Smithfield on ice

Apparently Smithfield on ice is no more! Dublin City Council announced yesterday that the popular ice-rink event, which has been held in Smithfield, Dublin during Christmas for the past five years, will not go ahead this year. The partnership which ran the event has dissolved and the remaining interest, RSVP Event Management, is not in a position to deliver the project, the council announced.

Adidas Dublin Marathon

Today, once the worst pain is hopefully gone, and our knees are bending again we can write few words about last Monday’s experience!

Before start

Eleven thousand people, a couple of comedians, few leprechauns, Blues Brothers and Donald Duck took to the streets of the city on Monday to be part of the 28th Adidas Dublin Marathon, and among them us. It may sound a bit mad – who, in their right mind, would want to rise early on Bank Holiday and run 26 miles through streets of Dublin? In realty we run Dublin Marathon for the same reasons other climb a mountain – because it’s there! The goal was simply to get to the top, to cross the finish line.

Start

Of course there is, within every city marathon, another event altogether, for competitors and athletes. But this is strictly minority affair of the concern to no more than 10%. The real hart of this spectacle were thousands of participants, all shapes and makes of ordinary people, running for as many different reasons, as there are participants.

The General Post Office
Dublin O'Connell Street

This year’s race started on Baggot Street, at 9am – 15 minutes before the start – the street was completely filled with marathon runners. We were somewhere at the end so we’ve started five minutes after the official start! The first few miles were nice and easy, everyone was in a good mood! It was more of a sightseeing trip around Dublin tourist attractions than anything else, running up O’Connell Street by The General Post Office, the focal point of the Easter Rising of 1916. We hit Phoenix Park around the four mile mark, and we got onto Chesterfield Avenue – over a mile long, straight and slightly uphill part of the course. The fact you can see so far ahead makes you fill less comfortable - but it was nothing comparing to the pure torture of a long, steady climb of the Crumlin Road!

Nearly there...

We saw, especially after the half way mark, parts of Dublin, we’ve never been to. It got really though on the last six miles, and only around the Trinity College, with the support of crowds on both sides of the street legs become a bit lighter, and the last 195 meters were pure pleasure! And in the end one great purpose of the marathon is to prepare you for one of the best pints of Guinness of your life!

Comedians Ed Byrne and Tommy Tiernan completed the course, with Ed coming first. We finished somewhere between them – we bit you Tommy!

Ireland top list for friendliness

According to Lonely Planet travel guide, Ireland is now the friendliest nation on planet!
“Centuries of turmoil, conquest and famine – and subsequent immigration – have certainly taken their toll on the Irish; it’s left them with a delicious dark sense of humor and a welcoming attitude towards strangers” claims the guide.
That famous ability of the Irish to find the craic (fun times with convivial company ;-) ) in bum or bust times – means you’re always in for a treat.”
And it isn’t just the lack of food or abundance of invaders, that according to the book, has made Irish so happy – the sorting out of that unfortunate business up north has boosted Irish moods to an all-time high.
“These days, after the end of “Troubles”, a cautious optimism reigns supreme, infecting the land once again with the sense that anything’s possible” it adds.
The tip-driven smiles of the Americans have landed the US in second place, though residents of few nations may not agree.
“Blamed for the coming of World War III, the Anti-Christ, Bon Jovi, Tom Cruise, Michael Jackson, rampant street crime, and noise pollution through overloud talking, Americans just take it all in their stride” says the guide, claiming Americans will do anything to make you feel welcome.
Poverty stricken Malawi was third on the list (they can’t afford not to be) while Scotland, Turkey, Samoa, Thailand, Fiji, Indonesia and Vietnam made up the rest.
Needless to say Ireland also made it into the top ten on the Best Brews Bluelist – cheers for that, Guinness!

Festival of World Cultures - Dun Laoghaire

The Festival of World Cultures 2007:

49 surfers on a single wave!

We were so excited about the Saturday’s race that we nearly missed it! On Saturday, surfers in Lahinch in County Clare once again smashed the world record for the largest number of people to ride the same wave simultaneously.

At about 5.45pm, 49 surfers managed to stay in formation for the required five seconds, thus breaking the previous record of 44, set on the very same beach a year ago. Lahinch will host another attempt to break it’s own record in May next year.

Adidas Frank Duffy 10 miles run

For those training for the Dublin Marathon in October Adidas organised series of races that offer opportunity to test you at short distances ahead of October's race. Last Saturday we took part in Frank Duffy 10 miles run, second race of the series.

10 miles = 16.09344 kilometers. If in the beginning of July someone would have told me that I’ll be able to run 10 miles I would laugh at him (or her). It all started few weeks ago, on 12th July, when we signed (with no training - I know a bit irresponsible) for the 5 mile run and ……… we did it! From then we were preparing to the 10 mile race.

