Kim Batchelor

Writer of magical realism and other imaginative fiction

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Jul 21 2016

Chiloé

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Emerging in the early morning fog, a woman in a dress made of blue-green algae rises from the water off Chiloé. She steps on the shore, her skin perfumed by the sea, her golden hair churning like sea foam. She turns toward the waters from where she came, begins a ritual dance and combs through her hair. Her actions bless the sea life in the waters from which she emerged. The fishing that day will be bountiful.

If she had turned toward the shore, the catch would have been more meager.

The woman is La Pincoya, a Chilote—native to the archipelago of Chiloé—goddess of the sea. Some call her a sea sprite. Another of La Pincoya’s tasks is to transport with great tenderness those on the island who pass away. She carries them to the mystical ship the Caleuche where they begin a new life of eternal happiness.

To reach Chiloé, travelers can choose a 14-hour bus trip from Chile’s capital of Santiago, or take a less than two-hour flight from Santiago directly to Castro, a town located on the Grand Island of Chiloe, the largest in the archipelago. Another option is to fly to Puerto Montt, close to Chile’s lakes region, and drive to Pargua to a ferry that transports them and vehicle to Ancud, Chiloe’s northernmost city. Seals often accompany the ferry on its relatively short 30-minute voyage. Once in Chiloé visitors find brightly colored houses on stilts called palafitos, and in various location 16 wooden churches that are considered UNESCO world heritage sites. I saw images of the ship and other Chilote myths on the walls of a church there. The northernmost island is home to Chiloé National Park, an ecotourism site.

File0002 - CopyBecause of its uniqueness and how the mythical appears in unexpected ways throughout Chiloé, I have often thought of setting a novel there. In the novel, Chiloé is the place where a woman goes to start her life again four years after a tragedy that kept her from completing her doctoral dissertation about the island’s myths. She meets a man—Chilean but also an outsider to Chilote culture—who lost his younger brother in the country’s past political upheaval. Recently, the waters off Chiloe, a community dependent on fishing, were poisoned by a serious algae bloom that threatened its main source of income, its very survival. Sea life of all kinds washed ashore, poisoned by the algae. That tragedy also has a place in the narrative.

In this novel, I want to reflect on how people recover from tremendous loss and how mystery works in the background of their lives. Chiloe, with its myth and unique scenery seems the perfect location to explore the fragility of life. I have to admit that most of all, I want an excuse, though I don’t really need one, to return to a place that fascinated me from the first time I visited there more than a decade ago and one time since. I plan to go back next year. The novel is only one reason why.

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Written by Kim · Categorized: Fantasy, Magical realism, Myth, Novels, Travel · Tagged: Chile, Chiloe, Folklore, La Pencoya

Jun 23 2016

The Otherworld in Killarney National Park

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When I used to imagine Ireland, I had two visions. One was of rolling green hills filled with cows and sheep. Another was of a more mystical place, a land of forests that held secrets amidst the foliage lining paths that weave through the trees.

The rolling green hills of the first vision were prominent as we drove across western Ireland last May, carefully navigating the curving roads. Then, on an overcast day, we happened upon Tír na mBeo, the land of the living, the Otherworld of Irish mythology. Or maybe the luminescent leaves of trees and strands of sunlight through the upper branches of a small ringed forest were just the boundaries of that place known only in legend. Killarney National Park, a stunning gem adjoining the city of Killarney, seemed so different from the miles of green countryside that we’d passed on the way there.

I took photo after photo, but only a few came close to doing justice to the dreamlike spaces within the park. We opted to spend time there immersed in nature rather than joining the traffic on the nearby Ring of Kerry, a 180 or so km drive around the Kerry Peninsula. The hours we spent in the park, a large lake ringed with forest, following paths that threaded through the trees until we ultimately arrived at the Torc Falls, were some of the most memorable and visually stunning of the trip to Ireland.

I found the wood where my fictional character Lyric Doherty lives in a cottage with her father Michael and her brother Padraig. A voice in those woods calls her from sleep to alert her to small gifts that later link her to a lost loved one. I stood at the foot of the mountain where another character, Andrew Devlin, climbs in the evening, hoping to glimpse the sliver of sea that might link him to his mother who disappeared long before. Both characters populate the Mists of Na Crainn, ‘na crainn’ meaning ‘in the woods’ in Gaelic.

The book is still in revision for future publication, and I knew it would never be finished until I actually travelled to Ireland to see the country that inspired it for myself. No matter that the fictional Village Na Crainn is wholly a product of my imagination. Killarney National Park brought into full view the setting of the novel as a gift.

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Written by Kim · Categorized: Celtic, Forest, Ireland, Travel · Tagged: Killarney National Park, myth

May 22 2016

Driving Ireland: Twelve Tips

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Slea Head Drive outside Dingle, Ireland
Slea Head Drive outside Dingle, Ireland

When planning our recent trip to Ireland,  the one thing that concerned me most was how to get around. Should we take a bus? Limit ourselves to train travel? Or should we rent a car, as so many travel sites suggested?

