New goal in life: Ulysses

Since the weather was absolutely beautiful today, I decided to take the DART south to Sandycove and enjoy a walk along the beach and pay a visit to the James Joyce Tower. I even walked into town from my home; the weather was simply THAT nice.
The DART is a sweet little commuter train that drives up and down the coast of county Dublin and makes stops in even sweeter little towns along the shoreline. Sandycove is one of these little towns and lies about 30 minutes south of Dublin. It's two famous features are the Forty Foot Pool and the Martello tower which actually lies next to it, so that's very convenient. This photo shows the Martello tower as seen from the boulevard.


According to my travelguide, the Forty Foot Pool originally was a place where men could bathe in the sea naked. Nowadays, everybody is welcome unless they're naked. Times have changed. Apparently people actually go swimming here all year round and today was no exception. Although I obviously did not dare to stick my feet in the water myself, there were a few braver ones that did decide to take a dip in the ocean.
My next stop was the Martello Tower, which hosts a small museum dedicated to the Irish writer James Joyce. The reason for this is that the opening scene of his famous novel Ulysses is set in this tower. Around 28 of these towers were built along the coastline between Dublin and Bray (further south than Sandycove) to serve as a defense line in case Napoleon would try to invade the country. I don't know how many of these are still there, but Sandycove sure has the most famous one. Here's the view from the Martello tower. These were the brave people who went swimming in Forty Foot Pool.


Apparently, if Dublin should burn to the ground you would be able to rebuild it with Ulysses as your source. In the book, Leopold Bloom and his fellow-characters are followed on their activities and their ways across the city of Dublin. So, my new goal in life this year is to actually read Ulysses (I have tried before, but never succeeded) and try to sort of retrace the steps of the characters in the book. I figured this would be a great way to get to know the city. I will ofcourse keep you all posted and hope to be finished by Bloomsday on June 16th, the day that all the events in Ulysses take place (yes, a 900+ page book about just one day).
My second new goal in life is to have coffee with Bono, but I'm afraid I will have to be realistic about that not being very likely to happen....