Learning the Pub Ropes

It’s Day Four now but my blog is still on Day Two. I’ll be catching up, as our guests just left and I’m back at it. Fred’s research led him to connect with a Brian Lynch (presumably a relation, but no proof) whose second career is as a cheesemaker (the one we ran into at the baby cemetery).  Anyway, he gave us the most generous gifts — long since opened and consumed, so no photo — of several cheeses (of his own!, crackers, jams, relish, chutney, and a print of a map showing a heart in Ireland and one in the States where the Lynches first landed. SO VERY THOUGHTFUL. Needless to say, Fred’s heart is full.  By the way, the town of Roads has proved very tricky to research as you can imagine. A Google search of:  "Roads Ireland" has quite a few results.

Fred took me to all his favorite haunts. AKA Ruins on previously-Lynch-owned land. 

An umbrella left by a wife at a gate to a field being visited by a husband whose ancestors left this field 183 years ago. 

A thatched roof home built by "Continentals." AKA some Dutch people.

As I mentioned earlier, Fred’s research has been so deep that it’s as if he’s been here before. He chose two pubs in town he knew would be great —Fertha (which is a woman’s name) and Mike Murt’s. And they were. In different ways. The former has food, and GOOD food. We had the seafood chowder. Best ever.  There were two male Irish bartenders and two female bar hands—one Italian and one French —  both here for a few weeks on a program to learn English. They were all in their late teens/early twenties and all beautiful. The atmosphere was fun and light, particularly when I admitted to not loving Guinness but determined to change that. There’s a little trick they have here to help “the ladies” acquire a taste: add a splash of black currant syrup. The young bartender said he’d wean me off the syrup one pint at a time. This young man spoke Irish with an older man who came in. Great to hear. Sounded a lot like Danish to me, which I must research. I think it was the Viking influence.  We came back the next night but the girls were gone and at the atmosphere subdued.... 

Found this: 

Is Gaelic a Scandinavian language?

The Norse–Gaels also known as Hiberno-Scandinavian (Old Irish: Gall-Goídil; Irish: Gall-Ghaeil; Scottish Gaelic: Gall-Ghàidheil, 'foreigner-Gaels') were a people of mixed Gaelic and Norse ancestry and culture.

The seafood chowder and brown bread and my Guiness at Fertha's.

Mike Murt’s has no food, but an atmosphere to kill. 

A Snug

Guess which drink was mine..... 

The day our friends from home arrived (after hiking for five days in Dingle), while shopping for them in our town, I stopped in at Quinlan’s Fish Market where CNN’s Donie O’Sullivan’s father works. (I’d stopped in the day before but he had already left for the day.) Fred and I thought he was shy because when CNN ran a little story about Donie when he was home a few months ago, it was his mother who did most of the talking. But the senior O’Sullivan is NOT at all shy or reluctant to pose for a selfie — in front of their framed newspaper article about Donie’s success. Homeboy done good in America. I even overheard some townspeople talking about Donal and Donie in a café where I stopped to get a little work done.

Mr. Donal O'Sullivan and I. (I got him to dish about who Donie is dating from CNN!)