When we made the decision to rent a car, that opened up a series of questions in my mind that no web site I ran across could adequately address. Actually, it boiled down to one question: what problems would we encounter driving in Ireland and how easily could we address those?

An on-line search helped identify some potential issues. Irish roads are narrow. Irish drivers drive on the left instead of the right. Cars for rent are generally manual transmissions as opposed to automatics. And I believe I saw mention of how fast Irish drivers drive.

My spouse did all the driving, I will confess up front, even though I’d intended to share in that responsibility. Instead, I took on the role of navigator and backup alert system. If you are assigned that role, remember these four things:

  • As you sit on the left side of the car, you will perceive foliage and walls to the left as being closer than they really are.
  • The tires will sometimes squeal against the curb on the left and occasionally said tires will go up over the curb verifying that your perception of their close proximity will be correct.
  • You will often, at least initially, find yourself attempting to reach for a phantom steering wheel and maybe even pressing your foot against a mythical clutch pedal.
  • No matter how hard you try, you will periodically scream out. Since you’re not really in the driver’s seat, feel free to self-medicate with a good craft beer or hard cider to take the edge off and reduce the urge to flail your arms and loudly express the view that you are about to die.

My spouse who did the driving offered the following perspective:

  • Driving on the left isn’t that hard to get used to, although turning into the correct lane, especially turning right, does take some getting used to and requires some thought at intersections.
  • A very experienced driver of a manual transmission may still have trouble operating the clutch and getting the transmission into the right gear. (This, by far, was his biggest challenge.) Foot pedals are where you’d expect them to be but the gear shift is on the left.
  • The passenger riding to the driver’s left is no help when he/she cries out in a panic. Except for the exceptions mentioned above the driver knows what he/she is doing.

In general, there are several other things I wished I’d known ahead of time:

  • The freeways are great and easy to navigate. We took two, one between Dublin and Cork and the second from Galway to Dublin, roads designated with an ‘M.’. After first driving a car in Ireland, getting on the freeway fairly quickly makes it easier to get used to driving on the left. The freeways are divided therefore preventing driving head-on into oncoming traffic. Once on the freeway, exit on the left and stay in the left lane if you would like to drive more slowly than traffic.
  • The speed limit on many roads, even many rural ones, is 100 kilometers an hour. The driver should always take into consideration that this is a ‘limit’ and not a ‘floor.’ Yes, Irish drivers drive very fast, even around blind curves, but they will pass you if you choose to drive more slowly.
  • Always look both ways before proceeding. Our one close call was near the center city of Galway when we inched forward through a gap in traffic only to encounter a speeding car in the lane beside the one where traffic had stopped. Fortunately, the driver was able to brake in time.
  • If you choose to take the ferry between Cork/Dingle and Killarney/Cliffs of Moher/Galway rather than going through Limerick, just remember
    The Ferry
    This ferry on the way from Dingle to the Cliffs of Moher/Galway in Ireland is an alternate to Limerick traffic

    that the ferry sails once an hour, and also that each ferry holds many more vehicles than you’d think. We’d overhead someone in the car line waiting for the next ferry say that only nine vehicles could get on the ferry. As far as I could tell, all the waiting cars made it on, including a large gasoline truck—many more than nine vehicles.

  • And some roads can be very narrow, especially off the main road. Outside Dingle on Slea Head Drive, which is little more than one lane, we encountered a beer truck coming the opposite direction. Except for that one encounter, though, making the lovely drive was the best few hours we spent in Ireland.
Killarney National Park, Ireland
Killarney National Park, Ireland

Although my spouse isn’t eager to drive again in Ireland, and we think we will be happy on a return trip to take a bus and use tour companies, our trip would have been much more restricted if we hadn’t hand the car. Having a car was useful when we visited Killarney National Park where we spent as much time as we wanted walking the paths and making our way to the Torc Falls, as well as having a decent lunch in the visitor center. As mentioned before, Slea Head Drive is beautiful and we had time to take in the different spots in the circuit at our own pace and according to our interests. The Blasket Islands Center was beautiful and fascinating. We spent time looking through the poignant famine cottages, and saw a museum or two and the ancient bee hive houses along the way.

If you plan to visit the Cliffs of Moher from Galway, you might have someone else do the driving. We drove that same route going to Galway and were happy to be on the side of the road away from the steep drop offs, having arrived at the cliffs coming from the south.

However you go, however you travel through it, don’t miss a trip to Ireland in all its green lusciousness and with its extremely friendly people, the friendliest I’ve ever encountered in my travels. Whether you drive yourself or let someone else do it for you, visiting the country will definitely be worth your while.

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Written by Kim · Categorized: Ireland, Travel

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