Day 1

June 1

A statue near the top of Slieve Patrick

The group is split into four houses named for important figures in Irish religious history: Patrick, the British-born cleric who brought Christianity to Pagan Ireland, Brigid, the female saint and disciple of Patrick who continued further down into Dublin, Collumcill, another saint and Patrickian disciple, and Malachy, the first bishop of Down. I’m on the latter and largest team, Malachy. This seemed fortuitous to me, as the name Malachy comes from the Hebrew root, “melech,” or king, which I think means my team will win.

House of Malachy is also in the nicest accommodations by far, the Marine Villa in Newcastle, a five bedroom vacation home with a view of the Irish sea, a four poster bed in my bedroom, and my personal favorite feature, an enormous freestanding tub. It felt amazing to go to bed that first night after such a long day of travel, and I ended up sleeping for a little over 11 hours.

The tub at Marine Villa

The first day we got up to bus to Skiffie fest, a “friendly” rowing competition on traditional Irish boats called St Ayles Skiffs. When we got there, the rowers proudly told us that they built the boats themselves from kits ordered online, “a bit like Ikea.” Two of the Young Ambassadors (YA), Connor and Teaghan, had rowed before and got invited down to watch from the docks. When Connor told them he rowed on a skull, they laughed and told him this was "real rowing."

There were a number of rowing clubs there, but none could hold a candle to Dundrum Coastal Rowing club, who were three time Skiffie world champions and “unbeatable” as far as the rest were concerned. We were too high up on the side of the grass to really track the races in the water below, but there was a lovely sense of camaraderie in the air whenever a team came back out of the water. People applauded and clapped each other on the back. We also learned about the different age leagues, numbering up to 250+, in which the combined age of the rowers had to equal to greater than the assigned number. For the 250+ league, the rowers had to be at least in their 70s, and most were even in their 80s and 90s.

One of the ladies from the Killyleagh rowing club’s 250+ division told us that it was a marvelous sport because it exercises your whole body and yet you can continue into your old age because “really you’re just sitting on your arse.” That gave us a good laugh; maybe when I turn 70 I’ll take up rowing, but probably not before.

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After Skiffie Fest, we bussed to an outdoor mass in Saul, on top of the mountain Slieve Patrick. It’s one of the only outdoor masses in the whole world, and it was astonishing to watch women as old as my Bubbie make their way up the steep grassy hill in black heeled shoes.

I have been to many religious services before in my life (Sikh, Presbyterian, Greek Orthodox, Muslim, Hindu, and Jewish of course, plus two Roman Catholic masses), but never one outdoors like this. There was something uniquely moving about the experience being situated in nature like that.

The bishop was visiting, and as he spoke, the wind in the trees seemed to accentuate his pauses. When people dropped to their knees to pray, they spread jackets on the ground, or just knelt directly on the grass. And perhaps most miraculous of all, the sun held through the entire service, even though it seems to rain here 90% of the time.

Meeting the Bishop of Down and Connor, Alan McGuckian

After the service, we walked up the rest of the Slieve to the Saul Memorial Saint Patrick statue. Dr. Tim explained that Saint Patrick is a unifying emblem in Ireland: having lived and died before the Reformation, Patrick was neither Catholic nor Protestant, and thus can be embraced by both communities. The statue at Saul itself attempts to reflect this unity. “The figure is carved with the robes of the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Armagh, the Primate of all Ireland and was given the face of the Protestant Bishop of Dublin as a way of bringing all Christians together to celebrate Patrick’s legacy.” (St. Patrick Centre website.)

It then started to rain, so we hurried down the mountain and ended the day by completing the Peace Maze at Castlewellan, an enormous yew tree hedge maze representing the Northern Irish peace process. The maze was much harder than we thought it’d be, but finally with the help of a group of kids, we made it to the bridge at the center.