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Cork Traveler
Sonia at Glen River parkrun
December 14, 2019 in Ireland ⋅ 🌬 5 °C
This morning I volunteered to do barcode scanning at Glen River parkrun. They are, as expected, a very friendly bunch. John, who seems to run the whole show, is particularly smiley and friendly. He told me that he puts his camera out on a tripod on the course every week and that it takes photos every two seconds. He then goes through thousands of photos to pick out the good ones. Now that’s dedication! My fellow barcode scanner, Donal, also seems quite dedicated. When I arrived, he asked me if I was related to the Fiona Shine from Crusaders that sometimes does the run!
The real highlight of the morning, however, was an unexpected visit from Sonia O’Sullivan. It created such excitement and, as usual, she was more than happy to pose for photos with anyone who asked. News of her appearance even made it onto a local news website!Read more
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Cork Traveler
Christmas shopping
December 13, 2019 in Ireland ⋅ ☀️ 7 °C
There is a shop on Bridge Street where you can buy all the necessary bits and pieces to make your own hat! 😍 I have it in my head now to somehow get invited to an occasion that needs a hat and then have a hat making party beforehand - whether than actually happens or not, we’ll see!

I also found another amazing shop called Mother Jones Flea market - a real Aladdins Cave of all sorts of random stuff! If you were making a film, it would be the perfect place to find costumes!

Later that evening, we had our work Christmas party. Eight of us had dinner in The Cornmarket and this was followed by a drink in each of The Roundy, Dwyers, Edison and Barbarossa. It wasn’t meant to be a pub crawl, but for some reason we kept moving on every so often! The only problem with that is that people went home in between each pub. By 1am, it was just me, Claire and May drinking cocktails with the CEO from the Dublin office in Edison cocktail bar! I don’t think a cocktail bar would have been his exact bar of choice! Claire was getting a flight to Sardinia the next morning, so at the end of the night I walked her to the 3am aircoach and I got a taxi home. I don’t know how she did that trip!! I’ve definitely taken it for granted how close I’ve always lived to Dublin airport.

I’m finished work for three weeks now, so the festivities can begin properly, and my students finally get their long-awaited trips home to feel some warm weather again! Hopefully that might stop them complaining about the cold for at least a few days in January! Presumably they’ll still be wrestling the dimplex heater off each other though.Read more
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Exam corrections!
December 12, 2019 in Ireland ⋅ ⛅ 8 °C
I started today with a forty minute run along the road out towards Blarney, then up to Hollyhill and then two laps of St Mary’s Health Complex grounds to finish. Usually there’s a few walkers out in the trail in St Mary’s, but I had the place to myself today. I like finishing my run there because it’s only 1 minute to my door from there, and it’s the only way to avoid several minutes of uphill at the end of my run!

After that, my plan for the day was to get my chemistry exam corrections done. Except for one trip out to a mad busy Wilton Tesco, I spent the entire day correcting and writing reports, and I was finally done by about 6pm! Hurray! One person got 7%, one person got 99% and everyone else was somewhere in between. That’s quite some spread!Read more
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Cork Traveler
Cafe Mexicana
December 11, 2019 in Ireland ⋅ ☀️ 6 °C
Today started off with me invigilating the chemistry exam at college. I must have been asked about fifty questions during the exam, almost all of which were aiming to get me to give away the correct answer! After that, we had a staff meeting and I had my one-to-one feedback session with my manager, following my lesson observation in November. She didn’t have much to say, except to ask if I would deliver a CPD session in January to share some of my resources and activities with the other teachers! I’m the only staff member with a formal teaching qualification, so my manager is keen that I share some ideas on structuring lessons etc with the others. It’ll be extra work for me, but it’s good to get this positive feedback too!
That evening, me and Peter decided to go for dinner. We wandered down to the Paul Street area of the city, which has loads of restaurants of every different type. We ended up in Cafe Mexicana, which is a very cute, small Mexican restaurant. The food was lovely!
Afterwards, we joined some people from the UCC chemistry department for a drink in Electric. Here I met a woman from the department for the first time, and she seems to be the definition of a Cork person with a chip on their shoulder! Her first sentence to me was “how are you finding Cork, given that all you Dublin people don’t like us at all and are of the opinion that we think we’re full of ourselves?” This was followed up with something along the lines of “so, have you found it hard settling in, when Cork people all think they’re better than Dublin people?” My general response was that I hadn’t really come across that at all and that we’ve been getting on great. What else could you say?! This woman, who is older than me, later announced to us all that she’d never lived anywhere outside of Cork city in her life. Not the most surprising revelation ever! 😆Read more
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Cork Traveler
Mad training in the rain!
November 18, 2019 in Ireland ⋅ ⛅ 8 °C
I think all sense has left me! Last Friday, at Finbarrs, Marie suggested that I try out Monday evening training, and I agreed. High vis gear is compulsory on Monday nights, so I donned my oversize high vis and my flashing shoe light, that I got from the VHI, and I joined about 25 other people in high vis at the end of Mardyke Lane. During the announcements at the start, new people got a clap. I also got a clap, not for being a new person, but for being new to Monday night training! Haha!
We then headed off for four miles around Cork city, at a decent enough pace. All the high vis must have been quite the sight, because we were beeped by lots of cars! Our run ended at the bottom of a long hill near the track, and we finished the evening with four hill reps, about 100m long each. Dan, the coach, kept telling us to move out of the way of cars “because it’s all consultants that live up here and they’ll kick us off their private road if we annoy them!”
I walked home, in the dark, up Strawberry Hill. By the time I made it in the door, I think I was a bit in shock from the 80 minutes of mad running we’d just done, especially after my 80 minute long run yesterday!
And, as if that wasn’t enough, I followed it all up with training again on Wednesday night (having done absolutely nothing on Tuesday)! The rain on Wednesday was torrential, and I had to jog to training in ankle deep flood water! Because of the monsoon-like conditions, the session had been changed from 800m reps to a 20 minute tempo with Indian file sprints. Again, the pace was a bit mad, but me and Marie clung on to the back because having to run in your own in that weather would have been terrible. At least, with the Indian file drill, you get to the front every so often and can slow the pace briefly! Haha!
I’m not sure I’ve ever done so much running before. I’m loving it, and it’s great motivation that me and Marie have an ongoing agreement to show up every week, so that we each have someone to run with! However, it’s probably also just as well that I’m heading away for the week now and having an enforced break from training!Read more
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Cork Traveler
Margo and John come to visit
November 16, 2019 in Ireland ⋅ ⛅ 6 °C
Peters parents came to visit us this weekend and, while his Dad has been here before, it was his Mum’s first trip down in the three years that Peter has been living here! It was also only her second visit to Cork ever.

