Ireland was amazing! Well, let's be honest, I went for St. Patty's Day so of course it was going to be that way. We started out with a lot of traveling as cheap flights out of small London airports means the airport isn't actually in London. This time we flew out of Gatwick which is about a 1 1/2 hour bus ride away, flew to Dublin (only an hour!!) and then got on a 4 hour bus from Dublin to Galway. At the bus station there was this guy, I'm guessing he was quite drunk, trying to get a bus ticket to Dublin. Catch that? HE'S IN DUBLIN! The guy at the window was just laughing, and kept saying, you're in dublin and the guy would respond "yes, Dublin, I want a bus to Dublin." Finally his coworker got super angry and walked to the window and said "you want a bus to Dublin? We don't serve Dublin, get the hell out of here." I walked up to the window next and the guy just said "Welcome to Dublin."
Once we got into Galway we had a full Irish dinner, which meant lots of food. After that we just went to bed since we'd all had about 4 hours of sleep the night before because we decided that despite early travel plans we wanted to go out to a club. Always a good idea. The next morning Ben and I were the first ones up so we went, got bagels, and took a walk to the lighthouse. It was cloudy but so beautiful. We actually walked back later with Andreas and Dani (Dani also goes to Chapman and is studying in Glasgow). After that we walked into Galway, which is very quaint, it has a very small town feel. The nice thing about being in Galways versus Dublin was that, though there were a lot of travelers there, it was far less touristy than Dublin would have been and, as a result, far less expensive.
Later we met up with Dani and Andreas to purchase our St. Pattys Day shinanigans, ie hats, tattoos, and flags. We met these guys from Seattle as well who have been hitchhiking Europe for 3-5 months (depending on which one you talk to) and ran out of money so they started playing street music. They'd been in Galway a couple of days so they told us the good pubs to go to. Around 5 or 6 we ended up at the King's Head and spent the night there with Guinness and a local beer called the Galway Hooker, which I quite enjoyed. (hah) We met up with the hitchhikers there and hung out with them the rest of the night. We also met some Irish girls studying in Belfast who had never celebrated St. Patty's "in the city." Lots of new friends and fun that night. St. Patty's day morning Ben and I were again the early risers and went out for our big meal of the day. We all figured that we should get a fair amount of food in us before the parade so Ben got a huge Irish breakfast and I got a giant crepe and, since I couldn't decide, eggs on toast as well. I finished some of Ben's food so we were both absolutely stuffed. We met up with the lazers and watched them eat after that. The parade was from about 12:30 to 1:30 and it was fabulous. You could tell that it was a smaller town because it was really just little non-profit groups making up shakey dance moves and dressing up really silly but it was really entertaining. Oh right, and because I put a picture up I should explain that the stick-on tattoos should really be called lick-on tattoos because we had no water so we decided to use spit... genius, right?
Here is our ridiculous group photo from the parade. Ben, Chris, Traci (Chris's girlfriend currently studying in Spain), Dani, Andreas and I. We girls look fairly normal but those boys and their hats were ridiculous. I couldn't look at Chris without laughing.
After the parade we went to Taaffes Bar (James Joyce award for authenticity, legit!) for our first Guinness of St. Patty's day (see a pattern?) and basically spent all day and night bar hopping. Well, I suppose you could use that term loosely as we really spent the majority of our time in the King's Head again (well, Ben, Andreas and I did, we lost Dani, Chris and Traci half way through). At one point we were at an ATM machine and this guy behind us started talking about his girlfriend, who was with him and how "Nobody wears pajamas on a MOONday unless they have downs syndrome, nobody loves her because of her pajamas so I have to love her," the ridiculousness of this entire conversation was hilarious. We did a lot of running back and forth to the grocery store to buy ciders for cheap rather than spending money on it in the pubs. This caused Andreas and Ben both to go to bed at the striking hour of 9:30, I was then left to my devices with the Irish girls from the previous day and we had a lovely evening.
