Well, today was the last day on the island. We all had a fabulous time and spent way too much money (maybe enough to pull Ireland out of its bit of a recession). But all that aside, I wanted to give a quick summary of the week here.
Obviously, some of my fellow travelers were here to see the St. Paddy's (that's how they say it here) Day Parade. They had a blast watching people walk from all over the world.
When we arrived on Monday morning, our first stop was at The Bald Barista - a fabulous coffee shop. And yes, he actually is bald... and he has a tattoo on the back of his head that says "The Bald Barista." To each his own I suppose. We then walked around St. Stephen's Green, which was absolutely beautiful. Guinness Brewery was the next stop. Most of us opted out of the full pint of free Guinness, as we really couldn't handle its strong flavor. But, the city views from Gravity Bar were absolutely breathtaking. Later that night, we hopped onto a train to Howth, a small town on the coast. We hiked (I know you are finding it hard to believe I even went outside) up a large hill to see the rocky hillside coasts. We ate at a local pub, socializing with swanky locals.
On Tuesday, we toured the National Museum and the National Gallery, to give ourselves time to catch up on Ireland's history. We then proceeded to Christ Church Cathedral and St. Patrick's Cathedral to learn more about how religion has shaped the history of Ireland. At Christ Church, we were able to explore the crypt, which contained a mummified cat and rat - gross, I know. On Tuesday evening, I attended the Abbey Theater's production of King Lear. While I was quite tired, I was able to get into the play after the first fifteen minutes. Considering we were the fourth row from the stage, it may have been embarrassing if I had fallen asleep.
Wednesday morning - trip to Wicklow, the mountain country. We first rode to Malahide Castle, and while some members of the group thought the word Malahide reminded them of formaldyhyde, I can attest that it was nothing like that awful smell. The desserts served at Avoca were fabulous, and we ate those first. We brought our sandwiches on the bus - that was quite interesting. One classmate found a stick in his piece of bread... Yes, you did read that correctly, a stick. You thought you ordered a turkey sandwich.... Err, no, you really just ordered two slices of plain turkey. Moving on. The mountains were fabulous, and a friend and I were able to sport the ever famous UC pose in the middle of the Upper Lake at Glendalough. A ghost tour completed our Wednesday activities. While waiting in line to head to the most haunted place in Dublin, two young boys were creepliy lurking near our group. They then proceeded to throw rocks at us. These kids were certainly not the typical, super-friendly Dubliners we had met previously. The kids asked us if we were from America, and one of the my fellow travelers frankly replied saying, "No, we're from Canada, and we eat little f****** like you." Scared the living daylights out of them.
On Thursday, we went to Trinity College to tour the Book of Kells. We also visited the Long Room, which was a library containing over 200,000 books, many of which probably haven't been opened in the past 500 years. The stick-in-the-sandwich friend and I posed outside Trinity College doing another UC pose, and we're pretty sure the Trinity student thought we were the weirdest tourists ever. A few of us then went to Kilmainham Gaol, the prison that was used during the Easter Uprising of 1916. It was a fantastic, but also quite sad, tour. Our professor suggested we check out the old hospital right across the street from Kilmainham. On our way to the hospital, we passed an art museum, a building with a facade similar to Kilmainham, but we could not find this old hospital. We asked for directions, and we were sent up this giant hill... to the real-life, functioning hospital... yeah. We obviously got out of there as soon as we could, and took a bus back to Dublin City Center. We got on a bus, the 46A, which would take us to Dun Laoghaire (pronounced as Dun Leery). It literally took an hour and a half to get out to the harbour town, but we met some local school children along the way. They were hurling players, and stick-in-the-sandwich friend got a pretty sassy remark when he asked the one boy if he was a hurler. Yikes! Dun Laoghaire may be the coldest place in Ireland, and the wind whips right up off the ocean. The waves were so high, and the wind kept pushing us closer to the water. After a warm dinner, which we paid for in mostly coins (it was embarrassing, but my roommate needed to get rid of some change) we got on the train, which cut down our transportation time by over an hour. We then headed to see the Woman in Black at the Gaity Theater. It was.... interesting.
This morning, we went to Kildare, which is horse country. We were able to see the Irish National Stud Farm, a place to breed and train the next champion horses in the racing world. The facts and figures of operating such a place are ridiculous, but the horses were beautiful. We got to see a horse that was born yesterday. It was awesome! We took the scenic route back to the hotel, and ended the night with last-minute shopping activities and a group dinner - an interesting potato soup, salmon, and a variety of desserts. Gelato rounded out the evening, where we ran into some young guys from England. As soon as they dissed One Direction, we peaced out, leaving them behind in the dust.
Although it rains evey day in Ireland, there is nothing better than getting to experience the city, the beach, and green spaces all at once. This has been a trip I will never forget, filled with many great people and wonderfully hilarious stories.
Keep living your dream!
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