Finally Cork

Cork City is Ireland's second biggest city (a whopping 125,000-odd souls) and only about 2.5 hours from where we live. I had been meaning to go there for months--can one leave Ireland and not see Ireland's second biggest city?--and we finally made it on April 28th. We decided to go by bus, because it is free for Richard and companion as seniors, an adventure in and of itself.

Our first attempt was actually on April 27th. Buses run every hour and a half from Dunmore East and I thought that I had read that a bus would leave in sufficient time for us to catch the bus to Cork. Unfortunately, I read the wrong timetable--I read FROM Waterford TO Dunmore East instead of FROM Dunmore East TO Waterford. I have a lot of trouble reading timetables. 

So I watched our bus to Waterford go by as I was walking the dog. Sigh. As the bus journey is so long each way, that put paid to our trip on April 27th. The next day we were better prepared. The bus timetable said that the bus left at 7:50 and we were down at 7:45. No bus at 7:50, no bus at 7:55 and no bus at 8:00. I popped into our local grocery store and the lovely lady behind the cash register said "Oh, that bus goes early, it leaves at 7:40 for the school kids." Hmmm, so much for bus timetables. 

We looked at each other and said "Well the bus to Cork leaves Waterford station at 9:00, we could just drive the car there (usually a 20-minute drive) and park it on the Quay." So we hurried back up to the house and jumped in the car. Rush hour traffic meant we pulled into a parking spot at the Quay at 8:50. Fumbling to get a parking voucher used up another 5 minutes and then we quick marched our way to the station, arriving at 8:58. We got on the bus and asked the bus driver, "Are you the bus to Cork?" He answered "No, I am the DRIVER for the bus to Cork." Whatever, we were on and he departed at 8:59. Note to self: always arrive early for buses.

The bus ride to Cork was long. It stopped about 12 times and each time more people got on so that we were full by the time we got to Cork at 11:25. We disembarked and R. said "Well, where shall we go?" I had looked up the Top 10 Things To Do in Cork on TripAdvisor, discounted anything that was geared towards kids or involved driving, and came up with The Crawford Gallery.

 Housed in Cork's original Custom House built in 1924, the collection began in 1819 when the Cork Society of Arts received a collection of sculpture casts from the Vatican (see photo below.) It grew and grew and although it is not huge, the exhibitions are well chosen and very interesting. Richard, the art hound, gave his seal of approval and THAT is saying a lot! The Gallery charges no admission and has a lovely, small cafe on site that serves organic produce. It doesn't even sell diet sodas so I had a "Curiosity Cola" which actually was very good.

Hall of Sculptures, casts donated by Vatican Museums

Looking toward staircase to first floor. 

 The Gallery also houses a collection of Harry Clarke's work. Clarke is considered Ireland's greatest stained glass artist as well as being an amazing book illustrator. He lived from 1889-1931 and produced stained glass works that hang in Cork, Dublin and even Miami, Florida. He also illustrated an edition of Hans Christian Anderson's Fairy Tales. 

The above work, which is in the Wolfsonian Museum in Miami, is Clarke's representation of  works of famous Irish writers. I didn't take this photo but the stained glass was so magnificent I had to include it in my blog. 

For some reason this was my favorite painting--"Skellig Night on South Mall Cork, 1845" by James Beale. I thought the colors were so appropriate to the theme and, well, in "real life" it glowed. There were some very good portraits as well and if you visit the Caldwell Museum website you can see some of them.

After a very healthy organic lunch in the cafe, we left the art gallery and walked to St. Fin Barre's Cathedral.

 Cork is a lively city full of music, very attractive even on a gray Friday. It also has many churches. St. Fin Barre's is one of the largest, a COI Cathedral, begun in the mid 1860s and done in the Victorian style. Lonely Planet describes it as a mixture of medieval whimsy and French Gothic. The outside of it is truly magnificent as is the interior. I was especially drawn to the carvings of the maidens outside the Cathedral doors. Whom do they represent? The 10 Virgins in the New Testament parable? That was my guess and I was quite pleased when I got home and Google'd it to see that I was right!

And some photos of the magnificent interior:

My photos really don't do it justice at all. 

I took a photo of the ceiling in the nave. A little dizzying eh?

The stained glass tells the story of the Bible from Genesis, at the Cathedral entrance up to the New Testament near the altar. As well there were gilded plaques all along the wall memorializing various COI families in Cork that donated money for the stained glass. I took photos of many of the plaques and they have been posted on our genealogy website.

This mosaic floor was beautiful but difficult to photograph.

We realized that we had better get going for our 3:00 bus but when we arrived at the Cork Bus Station at 2:40 we found we had miscalculated--this was the Friday of a Bank Holiday weekend and students at Cork University were going home with bags of laundry. So were families. The line for the 3:00 bus snaked back from the platform into the terminal. We almost made it--would have if we had been one person. But, no, we were two so we had to wait another half hour for the next bus. Was glad that we had left our car in Waterford because if we HAD caught the Dunmore East bus as planned in the morning, we would have missed the last Dunmore East bus home at 6:00 and we would really have been stuck. So all's well that end's well.