July 13, 1997

July 13, 1997

My relatives talked Aimee and I into joining them this summer for their annual beach holiday on the Florida Panhandle. I have jokingly referred to it as the “Redneck Riviera”. We are flying Northwest Airlines through Memphis to Fort Walton Beach, FL. In Memphis, we are told the next leg is oversold and they want volunteers to be bumped. Aimee and I jumped at the opportunity. Every other time, I have been on a business trip and I couldn't accept. We are offered a voucher for a free flight and a seat on the next flight to Fort Walton this evening. We also get lunch vouchers.

Since we have several hours to kill, my plan is to rent a car and see the city. Memphis is virgin territory for me. We ask the third bumpee, a middle-aged woman, if she wants to come along. She does. I look on the Memphis map and decide to hit Mud Island along the riverfront. I have no idea what it is. After parking downtown, we board an overhead monorail that carries us over the Mississippi River to Mud Island. I immediately recognize this tram from the chase scene at the end of the Tom Cruise movie ‘The Firm’ that came out a few years ago.

Mud Island turns out to be a Mississippi River museum. The first half is indoors and has exhibits on the importance of the river to local history and commerce. Steamboats and cotton are the main features. Outside is a large tent that holds “Memphis Belle", a famous B-17 bomber from WWII.

The second part of the museum is outdoors and is extraordinary. It consists of a huge scale model of the lower Mississippi River from Cairo, IL down to the Gulf of Mexico. This concrete structure replicates the river’s topographic contours including every twist and oxbow and floodplain. It even has running water. As we walk the 2000-foot length of the model where each stride equals a mile, we learn about the cities along the river and important facts about this vital American waterway. The most intriguing part is the mouth of the river. The model river flows out a concrete ‘delta’ into a ‘Gulf of Mexico’ swimming pool! What a cool idea!

Back at the Memphis airport we catch our afternoon flight to Fort Walton Beach and pick up our rental car. On the way through town we pass Indian Temple Mound Museum. I stop and take a quick look at this ceremonial mound near the beach. This mound is part of the same Mississippian culture of Cahokia Mounds near my hometown. Aimee stayed in the car. She is anxious to get to the beach.

Our family has rented a house on Gulf Trace beach east of Destin. We cross to the adjoining barrier island (part of Gulf Islands National Seashore) and then by bridge to Destin. By the time we reach the house, it is dark and hard to find. A small penance for our little adventure! The next morning we see where we are. This large house overlooks the beach and what a nice beach it is. It is wide and beautiful with ultra-white sand. We enjoy the rest of the week relaxing and playing a little golf. 

July 14, 1997

July 14, 1997

Aimee and I signed up for a scuba diving excursion out of Destin. This will be our first time diving in the Gulf of Mexico. The dive master builds up our expectations telling us we are chasing a whale shark. A dive alongside this rare giant of the sea would be a treat! Instead we end up diving the sunken Miss Louise Tugboat. It is not so great. The water is pretty murky. In addition I am having mask fog problems and can’t see two feet in front of me. Aimee says I missed a big barracuda watching us.

July 19-20, 1997

July 19-20, 1997

Our week on the beach in Destin, FL is near an end. We fly home tomorrow. Distressingly, there is talk of a hurricane named Danny hitting the nearby Mobile area. My relatives all drove here so they make plans to leave early to beat the hurricane. Although we have never been in a hurricane this house looks pretty solid and we are far from Mobile. Besides there is nothing I can do about the situation; everyone is trying to fly out today.

We are up early the next morning. Now I am a little worried. This huge house is deserted, and eerily quiet since my family all left in the middle of the night…and the weather looks ominous. The expansive beach is now much smaller with the tidal surge pushing water far up towards the house. Aimee and I pack up and start the drive over to Fort Walton. I figure it is better to get inland. Maybe we can stop and see the Naval Air Museum. Halfway to Pensacola the rain just lets loose. There is no way we are going closer to this hurricane. We stop and shop to kill some time. When there is a break in the weather, we head for the airport to wait out the storm. I am in no hurry as I am guessing our flight will be delayed or even cancelled. Shockingly, in a couple hours the sky clears and our plane leaves right on time! At home, we learn Danny was a Category 1 hurricane that dumped a record amount of rain on Mobile.

