My Traveling Companions two Flying Horses August 14, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Air Tickets, Airlines, Beirut, England, Europe, Hotels, India, Museum, Rail Pass, Sightseeing, Tour, Trails, Trip , 3commentsWhenever I’ve been asked to take a sponsored parachute jump I’ve declined, giving the excuse ‘fear of flying’. Of free will I chose to fly to India, taking as my travelling companions a stallion and two mares, in the back of a decrepit Boeing 707 on its third time round the clock. The interior was like a dingier station on the Northern Line, complete with peeling, dripping walls. Outside, the Flying Carrot, as this airline’s cargo planes are affectionately known to the handlers at Heathrow, has peeling orange and green livery. She’ll be all right when she’s finished, said one. Finished what? (more…)
A Fair Show, happy Travelers Diaries July 6, 2008
Posted by dodo in : Accommodation, Aquarium, Cars, Cash, China, Destination, Dolphinarium, Ireland, Library, Museum, Restaurant, Round The World, Tour , 3commentsThrough Leinster and Munster, along Connaught lanes and highways there’s a movement. Brazenly on verges, tucked behind hedges, parked in laybys there are caravans. Not tourists but the homes of the Irish Travellers, the Tinkers. Herds of their horses hold up the traffic. Greys, chestnuts, roans, bays and the especial pride, the batty mares: great coloured, patched horses, piebald and skewbald, hooves swathed in shaggy hair. They’re all heading along roads which lead to the nub, the October fair, Ballinasloe. A convergence for horses and horsemanship, dealing and drinking, exchanging news and the “crack”. “You’ll never see as many horses together as you will at Ballinasloe. Once Seamus McGinty rode down the high street at the head of sixty, his sons as outriders flanking their wealth.” (more…)
