Bonjour!
First I trained to Nice, France. The trip was so long that I ought to have planned out my entire life, done a soul search, come back from that search and had plenty of time to rest and live in nirvana while on the train. Of course I did no such thing; instead I learned some French with the correct Parisian accent. I trained into Paris, through Brussels, Bruges and finally to South France. The pastoral scenery along the way was made me want to taste the altitude and funneled my dreams into rural farm houses.
Nice was a picturesque place. I spent the first day gawking my way through the town town but simultaneously attempting to breathe quietly, afraid they would charge me for the oxygen traveling into my lungs. My hostel was located between a Louise Viton and a Gucci. The streets were lined with bird of paradise bushes and strategically placed marble statues. The entire city was laced with perfectly even cobblestones and brick sidewalks and roads. I found myself touring Chateau de Blu a hill to the West of the city. I then sat by the sea and stumbled, barefoot over the rocky beach. At low tide I collected sea glass and created a temporary sculpture in tribute to Andy Goldworthy. For sunset Amber and I drank Poor Man’s Mimosas on the beach as the sun went down.
While slightly tipsy we traveled to see Cirque du Soleil, Saltimbanco. It was an amazing show technically. I was amused to see spotlight operators handing from harnesses overheard. They bounced about on bungee cords directing their spots at the multiple stages. I have to admit I spent most of the time watching the techies work: the light board was a touch screen and allowed for the scrollers and movers (lights) to be controlled by hand. The Stage Manager calling the show was amazing too. EX: If the rope dancers were not ready, or there was some reason that they could not go on, the SM skipped ahead to the next act and then came back to the rope dancer’s act later. I was amazed that such a big production was as fluid as it was. Not to overlook the cast I will give a nod in their direction. The majority of the performers were previous olympic participants, even the gold medalists were now dancing on a stage in extravagant costumes, make-up and speaking in tongues.
Belfast
Post Dublin I felt a need to feed my desire to spend more time in Ireland.This led to my solo wanderings of Belfast. It was glorious. I took myself to see A Christmas Carol. I would never have known the words:”twat” and “bloody ‘ell” were used in Dicken’s time if not for this show. I do have to concede that it was a superior cast even if I was not fond of the script; I believe my enthusiasm for the show in general was probably due to the heavy Irish accents in which it was performed more than anything else. 
I went on the Belfast wheel, a smaller version of the London Eye. I tried Turkish Delight and found I disagree with Edmond upon liking that stuff. I spent an entire day wandering the 5 floors of the Linenhall Library. Built in 1678 is made of wonderful ancient wood and stone, all of the shelves are wooden with rolling ladders and each floor is covered in ancient books, theatrical indexes, Irish lineage lists and governmental scrolls as public documents. Outside the city the hills were typically tumultuous. When I took a train out to them I spent a good deal of time wandering up the paths to the summit of the “Irish mountains” more of what we would call foothills. Cranberry’s Zombie’s continually ran through my head. The terrain and political atmosphere up here is taught, recently IRA explosives were found a mile from Dundalk, less that 23 km from the boarder. I am hoping to exit the city before any violence surfaces.
On the return journey to Germany I miscalculated my money and ended up spending the night at the airport rather than a hostel. It was an amazing experience: at 22:00 the security shut off the majority of the lights, turned off the heat and locked me and the 50 others into the airport. As it grew colder we all huddled together for warmth, eventually getting into a huge circle of spooning bodies, then we slept. I got the best sleep of the weekend with my head resting on my backpack, being spooned in the middle of two boys I did not know on the freezing airport floor. At 5AM the lights came on, we all got up, boarded planes and went to our different destinations…
intrepid trekking 