August 1997

August 1997

Hiking the Appalachian National Scenic Trail is a bucket list item for outdoorsmen. Since it is well over 2000 miles long, most hike it in sections. I am ready to start, so an old college roommate, his young son, and I drive to one of the more accessible locations in southwest Virginia. We hike a section of the trail in the Mt Rogers National Recreation Area. Mt. Rogers is the highest point in Virginia. The trail is beautiful but well traveled.

Surprisingly, we ran into some wild ponies on the trail. About a hundred have run free on the slopes of this mountain for decades. They are Ponies, not horses, because they are less than five feet tall at the withers (shoulders).

March 27-28, 1998

March 27-28, 1998

I have been in Lyon, France for business and have a flight scheduled to Paris for the first leg of the journey home. Instead I get the local secretary to book me a train ticket. This high-speed TGV train gets me to downtown Paris in just under two hours. I spend the night there and have a few hours in the morning to kill. I took advantage of the time and revisited Sacre Coeur Church. On my way to see the Eiffel Tower, I got off at the Pont de l'Alma Metro station and accidentally walked over the underpass where Princess Diana died last Fall. The graffiti all over the bridge alerted me to it.

June 18-21, 1998

June 18-21, 1998

Aimee and I spent three days in French Lick, IN attending golf school. French Lick is in southern Indiana and was the boyhood home of basketball star Larry Bird. We are staying at the very dated French Lick Springs Resort, which was probably very nice in its heyday, a hundred years ago. In the back of the hotel near the pool is a sulfur-smelling hot spring, the reason the hotel was built here. This spa attracted the likes of celebrities like Joe Louis and Al Capone.

Aimee and I enjoy golfing together and would love to play better. We learn a lot during the school but I am not sure we are much better. At least I am not. I probably have too much that needs changing. Aimee seems to be hitting better drives. We can play as much golf as we want after class but after hitting the ball all day we are not much interested. For a change of pace we do play one round at the local country club in town.

August 28-31, 1998

August 28-31, 1998

Aimee is half Irish with lots of brogue-talking relatives, her mother included. She has been to Ireland a couple times and would love to go again so we plan a trip there. We add a stopover in London to add some variety. Landing in Gatwick airport south of London we take the train into Victoria station. When I did this in 1984 we were met by a guy hawking hotels. Not this time. I have to do some work to find accommodations. We eventually find a hotel down the street. On the plus side it is near a neighborhood of row houses all decorated with flowers. Very pretty!

Aimee has never been to London so she makes me repeat some of the highlights I have already seen. We start down the street at Buckingham Palace. Aimee loves everything about the British royalty. On the backside we walk through the Royal Mews (Stables), which has a collection of royal carriages. We then walked through St. James Park towards Parliament, but stopped at Horse Guards on the way. This building has ceremonial guards because it was the entrance to the Palace of Whitehall across the street. Whitehall was the home of the Tudors until fire destroyed most of it in 1698. Only the Banqueting House remains. Famously Charles I was beheaded in front of it in 1649 by Cromwell during the English Civil War. We then continued on to the Thames so Aimee could see Big Ben towering over Parliament.

We spent a couple hours in the British Museum. This was my idea. I had fond memories of my visit in 1984. It contains a lot of interesting historical archeology from Britain that were accidentally dug up over the years. But the museum is most famous for the treasures that the English collected from all over the world. This includes the Elgin Marbles off the Acropolis and the Rosetta Stone that provided the key to translating Egyptian Hieroglyphics.

The next day we visited the Natural History Museum. It is housed inside an ornate Victorian building with a beautiful central hall. It has some famous collections, like those of Charles Darwin. I especially like the exhibits on dinosaurs and the evolution of humans.
For lunch we take a break at Harrod’s Department store to see their amazing collection of “everything” for sale. We had lunch in the basement at the sushi bar. It is pick a plate off a continuous sushi conveyor belt.

We also walked by Trafalgar Square with its Nelson Column protected by four huge lion statues. The square is a memorial to Lord Nelson who died during this famous naval battle of 1805. It is overrun with pigeons fed by tourists.

London has a theatre district as famous as New York, so we get a pair of last minute tickets for tonight's performance of “Rent” at the Shaftesbury Theatre. I can’t say I was impressed with the show.

