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Put on 5.5lbs in a week in Ireland. I kept getting hungry at odd times, eating lots of stuff like bought sandwiches, gigantic scones, and huge slices of cake, and then not feeling hungry at dinner time (not surprisingly!), but drinking stout in the evening. Back to it now, and have lost about half what I gained, the easy half as usual. I expect I'll start logging again sometime next week.
Anyway it was a good trip. Because of the time of year, we didn't do a lot of outdoor stuff. We stayed in three places: in Bunratty near Limerick, in Cork, and in Galway. Bunratty has a restored castle which was very interesting to visit, and outside it they have built a 'folk park' containing some examples of houses that different kinds of people would have lived in during the 19th century. The labourer's cottage was basically a depressing little hut with a dirt floor and some straw and sacking for a bed, so it's no wonder that so many Irish emigrated if you ask me!
In Limerick we visited the Frank McCourt museum, which is in the school building where he went to school in the 1930s/1940s. He wrote Angela's Ashes, basically his memories of growing up in a slum house with no money, because his father was mostly working in England, drinking his wages, and not sending money home. The guide there gave us a comprehensive tour, explaining the significance of everything on display and how it related to the three books that McCourt wrote.
In Cork we spent a day exploring the nearby coast, and stopped at the small town of Skibbereen, where we visited the Famine museum, which was really depressing especially when you think about how close it actually is to the then seat of government in London, and how long it took the government to do anything to provide any effective relief, in the 1840s, which was a relatively enlightened time. We spent another day going to the pretty town of Cobh, which was the port from which the emigrant ships sailed, and also visited a small fort built to protect the harbour from pirates, which is now a science centre.
In Galway we drove out along the coast on a grey and windy day, and visited a centre dedicated to Patrick Pearse, a teacher and writer who was one of the leaders of the 1916 Easter rising, and had built a summer cottage there in a beautiful spot. The next day we drove inland to a small town which has a partially restored castle with a huge walled garden, mostly for growing food, but with some lovely borders of shrubs and flowers too. The same town also has an old workhouse, a very large institution built by the British in the 1940s to house destitute people, and now partially restored as a museum. That was interesting, as every town used to have one, but I've never been in one before. It seemed very cold and joyless, but at least you would get fed and clothed, and have a roof over your head. The owner of the castle was required to pay a tax to support the workhouse, but he objected to this idea, and said he would rather pay the passage for people to emigrate, and that's what he did.
We also visited some pubs and cafes, and some shops, and it wasn't all doom and gloom! Modern Ireland is thriving with lots of big houses lining the country roads, and busy, vibrant cities that seem to be growing all the time. I think it's better to visit in summer, though!
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134.9 lb
Lost so far: 1.1 lb.
Still to go: 3.1 lb.
Diet followed poorly.
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gaining 1.7 lb a week
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