A Well Kept Man

We had a wonderful trip to Ireland, in spite of all of the rain and cold temperatures. Most of the people in Ireland seemed downtrodden over the weather, labeling it as "October-like". I can't say it was that bad, although we were happy to get back "home" to Switzerland where shorts and t-shirts quickly replaced our jeans and rain coats. We maybe had two half-days of sunshine, the rest was a combination of cold, misty, rainy, overcast, windy, foggy, but vibrantly green and stony/rocky.

I never fully appreciated the size of Ireland until we started driving around. If you plan on going and want to see it all, you will probably need a good two to three weeks. It's not that cities and sites are located a long way from each other, it's just that the road system doesn't allow for efficient transit (most roads the max speed you could safely drive and not hit a passing car, 1000 year old wall, or sheep/cow was around 60 kilometers per hour or ~35 mph). I thought it would be super easy to just drive 2-3 hours per day and see everything...but we sadly had to drop some things from our itinerary (whiskey factory tour, driving tour of Connemara, a few churches/abbeys/stone forts).

If you plan on driving yourself (rather than taking a tour bus), I say go for it. I'll admit each morning I struggled with trying to remember that I was supposed to drive on the left, but once you almost crash head on into oncoming traffic once or twice then you remember. I was disappointed at Susan's performance at times, as there are now a couple major superhighways that did she did not know about so I was taken off on some windy country roads which impeded our progress somewhat, and I was often yelling at her (especially when she couldn't find our B&B that I told her about before we left).

Susan is the name of the chick on my GPS who pronounces things funny. In Ireland, she pronounces the word 'road' like you and I would pronounce 'rod'. But on the other hand she is worth every penny I paid as she has enabled me to avoid having to ask people for directions. If you plan on traveling on unfamiliar roads and are too lazy to plan everything ahead of time, get a GPS. Make sure the maps are up to date, download some POI's (points of interest), and you should be in for good times.

We saw bronze age forts, castles from the days of yore, and beer from last week (Smithwicks is great, Guinness is ok - although it is much better than in the U.S., Porterhouse brew pub beer is so-so, although I only had 3 of 9 varieties so maybe there are some better choices). We saw how they make Waterford Crystal, almost were lost at sea, stayed at an awesome B&B (a couple were sorely lacking), ate potatoes in multiple forms (fried, mashed, covered in cheese, roasted, boiled, stewed, au

Ireland is a lovely place, despite the weather, and I hope to go back someday to see all that we missed. More stories to come...must sort through 500 pictures of leprechauns, crosses, beer, and sheep. gratin, and many more), and interacted with the locals.

After yesterday, I have a new found admiration for the riders of the Tour de France, as well as those who choose to exercise on a regular basis. For those of you that don't know Lausanne is quite hilly. I am thinking the word hilly isn't strong enough but it would be an insult to the majestic Alps to call it mountainous. According to my Michelin guidebook Lausanne is "built on uneven ground," which is like saying flying from New York to LA gets you there a little quicker than if you had decided to do crawl the route on your knees instead.

I haven't been to San Francisco, but I'm pretty sure Lausanne has it beat. For geographical context, we live very close to the lake (less than 800 meters by pigeon ~ 1/2 mile). From our apartment to the water the elevation change is roughly 50m (160 feet), which isn't bad unless you were playing a game of soccer in the street and you miss the net. I had planned on riding my bicycle about 5km up to a park on the north side of Lausanne, spending the afternoon there (maybe grabbing a beer and sandwich, or just soaking up the rays) and then coasting back down to our apartment. Ask most people who ride their bikes somewhat regularly and 10km isn't all that hard (6.2 miles), even when you throw in some slight elevation change.

I however failed to note the elevation change that I would encounter on my trip. The first kilometer of my trip I experienced a 75 meter climb (250 feet), followed by another 50 meters through the next kilometer. No problem I say to myself, I made a short stop in a nice park along the route, but decided I was fine to go on. Plus, I had brought along my GPS which showed I had not quite 3 km left to my final target (I can choose whether I'm walking, driving, or biking so it changes routes and speeds to tell you when it thinks you'll be there). Needless to say the GPS figured if I was stupid enough to bike up through Lausanne, I must have calf muscles that were featured on the cover of Muscle Fitness magazine. The GPS showed that I should be able to knock off the last 3 km in about 20 minutes. I figured the beer would be the perfect reward.

