Maynooth

I took a detour on the way from the Wicklow Mountains to Belfast to visit Maynooth College, built in the mid-1800s to be the national seminary for Ireland.

I carefully wrote down directions from the hotel to Maynooth and from Maynooth to Belfast. I didn’t note where does the 11 a.m. tour start? South campus? North campus? And where to park? A bit of panic in Maynooth as I figured this out, but a friendly professor told me I could park for free in the faculty lot (on-street parking limited to an hour, which was a problem. No time for breakfast, another problem for me). Then he escorted us to the visitor centre across campus. The photo above is mom at the start of the tour. The tour guide told us today’s tour would be 30 minutes instead of 50 minutes because the chapel, the highlight of the tour, wasn’t open today. Whereupon I did my routine about my 86 year old mother traveling all the way from America to see the chapel. Whereupon she said she’d see what she could do. Here’s the chapel:

Here’s a sort of close up of the painted-board-by-board ceiling.

Want to get married in this chapel? The waiting list is seven years. The name of the chapel is College Chapel. Some of the money came from the British government (the Free State hadn’t been created yet), which meant two architects had to be appointed, one English, one Irish. The result was a Protestant-influenced design, with the congregation facing each other rather than the priest. Hence College Chapel, as opposed to a traditional church name.

Lovely alternating beeches.

We met an older man from Belfast, a musician, who was invited down to Maynooth for a memorial held for his sister, who was a leader in the Irish Church Music Association. He said he cried throughout the service as the members expressed their gratitude to her and their admiration for her. And sang their tributes to her. I can’t imagine how moving that would have been.
We finished the drive to Belfast in blazing heat--my car doesn’t have what I would describe as functioning air conditioning. Mom slept and I sweated.
Once in Belfast, we put together a picnic dinner hastily then drove into the city, where we got on a steam train--David’s birthday present. The train runs only a few times a year. On board is a jazz band that plays on the platforms.


I did a lot of dancing, mostly with two old men I’d never met before--two men whose wives were delighted to have them dance with someone else. Dancing with old guys is great--clear leads, very smooth. There was one young guy there who has been to Swing Belfast and I got in two dances with him--he’s a very good dancer, so that was fun.
And when I finally hit the sack, oh my word how tired I was.
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