Day Twenty-Three - 3/10/2012 - Cork

     Headed over to the English Market today.  As I wandered the stalls, I began acquiring bags filled with various provisions: some gourmet sausages, smoked chili salmon, and a hazelnut loaf, which has whole hazelnuts baked into it (and incidentally, is delicious).  Meng and I tried some chocolate hazelnut and mint chocolate chip gelato.  Meng also got a peanut butter macaroon, but much to her disappointment, they were not light and fluffy as she had expected.
     Immediately outside the English Market, we ran into a speed dragster painted light blue parked on the sidewalk with no apparent explanation.  The license plate read "342 MPH", perhaps an indication of its top speed.
     We crossed the street to pass under the double stone arches forming the entrance to Bishop Lucey Park.  The park was opened in 1985, having previously been part of the Corn Market on Anglesea Street, built around 1860.  This was part of Cork 800, a collection of events marking the 800th anniversary of Cork as a city.  Immediately upon entering the park, there is a rectangular depression that sometimes fills with water (it was dry on the day we visited).  The stones that make up this rectangular pool are a part of the original city wall, probably completed by the Normans in the early thirteenth century.  The portion visible today is a part of the rebuilding project that took place in the early seventeenth century.  Archaeologists excavated timber used as part of a fence in the present day park, and have dated the wood to sometime between 1115 and 1122, almost certain evidence that Norse city-dwellers had been living there.  Walking further into the park, past the lawns, trees, and many benches inhabited by Corkonians, I came upon a statue entitled "The Onion Seller".  An image of a woman wrapped in simple garments and holding onions, she serves as a tribute to the merchants of Cork, a mark of the many stores and shops in the surrounding city blocks.  Behind the Onion Seller was a fountain, made of black stone, featuring swans, water falling off of their glistening necks and into the basin below.  It had been raining the whole day, but only as I was standing under a tree, dutifully shielding my camera lens, did I realize that while it was raining on my left side, it was in fact, not raining on my right side nor behind me.  The boundary between rain and not rain was readily visible as I stood in amazement.  Meng was not so impressed, having witnessed the phenomenon before.
     After dropping off the English Market goods, we headed out to Dunnes Stores to get a water filter.  I have found it exceedingly difficult to find water filters here, and Dunnes had not only 1 model, but 1 unit in stock.  The days of dehydration are over.
     For dinner, we returned to Pope's Quay for the Bierhalle.  The place is mostly restaurant with an extensive list of beers available from Germany, Belgium, and the Netherlands.  Wednesday is 5 Euro burger night.  I tried an Erdinger Weiss from Germany.  It is an unfiltered wheat beer, lending it a more full-bodied, sweeter taste than its filtered cousins.  This place is quickly becoming dangerous for my wallet.