The next morning we took the train west to the Royal Botanical Kew Gardens. This World Heritage Site has huge collections of plants from all over the world. It also has a number of historic structures, including the Palm House, a Victorian greenhouse of glass and wrought iron. My favorite was the Waterlily House that contained giant lily pads. They reminded me of Tarzan lazily floating downriver on one. Unfortunately my bubble is burst when I learn they are from the Amazon of South America, not Africa.

In the afternoon we walked by Kensington Palace, which is the home of miscellaneous members of the royal family. We almost became TV celebrities. We were wondering why there was a huge pile of flowers spread all over the iron gate when Aimee realizes tomorrow is August 31, the one-year anniversary of Princess Di’s tragic death. At that moment a journalist asks us if we came over especially for this event. Without thinking I blurt out “No, you have to be kidding”. He then tells me he is with one of the tabloid TV shows and wants to film an American couple visiting Diana’s memorial locations. This could have been our fifteen minutes of fame! Oh well, I didn’t really want it to cut into my tourist time. To reinforce that notion, I dragged Aimee back to the British Museum for a second session.

September 1-2, 1998

September 1-2, 1998

Finished with our London diversion, we hop a short flight to Dublin, Ireland. We stay downtown at a hotel on the north side of the River Liffey. We start our exploration with a walk across the Liffey to Trinity College to see the Old Library. It contains an exhibition on the Book of Kells, a brightly adorned manuscript copy of the Bible from around the year 800AD. In that era Irish monks were busy doing their part preserving Western civilization by transcribing books. This copy of the Bible had been spirited off Iona Island in the Irish Sea to save it from Viking raiders plundering coastal churches and abbeys.

We also visit St Stephens Green, Dublin Castle, the National gallery, Christ Church and St Patrick’s Cathedrals. None are terribly interesting. I am surprised that both of these cathedrals are Anglican. I thought we were in a 90% Catholic country. Then I remember this was English territory when King Henry VIII confiscated all Catholic property. Apparently none of the Church property was returned when Ireland gained independence.

Along the south bank of the Liffey is the trendy Temple Bar area. We stroll and stop in a pub for a drink. They don’t have a wide of variety beers. Almost everyone drinks Guinness, so I order one too. The bar tender pours me a pint and then lets it sit. I start thinking he has forgot me until I observe he lets every beer sit for a minute before serving. Guinness is a thick hearty dark brew with a creamy head that is quite tasty.

The next day we walk along the river Liffey and then visit the National Museum. We see many archeological specimens from Ireland’s ancient history. The breadth of Bronze Age gold ornamentation illustrates that Ireland had a surprisingly rich beginning. So different from the rural agrarian society that we associate with the Irish.

We also learn about Ireland’s more recent history with a visit to the Dublin General Post Office. Besides having an exhibit on the 1916 Easter Uprising that eventually led to independence from England, this Neoclassical building is also a living memorial. It is riddled with bullet holes because the revolutionaries holed up here. I am intrigued enough to buy an Irish history book. What I learn is most of Ireland’s (and England’s too) large port cities were established by the Vikings as local bases of operation. Dublin is not Irish nor English, but Norse.

September 3, 1998

September 3, 1998

After a few days in Dublin we rent a car to explore the rest of the country. We start going northwest. Traffic is lousy with drivers passing at high speed in both directions on this two-lane road. Ireland apparently needs more highways to keep up with its rapid economic growth. An hour later in county Meath we reach the small town of Trim. In the center are the ruins of a Norman castle. This fortress with a huge central keep has a long Irish history but I am more interested to learn it starred as the walled city of York, England in one of my favorite movies “Braveheart”.

From Trim we follow the Boyne River downstream to Brú na Bóinne, Gaelic for Palace on the Boyne. This World Heritage site contains Neolithic passage tombs from the time of the Egyptian pyramids. The most famous are Newgrange and Knowth. Both can only be visited by guided tour. We opt for Knowth. From the Visitor Center we are shuttled to the site to begin our tour. The centerpiece is a huge earthen mound (220ft in diameter) more than 4000 years old encircled with stones carved with strange symbols. A passage runs under the center of the mound. It is oriented so the sun illuminates it only on the Equinox. Seventeen smaller tomb mounds encircle this largest one. The richness of ancient Irish history continues to astonish me.

