DINGLE

What a cool town!

Ann is off to bicycle the Slea Head Peninsula. I’m going to take a chill day and check out the town and bicycle Slea Head tomorrow. Before we go our separate ways, we stop at the weekly farmers’ market. They have hearty local vegetables, prepared foods and crafts for sale. My favorite is the cheese booth where the woman has a gadget that melts the top layer of the big cheese wheel. She then scrapes it onto a soft French type bread and the whole thing melts in your mouth deliciously.

I check out the local shops and the harbor and have a late lunch at the vegetarian restaurant: a goat cheese and spinach crepe. There is another book launch, at the Blue Note Jazz Club, and it is a book of poems. The writer, originally from California, came here on vacation and stayed. I join the group and we have a discussion about writing, and reading poetry vs. performing poetry. It is indeed a good poetry performance - followed by music of course!

A young man of 16 plays the Uilleann Pipes. What a beautiful sounding instrument! Uilleann means elbow and the player pumps the bag with his elbow while playing an attached type of flute as well as playing sax type keys. It’s really complex and comes together so smoothly… and is not loud like the Scottish bag pipes. It is also a pleasure to see the next generation be so skilled with such a traditional instrument.

Tonight I go to a live performance at the St. James Church with four musicians and singers on accordion, bodhran, guitar, Uilleann pipes and low whistle. What a high energy in-sync performance!

All this excitement requires at stop at the Courthouse Pub for a Bulmer’s… or two, and Ann shows up with an Australian couple she met.

The Ullean pipe player from the church also shows up. Before he settles in to play with the pub’s fiddler and guitarist, he takes me and Ann to a performance around the corner where a painter is creating his art piece to live music. It has a real Avant Garde feel to it with a sax player, base player and percussionist, and someone filming it all too. We go back to the Courthouse pub until closing. We are having so much fun, we go around the corner to another pub that is still open. This is where all the young people are dancing to DJ beat music and we join in!

What I love about this community is their support of diverse creative expression. They have 50 pubs with a whole array of music and storytelling performances! It feels like one would never run out of people to meet, music to hear or experiences to create.

I could settle in here!