around the Lake District on a frosty day. So I did.