Weekend in Ireland

The past week I spent writing a paper so that I could have it finished by the time me and two other girls, Olivia and Hillary, went to Ireland. On Wednesday I got an email from ISH saying that I had a "parcel" to pick up from the front desk. I got a lovely package from my parents with goodies in it! That made my Valentine's Day.

On Friday our train left London Euston Station at 9:10. Everything was going smoothly until a family with two annoying kids came on and they just happened to pick seats around where we sat. Needless to say I then listened to my iPod to help drown them out. Our train had many stops along the 3 hour journey to Holyhead in Wales to catch a ferry over to Dublin Port. I wasn't expecting the ferry to be huge and cruise-ship like, but it was. The ride on the ferry took about 3 hours to get to Dublin. Those 3 hours went by very slowly, but the ride was smooth. Once we got off the ship we were confused as to how to get out of the port and Olivia and Hillary thought we would be able to walk to where our hostel was, but I didn't think so, so we took a taxi instead. Good thing we did because it was confusing to get out of the port by car, so by foot it would've been a million times worse. We checked into Isaac's Hostel in Dublin and the staff was super friendly. After receiving our keys we walked down some road to find a place to eat supper, since by this time it was around 6:30pm. We couldn't find somewhere that looked interesting and wasn't super expensive so we made our way back to the hostel to ask the guys at the front desk. The hostel entrance was in an alley way and there was a restaurant just down the alley a bit so we checked that out, and it looked like a nice place so we went to eat there. Our waiter was super friendly and it was more like American waiter service. He checked on us a couple times to make sure everything was alright and was just an all around nice waiter, unlike the ones I've encountered so far in London. After eating we went to go find the Hard Rock Cafe so I could get my dad a shot glass to add to his collection. I was looking at the map the wrong way at an intersection and some guy had overheard us and he asked us if we needed help. He steered us into the right direction and was super nice about it. Check number 3 for being nicer than Londoners. We walked down Fleet Street where Hard Rock Cafe was and I accomplished my mission of getting the shot glass. We decided to call it a night around 9:30 and went to our room and fell asleep around 10:30.

Saturday, we woke up at 5:45 so we could get ready and find our destination to hop on a bus that would take us on our day trip to the Cliffs of Moher. The bus ride was uneventful and I took a nap. We reached Galway and we had to switch  bus drivers so that we had a driver who was also our tour guide. We made many stops along the way to the Cliffs of Moher that I can't even remember what we all saw. They have circles of trees and a thorn type bush in the middle of the circle, and that is legend that it is where fairies are. We stopped at one circle and we walked the heavily rooted path around it. We were basically going up a mountain type land form the entire time for this tour with bumpy roads. There was multiple times that I didn't feel well and got headaches because of motion sickness. We saw many burial mounds. We saw a castle, many sheep, and many many many rocks and stones since this mountain was like made with them. There were different areas of land with cattle grazing. Once our tour guide stopped the bus by some and one of the cows pooped and nearly everyone on the bus was like "Ewwwwww!" I had to roll my eyes. It's like they never saw a cow or any other animal poop before. After what seemed like forever we stopped at a pub in Doolin, Ireland. They served our food super fast because I think that's where every tour bus with this company stops for lunch. There was at least 2 coach buses of us there, and we were out within like 45 minutes. After lunch we continued to drive up this mountain thing. Finally we made it to the Cliffs of Moher. It was super windy which made it colder, but the views of the cliffs were amazing! Saturday was a clear day in Ireland too, so we could see the cliffs perfectly. We got back to Dublin around 9pm that night. It was a super long day so we just went to the basement of our hostel to use the wi-fi and then headed upstairs to our rooms to sleep.

Sunday we "slept in" and got up at 8:30. We ate breakfast in the lobby of the hostel and then checked out. We walked our way to the Guinness Distillery to take a tour of it. It was really neat inside of it, and it took us a little more than an hour to get through the self guided tour. I was sad that we didn't actually get to see any factory work being done. It was like all videos and stuff, but it was still cool. I watched a video on how they make barrels it was interesting. After the tour we could go up to the 7th floor and get a complimentary pint of Guinness beer. I opted out since I don't like beer. We left there and we found the Jameson Distillery, but since it was around 11:30 at that time we didn't have time to tour it. We stopped at the gift shop though and got some little souvenirs. After that we walked to a bus station to catch a bus that would take us to the port to catch our ferry back to Holyhead. The ferry we were on today was different and not as nice as the one we took over to Dublin. This ride was only 2 hours, whereas to Dublin it was 3. So I found that odd. The sea was rough on our way back and the whole time it was constant rocking back and forth. I pretty much just ate my chicken caeser wrap and then put my head down and rested my eyes for the 2 hours. I didn't feel motion sick at all I think because of the fact I had my head down and wasn't seeing the boat move. We caught a train and we had to switch trains when we got to Crewe. Those 2 hours on the first train took forever. I felt like we would never get back. Finally our second train back to London Euston arrived and we were on the home stretch of our trip. The second train was another 2 hours but this time it went by a little bit faster. Once we got into London we booked it back to MTH. The first thing I did when I got back was shower, and it felt so good. I will add pictures of my trip to Ireland within the next couple days!