Here is our ridiculous group photo from the parade. Ben, Chris, Traci (Chris's girlfriend currently studying in Spain), Dani, Andreas and I. We girls look fairly normal but those boys and their hats were ridiculous. I couldn't look at Chris without laughing.
After the parade we went to Taaffes Bar (James Joyce award for authenticity, legit!) for our first Guinness of St. Patty's day (see a pattern?) and basically spent all day and night bar hopping. Well, I suppose you could use that term loosely as we really spent the majority of our time in the King's Head again (well, Ben, Andreas and I did, we lost Dani, Chris and Traci half way through). At one point we were at an ATM machine and this guy behind us started talking about his girlfriend, who was with him and how "Nobody wears pajamas on a MOONday unless they have downs syndrome, nobody loves her because of her pajamas so I have to love her," the ridiculousness of this entire conversation was hilarious. We did a lot of running back and forth to the grocery store to buy ciders for cheap rather than spending money on it in the pubs. This caused Andreas and Ben both to go to bed at the striking hour of 9:30, I was then left to my devices with the Irish girls from the previous day and we had a lovely evening. The bus ride back to Dublin the next day was absolutely stunning. The Irish countryside is so beautiful, rolling grass fields, a lot of livestock and small hilly areas, plus it was a gorgeous day out!
Once we checked into our hostel (which, unlike the first hostel, actually had locks on the doors, safety first!) we basically headed straight out to the one site we decided we were going to see... the Guinness Factory. We waited about an hour to get in and went through a really neat self guided tour, making our way to the Gravity Bar on the 7th floor where you get a free pint and a beautiful view. This picture of Ben, Andreas and I doesn't really do the view justice but it was (save for the elevator) a 360 degree view of Dublin. It was so wonderful to hang out up there for a bit. Later we walked around Temple Bar, which is basically the night life area and had some great Indian food and gelato.
Ben and I went roaming around the city the next morning before we caught the bus back to the airport and got very lost (thanks Ben) despite Ben having a map and ended up seeing a lot as a result. We saw the House of Lords, Trinity College, the Church of Ireland and a very nice little park. We finally ended up at the James Joyce Center, our original destination, to find out that you had to pay to get in (I had, at this point, exactly €2 in my pocket for the bus and refused to take out more money), you had to pay to get into the Writer's Museum as well so we ended up in Tower Records reading until bus time. Now I'm home and, once again, I have a bit of a cold... stupid immune system hates me! But at least I'm on spring break now and don't have any travel plans for a whole 10 days, so I'm guessing I'll be fine by then and ready for the Loire Valley!
Once we checked into our hostel (which, unlike the first hostel, actually had locks on the doors, safety first!) we basically headed straight out to the one site we decided we were going to see... the Guinness Factory. We waited about an hour to get in and went through a really neat self guided tour, making our way to the Gravity Bar on the 7th floor where you get a free pint and a beautiful view. This picture of Ben, Andreas and I doesn't really do the view justice but it was (save for the elevator) a 360 degree view of Dublin. It was so wonderful to hang out up there for a bit. Later we walked around Temple Bar, which is basically the night life area and had some great Indian food and gelato. 
Ben and I went roaming around the city the next morning before we caught the bus back to the airport and got very lost (thanks Ben) despite Ben having a map and ended up seeing a lot as a result. We saw the House of Lords, Trinity College, the Church of Ireland and a very nice little park. We finally ended up at the James Joyce Center, our original destination, to find out that you had to pay to get in (I had, at this point, exactly €2 in my pocket for the bus and refused to take out more money), you had to pay to get into the Writer's Museum as well so we ended up in Tower Records reading until bus time. Now I'm home and, once again, I have a bit of a cold... stupid immune system hates me! But at least I'm on spring break now and don't have any travel plans for a whole 10 days, so I'm guessing I'll be fine by then and ready for the Loire Valley!
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