The road from Kutaisi followed the flat coastal plains of what used to be, in Greco-Roman geography, Colchis — the land where Jason and his Argonauts sought the Golden Fleece. Archaeologists believe there may have been some truth to this legend, at least as far as the fleece was concerned. Around the 5th century BC, people in this region did sometimes stretch a sheep fleece over a wooden...
Tom Parfitt Tom Parfitt walked across the northern flank of the Russian Caucasus, from the Black Sea to the Caspian Sea, through republics whose names are synonymous with violence, extremism and warfare. He did it to rid himself of nightmares brought on by the terrible events he witnessed during the 2004 seige of School Number One in Beslan, North Ossetia. He also wanted to understand how places...
Jacob Mikanowski I’ve always found the history of Eastern Europe difficult to come to grips with compared to Western Europe. The history and culture of Spain, France and Italy seem to fall within clearly defined boundaries. We know what French or Italian food is, with all its regional variations, and we have a sense of French and Italian film or literature. Eastern Europe is different. Its...
New Year’s Eve in Dublin The echo of words were in the air as we made our way to Dublin to tramp the streets of Ireland’s Big Smoke on the last three days of the year. Our hotel off Leeson Street Upper was a stone’s throw from the Grand Canal, and a quick cut across St. Stephen’s Green — or a detour past the rigid brick symmetry of Fitzwilliam Square’s Georgian facades — to the River Liffey...
Kilkenny Castle “It’s smaller than I thought.” That’s a phrase no one wants to hear, particularly men, but I was talking about the castle we’d driven across Co. Tipperary to see. The photos I’d seen were so imposing that I guess I just expected its rooms to go on and on. Inside, it felt more like a very large country house than a fortress. Of course, size is relative. As my dad used to say, “It’s...
Exploring the ruins of Athassel priory The countryside around the Rock of Cashel is scattered with ecclesiastical ruins. The entire region bears the traces of half-forgotten martyrdoms, and the struggles of early Christian saints to wrest the island’s inhabitants from the pagan beliefs the Irish had lived with since time immemorial. The monastic way of life began in the deserts of Egypt in the...
The Rock of Cashel We left Killorglin early the next morning for the long drive across Co. Limerick to Tipperary, with stops for strong lashings of Bewley’s tea to inject alertness into a blustery grey day. Our destination was the Rock of Cashel, a remarkable cluster of medieval buildings erected on a 60m (200 foot) limestone outcrop with commanding views of the Tipperary plain. Long before...
Muckross Abbey I spent my last County Kerry day wandering the wet woods of Killarney. With so few people plodding the post-Christmas streets of the town, it was difficult to imagine just how packed Ireland’s first — and most popular — national park could be in the high season. The mountains were dressed in purple heather misted by passing rain. The interlinked Lakes of Killarney, each with its...
Dick Mack’s in Dingle We hadn’t been walking through Dingle very long when two girls with long curling tails passed me in the street. I was surprised by this, as you might imagine. But then I began to ponder the possibilities of growing up in a place where girlfriends had tails. I mean, if that’s how they do things in Dingle, who am I to complain? The wake of their perfume had barely...
Squalls sweep in from the Atlantic Eric Newby wrote that the “Dingle Peninsula contains within it one of the greatest concentrations of ancient remains in Ireland.” Much of this is located at its far end, where religious ascetics shivered their way to salvation in damp stone huts whose sparseness must have accelerated their journey to the afterlife. That’s where we headed on Boxing Day — Dingle...