I want to slowly make our way across the north of Ireland visiting more sights. Aimee on the other hand is anxious to see her relatives, so we drive straight across to County Mayo in the far northwest corner of Ireland. We spend the night with her aunt in the town of Crossmolina. The next morning I notice some stone ruins in the backyard. Could this have once been a castle? Hmmm, maybe Aimee comes from Irish royalty!

September 4-9, 1998

September 4-9, 1998

This morning we visit Aimee’s oldest uncle. He is a bachelor and lives alone on a cattle farm. He hasn’t let progress alter his lifestyle. He still has no indoor plumbing and heats his small farmhouse by burning turf (peat) in the large cooking fireplace. His only nod to modernity is a telephone and electricity for his tiny TV. It is early morning and he serves me a shot of whiskey for breakfast. We talk around his kitchen table but I have no idea what he is saying. I can’t understand his brogue so I just smile and nod. After an hour we take him for a ride to the local “big city” of Ballina. It sits at the mouth of the River Moy famous for salmon fishing. Instead of touring (or fishing) we stop at a pub for another shot of whiskey. I am thinking I got to take this guy home while I can still drive.

The next couple days we stay with Aimee’s cousin in Castlebar. She graciously takes us around to see some of the sights in county Mayo. We drive north to the coast to Downpatrick Head to see the sheer rocky ocean cliffs. They are tall with crashing ocean waves far below. Somehow sheep manage to crawl partway down to nibble on grass ledges. I wonder how many end up falling into the sea. A hundred yards off shore is a lone sea stack. It used to be connected to the mainland until the adjoining land fell away some 700 years ago. Nearby is a sinkhole. When I peer into it I can see the sea far below. I suddenly get very nervous knowing the ocean undermines this whole area. Not wanting to go for a sudden swim I carefully tiptoe back to where Aimee and her cousin are waiting.

A short drive to the west is the Ceide Fields. This is an area of peat bogs. Archeological digs have unearthed ancient farms, stone walls, houses and tombs. The Visitor Center explains that Ireland was heavily pine forested at the end of the last Ice Age when men first arrived. These Neolithic immigrants cleared the trees for sheep and cattle pastures. The loss of trees caused greater rainfall turning much of Ireland into unproductive bogs. As bogs age the accumulated organic material decays into peat (called ‘turf’ by the locals), a predecessor to coal. The Irish have traditionally dug up brick-shaped pieces of turf, let it dry in the sun, and burned it in their fireplaces for heat and cooking as we might use firewood. Aimee’s uncle still does.

The next day we drive west toward the town of Westport. It is a cute touristy town that overlooks Clew Bay, a pretty ocean inlet choked with thousands of small islets. We drive west to Croagh Patrick, the tallest mountain in the area. St. Patrick, who brought Christianity to Ireland, supposedly fasted and prayed atop it for forty days. Climbing it is a pilgrimage for many the Irish. We start to hike up it but change our minds after we notice storm clouds at the peak. We stop high enough to get a good view of Clew Bay before returning to Westport for dinner.

The next day we drive south to Ballintubber Abbey and stroll its ruins. From there we go to Cong, a village made famous as the film location for John Wayne’s “The Quiet Man”. We walk from the ruins of Cong Abbey, across a small river, and through a thick forest where we come across a single tower hidden in the canopy. It is a tight climb to the top of Leonard’s Tower. Many medieval abbeys had this tall narrow tower. They were a place of refuge for monks during Viking raids. Further along we emerge at Ashford Castle. First a fortification, and later a country house for the Guinness family, it is now a high-priced grand castle-hotel with manicured lawns. We stroll the grounds and walk the castle walls. It is very picturesque.

Another day we drive out to the northwest corner of County Mayo and across the bridge to Achill Island. There we stroll the beach, which is littered with giant kelp. Nearby is Achill Island Golf Course. I want to play some golf while in Ireland, but I have to laugh. This coastal Links course is perfectly flat with nary a tree or bush. The only hazards I see are sheep! There are dozens on the course to keep the fairways trimmed. I stop in the pro-shop to check out the cost, but I am waylaid by a group of older lady golfers who force me to join them for a drink. Aimee and her cousin, wondering where I am, eventually come in laughing at this scene.