The days are short at the moment, as it gets dark early. As a result we put off our original plans to visit Gougane Barra or Spike Island, and instead we went on a few nice walks.

On Saturday we all headed down Strawberry Hill for a walk along the river Lee, and we walked as far as we could go, right to the end of the corn field. Then it was home to get takeaway and watch Leinster in the rugby.

On Sunday, we parked at Blackrock Castle to do the greenway loop out there. Peter and his parents walked the full loop, and I did an 80 minute run while they did this. After this, we had food in the Turners Cross Tavern before dropping Margo and John to the train station. A nice, relaxing weekend!

There are some lovely Autumn photo opportunities out there at the moment too!Read more
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Cork Traveler
Glen River Parkrun
November 16, 2019 in Ireland ⋅ ⛅ 2 °C
It was cold and frosty out this morning, but it ended up being perfect running conditions down at Glen River parkrun. I met Mairead just before the start and the two of us ran together and had a nice catch up. She’s heading back to Dublin tonight before running in the first Meet & Train race of the season tomorrow, while I’m staying put for the weekend.

She told me that she’s mad jealous of all the parkrun tourism that me and Mum have been doing, so I said I’d keep her in the loop for future travels, and we’ve also agreed to do a few more Cork races together hopefully.

I headed straight home after the run as Peters parents are staying with us for the weekend. Not sure what our plans are yet!Read more
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Cork Traveler
Tuesday in chemistry class
November 12, 2019 in Ireland ⋅ 🌙 5 °C
“Hello teacher! Have some traditional South Korean food!”

“Thank you Joel! Where did you get it?!”

“In the Asian supermarket Ms. Lisa!”
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Cork Traveler
Science Week in Cork
November 11, 2019 in Ireland ⋅ ⛅ 7 °C
It’s science week and there’s lots on in Cork! We decided to go to an event on climate change this evening in UCC. The lecture hall was packed out and the event operated as a panel discussion, where people could submit their questions online and they would appear on the big screen.

It was really interesting, and gave me lots to think about. What struck me most though was the type of questions being asked. Several people had questions about how agriculture and farming will be affected by global warming, or about how people in rural communities might reduce their reliance on cars if there’s no public transport available to them. I find myself generally hearing more discussion about farming and rural life since moving to Cork, and I like it, as it gets me thinking about things outside my regular bubble! A lot of people here work in the city but live rurally, so you can’t help hearing about things that affect people living in the countryside. Sure we’re nearly in the countryside ourselves - a ten minute jog and I’m surrounded by fields as far as the eye can see!

Speaking of where we live, it’s just as well that we’re on one of the highest hills in the city. There was much discussion this evening about flooding in Cork as a result of sea level rises, and how difficult that will be to deal with, given that the city was built in a marshy valley. At one stage someone suggested that the only solution might be for everyone in Cork to move to Dublin!Read more
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Cork Traveler
Long run at the Marina
November 10, 2019 in Ireland ⋅ ⛅ 6 °C
The best (and pretty much only!) place in Cork city to do a long run is at the Marina. It’s nice at any time of year, but I really enjoyed the sunshine and the Autumn colours today. I was tired after yesterday’s race, so I put my earphones in and didn’t think about pace at all for 90 minutes. I did the usual loop in the opposite direction for a change too, heading out along the old railway line as back by the coast.

After the run, me and Peter decided what to do with the rest of our Sunday. We were both tired, so the main activity for the day was shopping in Wilton Tesco, followed by several episodes of The Handmaids Tale. And, to be honest, this was just fine by me!Read more
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Cork Traveler
Eyeries 5 mile
November 9, 2019 in Ireland ⋅ ⛅ 9 °C
Today I travelled out to Eyeries in West Cork for my first race with my adopted club, St. Finbarrs. It’s such a gorgeous part of the country and I was delighted to stop off in Castletownbere on route for a quick view of Bere Island again!
The race itself was very hilly, but I was able to push myself more than I have in a long time. After a sprint finish with a new F35 rival from East Cork, I ended up finishing 7th female. I also won a prize for 2nd F35, missing out on 1st by only two seconds! The prize is a voucher for glamping in Eyeries glamping pods, so I’ll be back to Eyeries again soon!
It was lovely to join about thirty runners from the ‘Barrs at this race, and it was motivating trying to catch people that I know are about my standard in training. At one point I was even able to tag on to the coach and his daughter for a little while as they jogged past during the race. They were chatting a bit but I could only manage single word answers!
After tea and sandwiches in the community hall after the race, takeaway at home and a few episodes of the Handmaids Tale was the perfect way to spend the evening!Read more
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Trip start
November 1, 2019