But as I referred to earlier, the only thing physically I have going for me is that gravity has to work a little harder to keep me on the ground since my bone to muscle ratio is like 3 to 1; of my 82 kg (180ish pounds), I'd say 60% is bone, 20% is muscle, 10% skin, and the rest is gristle. The rest of the trip did not take me 20 minutes. For the next 2 km I completed a climb that could be described as grueling, but that would be polite. It was over a little over 100 meters (325+ feet) and I still wasn't even to the stupid park that looked so close on the map. I got out my GPS to see how long it thought I was from my target when I found out I missed a turn somewhere and was actually further away than when I started the climb.

I think it was at this point I started sweating pure salt. I started to ride again only this time with the GPS out of my backpack to make sure I didn't miss another turn. Fortunately I was able to go downhill for a bit (800 m) which provided a nice breeze; this enabled me to outrun the vultures and flies. Now I found myself getting extremely close to the park, but due to the topography of the park I was on the wrong side (the park features a valley with a river on the far east side that flows south towards the lake, and I wanted to be on the northwest side even though it was on the complete opposite end).

My GPS assured me that I was under 1 km to the finish, although the map it displayed didn't take into account the fact that construction began on new roads through the park about 6 months ago which left me trying to decide if I wanted to go all the way around the outside of the park (um, no) or through the construction zone (why not). The road on my GPS no longer existed so I was forced to use my skills from two years of Cub Scouts to determine which way to go. Unfortunately we hadn't learned navigating before I decided baseball was more fun so I had to guess.

The GPS indicated there was a route called Chemin de Cascades, which if my French were better would have known meant Dirt Path by Waterfalls. Silly me, I thought it was a real paved road. Only the dirt path might have been more aptly portrayed by a picture of Indiana Jones holding a machete and some ancient Swiss amulet being chased by wild guinea pigs or something. I probably should have known to turn around when I saw the sign which thankfully I could translate due to the universal picture for this area is prone to flash flooding. To the right you will see the sign, I think it's a pretty good one as far as trying to get across a point as clearly as possible.

What made matters worse was I was apparently at the base of the river bed and I needed to get to the top...80 meters up, and it's a dirt path, that's overgrown with every possible Swiss plant that either would hurt alot if I hit it, or would leave nasty thorns in my arms, legs, and face. So I did what I had to do and carried my bike the whole way. I don't know if you've ever watched one of those outdoor adventure challenge races they sometimes have on TV on Saturdays where people kayak, mountain bike, hike, climb, kill woodland creatures, and run up mountains to win t-shirts, water bottles, and other great prizes, but that's what I was basically doing. Except my prize would be someone finding me alive.

I eventually made it about 2/3 of the way up when I came across a woman and her two dogs so I figured at least I won't die alone, but I obviously spooked her as they quickly vanished and I was again left alone. But as luck would have it my Cub Scout skills came in handy as I heard a faint noise that could neither be described as organic...cars. I realized now that I was close to a real paved road and I could probably get a decent GPS signal to find my way out. Sometimes the GPS gets confused when it only sees a couple satellites and starts to try and figure out where you are, so the dense canopy above me was making the GPS think I was capable of time-shifting or something.

Once on the road, I found that I was only 500 meters from my destination, which on the map looked like a nice park; in reality it was a weird lake surrounded by barn animals (goats, sheep, cows, chickens, etc.) which I noticed before I could see it if you catch my drift (I certainly caught theirs). Anyway, I spent about 10 minutes up there trying to catch my breath (which was very hard to do, not because of altitude or anything, remember, there are goats, sheep, cows, chickens, etc.), and then I decided I had enough fun for the day and decided to head back home.

I gather I spent about 2-3 hours biking up to this park, and about 15-20 minutes biking down (I can't be sure on the exact time going up as I think I lost consciousness for a while or at least it felt like time was standing still). I guess if I want to develop some muscle, then I should definitely bike around here more often. If you do come visit, I promise we'll take a car or public transportation at all times, especially if you want to go see the city farm.