On Sunday, we attend church at the modest local Catholic Church. A few blocks down is the much nicer stone church I learn is Anglican. I guess when the English ruled Ireland they must have converted all the best churches to Anglican (Church of England) and left the Catholic Irish to fend for themselves.

September 10, 1989

September 10, 1989

It was nice visiting Aimee’s Irish relatives and seeing how they live. They are truly nice people. But I am itching to see the rest of Ireland. We have only a couple days left. Aimee agrees and we head south along the western coastline. We drive by Kylemore Abbey. It used to be a castle but is now owned by Benedictine nuns. We pass on the tour and just admire its picture perfect location on a mountainside overlooking a lake. We spend the night at a B&B in Oughterard on Lough Corrib. Lough means “lake” in Gaelic and sounds like Loch Ness.

September 11, 1989

September 11, 1989

Today we drove south past Galway, Ireland and stopped near Kinvarra at Dunguaire castle. It is picturesque, perched on the shore of Galway Bay. It used to be the home of one of the legendary kings of Connaught, one of the four provinces of old Ireland.

We then drive west into County Claire and through the Burren. The Burren is a large rocky area of Karst limestone flats that were bulldozed bare by glaciers during the last Ice Age. Lots of piled up stones called cairns and a few tombs are scattered across this treeless expanse. It is raining, making it hard to appreciate. We continue down the coast to the Cliffs of Moher. These coastal cliffs are the more famous but I think the Downpatrick Head area is more dramatic. We spend the night at a B&B near Bunratty Castle outside Shannon.

September 12-13, 1989

September 12-13, 1989

This morning we tour nearby Bunratty Castle, which is a tall near perfectly square Keep. It was the site of many Irish battles and is much restored. Exploring is a lot of climbing up and down narrow dark stairways into damp cold rooms with no running water, electricity or toilets. Living in a medieval castle even for a king was probably unpleasant. We skip the folk park outside the castle. I don’t feel the need in seeing their displays of Irish country life. I lived it visiting Aimee’s uncle.

I wanted to play golf at the famous Ballybunion golf course but it rains almost every day in Ireland. You have to have a flexible schedule to enjoy golf here. I guess there is a reason they call Ireland, the Emerald Isle. Instead we turn east and spend the night at a B&B in the town of Cashel.

Ireland has thousands of castles and I wouldn’t mind seeing them all. Aimee is tired of castles and said, “no more”. I try to tell her the ruins on the hilltop above us, called the Rock of Cashel, are of a religious site and not a castle. We stroll among the ruins after dinner. Cashel was the seat of the kings of Munster, the southwestern province of old Ireland. In 1101 the king donated the fortress to the Church.

The next morning we drive to Dublin and catch a flight back home.

October 19-20, 1998

October 19-20, 1998

I have a business meeting in Jasper, Alberta. This is an area that I have never visited, so I flew into Calgary a day early and drove the longer scenic route through the Canadian Rockies. I rented a car and stayed the first night in the city of Banff. It is a great little town surrounded by mountains with an awesome fossil store. I hiked up the steep Tunnel Mountain trail for a great view of the valley and the Banff Springs hotel. This hotel is one of Canada’s iconic and historic 19th century grand railway hotels.

The next day, I drove north through gorgeous mountain scenery of Banff National Park. It is an absolutely stunning drive paralleling the Continental Divide and worthy of its World Heritage status. Forty minutes later, I stopped at Lake Louise with its nice lodge facing this scenic glacier-fed turquoise lake. It is colder here; apparently so all year round because of the glacier. For exercise I hiked the five-mile Lake Agnes trail up to this high alpine lake. It is a strenuous 1500-foot elevation gain. Surprisingly there is a little teahouse at the end for a reward.

Just north of Lake Louise the road splits with the Trans-Canada Highway turning west. I continue north instead along the Icefields Parkway. After ninety minutes I reached Jasper National Park and the Columbia Icefield. Here Athabasca Glacier, one of the toes of this vast patch of ice and snow, spills over the mountains and almost reaches the road making it the most visited glacier in North America. You can walk up to the edge but I signed up for a SnoCoach tour. This is a special high-clearance bus that actually climbs up onto the glacier. That is safer than walking it and accidentally falling down a deep crevasse.

From there it was another hour to the town of Jasper for my sales meeting at a local lodge. On the return drive back to Calgary, I only had time for a quick hike to a small waterfall.