How could I resist an indie music festival named after a food event? I couldn’t. My two passions, almost rolled into one. In a name anyway. Off I went after my trip to Paris to Stradbally, Laois in Ireland for Electric Picnic, the boutique music festival. I was really excited. I was going with some old friends I don’t see often enough to what promised to be one of the most fun festivals I had been to. Lots of bands I love – Clap your Hands Say Yeah, !!!, Iggy & the Stooges, Sonic Youth, Jarvis, the Good, the Bad & the Queen, My Brightest Diamond, the Go! Team, Ratatat… the list goes on and on. I was also assured of lots of late night dancing. Woohoo!
I landed in Dublin on Thursday afternoon rather shook after my late night return on the eurostar. I whizzed around camping shops (yes, sigh, camping) buying a sleeping bag, wellies (in Ireland it’s sure to rain) and other random essential bits and bobs. I was pleased to see the fruit sellers were still around, selling their fruit out of old prams. I stopped to take a photo when a teenage boy threw a grape out of my head (oh yes, I was home) to which I turned and pounced – “well, that was very funny boys, wasn’t it?!!”. Teacher mode! I have no idea where it came from and regretted it instantly as I was sure they would react negatively but, no, to my shock they denied it and pointed at their friend inside the shop door behind them, exclaiming – “it was him!”. They passed me about 10 minutes later further down the street and were eager to point him out again. So funny, I had to repress the laughter. So much so, that, in fact, it was very funny after all!
Once complete, I rested my weary legs and waited for some friends with a welcome latté & some soup, a nice big bowl of chunky irish vegetable soup. It was so soothing! Chunks of carrot, potato, celery & swede in a lovely stock. I miss it! It’s hard to find it like that in London, unless I make it myself of course. Shortly after this, the girls arrived and we headed to Fallon & Byrne’s wine cellar for some wine to rest our weary souls in. I had popped into Fallon & Byrne’s on a previous visit and was quite impressed with what I saw, a speciality supermarket & food hall, restaurant and wine bar in the cellar. We were all about the wine, the girls having just finished work and me, now three inches shorter, having carted my bags all over Dublin. I was so tired, I neglected to take photos, bar one of some paté and am now really annoyed with myself. For now, my words will have to do… It’s a nice big space, the supermarket is really airy with big windows and nice high ceilings, the downstairs wine bar was lined with shelves of wine bottles, an impressive selection, but was extremely busy and we had to wait to be seated. We ordered the house red and it was delicious, I will certainly go back to try more wine, eat lots of food and blog it here. A friend also had some very good paté, pic below. We had rather alot of wine that night and I am thankful that the nearby Japanese karaoke bar hadn’t any booths free at 1am!
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