We arrived at the race HQ in Castleknock College at 9am (the race commenced at 10am), the college gym was already completely filled up with people patiently waiting in queues to collect race number and goodie bag. One could see runners of all ages – impatient and eager to run teenagers and full of energy older athletes – it proves that running is a sport for everybody! 20 minute walk to the start line was a perfect opportunity for a warm up. As soon as we left the college, we were carried by the wave of participants, all heading in the same direction.

Race was run in the Phoenix Park - the largest urban enclosed park in Europe. The main entrance is only about 3 km (2 m) from Dublin’s city centre. It contains large areas of grassland, tree-lined avenues and many areas of dense forest. On every sunny weekend park is full of families relaxing after hectic week and tourists admiring parks’s attractions. Park is home, among other things, to Dublin Zoo and Áras an Uachtaráin (Irish White House) occupied for last 10 years by Mary McAleese – current President of Ireland.

We’ve reached Chesterfield Avenue, which was already completely filled with runners, 10 minutes before the start. The attendance was overwhelming; over three thousand runners signed up for the race. Unfortunately organisers didn’t foreseen that many participants and queues to toilets were gigantic – and as we all know you need to hydrate before the exercise – unfortunately not all water want to stay in ;-).

Phoenix Park is home to a herd of wild Fallow deer. We’ve met quite often during training those dignified animals proudly presenting their antlers. Deer were always curiously looking at us, two leg mammals running around park with no purpose. I wonder what they were thinking… The deer have right of way on the roads through the park, however last Saturday they must have been intimidated by the number of uninvited guests and decided not to show themselves, so we didn’t have to let them through ;-)

Finally after one hour and thirty five minutes finish! Now only to collect well earned Adidas T-shirt, an hour long walk back home, and rest of the weekend spent on the couch watching TV ;-).

And from Monday we’re training for the half-marathon, which will take place in September.

Vikings finally arrived

They finally arrived. A full size reconstructed Viking Warship “Havingsten”, known also as Sea Stallion of Glendalough, has arrived to Dublin yesterday around lunch time. Before one could see the boat, one could hear warning sirens of ships docked on the Liffey and bells in local churches – like almost 1000 years ago they were trying to warn citizens against the Viking invasion! There was no panic today, like more there would be in medieval times. Crowd of tourist on both sides of the river, reinforced with curious office workers that have just gone out for lunch, freezed in excitement.

First one could see port authority and fire brigade ships; only then between them there was Havingsten sailing proudly powered only by big orange and yellow sail. The After few minutes the sail was lowered and the sailors, encouraged by the crowds, started to row.

The Sea Stallion is docked on the Liffey close to IFSC and will be moved tomorrow overnight to the National Museum in Collins Barracks. On Friday at 6.30pm the National Museum will officially open the exhibition about the Sea Stallion and the Viking Age. It will run until summer 2008.

A stamp celebrating the arrival of the Viking Warship in Dublin was issued by An Post. The 55c stamp features the Sea Stallion of Glendalough, a reconstruction of the Skuldulev 2 Viking ship built in Dublin in 1042. Researched and illustrated by leading Irish philatelic artist Vincent Killowry, the stamp is available from the main post offices.

Flights from Knock to New York & Boston

From the end of May Ireland West Airport Knock is connected with FK Airport New York and Boston Logan International Airport. It's a first scheduled transatlantic service with a low cost carrier flyglobespan.com from Knock, located midway between Galway and Donegal. The Scottish carrier operates three services a week from Knock to New York, and two services weekly to Boston. Seat fares starts at just €157 plus tax each way.

Where are the REAL Vikings?

The crew of replica Viking longship dropped plans to sail across the North Sea because of unfavourable winds and decided to take a tow to Orkney. The Sea Stallion of Glendalough, billed as the biggest ever Viking ship reconstruction, will be towed by a support ship before continuing its voyage to Dublin, where it is set to arrive on 14th August. You can find more info in this post. The plan was to travel from Roskilde to Dublin using only oars and sails - like Viking warriors did 1000 years ago.

Pub where you can serve yourself pints!

It’s every drinkers dream! The Baggot Inn, one of Dublin’s oldest pubs reopened last week after eight years offering the chance to pour your own pint of Guinness.The act of pouring a good Guinness has become an art-form and bartenders are specially trained by Guinness to pour the black stuff.

But now customers can sit around a table with six to eight friends and pour Guinness from a tab, the first time it has been done in the world. Bartenders have been trained to teach customers how to pour pints, while instructions on each table, “the six steps to perfection”, will help amateur pint-pullers.

The Baggot, the oldest pub on Dublin’s Baggot Street and steeped in musical history, was first licensed in 1700 but closed its doors eight years ago. In the Baggot Inn:

- Bono was once turned away from its doors for looking to young until he told the doorman he was the lead singer of the band for the evening

- Tracy Chapman launched her career here

- Bob Geldof had to beg for a month before he was allowed to play a gig

- Fresh from recording studio, David Bowie performed here just to try out new material on a live audience.