Precisely 9 days ago I was arriving in the lovely Ireland town of Galway, after a long day of sitting on trains, planes, and buses, excited to finally be back in a place where people spoke English! I had been wanting to go to Ireland since I could remember (and not just because of Gerard Butler!) and could not believe I was finally there.
Minor segway>>I've started doing this thing in my head whenever I arrive at a new destination where I visualize the world map on my head and thing about where I grew up, where I'm currently living, and where I am at that moment. It's kindof mindblowing to think that all three of those places were so different this weekend, and yet all of them so spectacular in their own right.<<
First of all, what I realized I knew about Ireland once I got there, but hadn't really thought too much about ahead of time was the fact that everybody in Ireland is so nice! Not that people in Italy are overly unfriendly, but I think the whole lack of a language barrier really helped things out, never-the-less, from the very moment Stacey and I arrived in Ireland and chatted with the passport control man, we knew it was going to be a great trip.
After our three-ish hour bus ride across Ireland, we arrived in Galway, the college town of Ireland, to enjoy the locals, their pubs, and the countryside the next day. The guy at our hostel was also very friendly, he showed us where we could first grab a bite to eat and then the path we could take for our adventure out that night. I believe it went something like this, "First go here, grab a pint, they have good music...Then, walk to this bar, they also have good music, and you can grab another pint...Then, head to this bar, they stay open the latest, and you can get another pint there...then walk back this way and stumble through Eyre Square back to the hostel and go to sleep, just ring the bell, I'll be here all night." Stacey and I were cracking up!!! So we took his advice, stashed our stuff, and headed over to get a fast food dinner at Supermac's (the only place that was still serving food) before heading over to our first Irish Pub, Skfff's.
We walk in and are immediately greeted by a rousing Irish band and head straight to the bar to get our first pints of Irish Cider! Of course we have to get a picture, so we ask one of the many girls just standing around near boys at the bar (girls are always better at taking pictures) and come to find out the girl we asked name was Amy, she goes to school in Galway, and she really wants to show us around for the night so we can see what it's really like to be a student in Galway! We end up meeting a bunch of her friends, my favorite happened to be a girl named Kiera who (probably due to too much Jersey Shore) thought that all Americans walked around saying "Yeah buddy!" all the time and thought it was hilarious when we said it with American accents. We were quick to inform her that Americans definitely didn't say that all the time and then taught her how to say "For sure..." so then she kept walking around the whole night yelling "Yeah Buddy! For sure..." ya so it was probably one of those things you had to be there for, but still it was hilarious. We ended up going with the girls to a club called Karma and it was pretty much club music with an insane Irish mosh pit on the first dance floor (there were three) so we learned our lesson there pretty quick and headed up to meet the girls on the third floor, after a lot of dancing we headed back to the hostel. However, we did have to walk back by Supermac's (the place where we had eaten before) only to find that at around 2 in the morning it was insanely busy! We decided that it was definitely the Taco Bell of Galway...pretty much the only place to be after a night out. However, since we had already eaten there earlier that day, we decided to skip out on the excitement and just head back.
The next morning we got up at a decent time in order to make the day trip that we had booked to the Connemara Region with Lally Tours. This was not only supposed to show us some amazing Irish countryside, but also take us to Kylemore Abbey, a castle turned abbey so that Stacey would be able to visit a castle while she was in Europe! The tour started out with a brief drive through Galway City, showing us the nearby lake and the famous college. It then went on to drive through the small towns of Moycullen and Oughterard before stopping at "The Quiet Man" Bridge, a famous bridge where the movie The Quiet Man with John Wayne was filmed. This was the first movie to be shot on location ever, and while the director didn't think it would be that popular, the people in Ireland loved it so much that it was a huge success. Coincidentally, no one really knows what the bridge was called originally, everyone just calls it the "Quiet Man Bridge" now.
From here we moved on to Maam Cross, where the original Quiet Man cabin is, but since we were stopping there later, we just drove through and then stopped at the next town, Leenane, where I had my first Irish coffee! So good! It was a picturesque little town, but unfortunately we didn't get to stay that long as we left a couple of minutes later to make our way onto our main stop of the day, Kylemore Abbey. Kylemore Abbey was actually originally called Kylemore Castle and was built in 1867 by a rich politician from Manchester, England. It became a boarding school that was ran by nuns in 1920 and has technically been an abbey ever since then. The man from Manchester also built a gothic church on the grounds as well as Victorian Walled Gardens to appease his wife. The latter included 23 glass houses that sheltered the many tropical plants that his wife brought back from her travels around the world. Unfortunately, the castle and gardens fell into disrepair before they were turned into the abbey they are today, so only two of the glass houses have been restored for people to visit in the gardens. It was kindof funny when we visited the gardens however because there was a sign right at the beginning of the gardens that said "Please excuse the condition of the lawns. Essential seasonal lawn maintenance in progress." which I thought was hilarious because the lawn was the greenest I've seen since I've been in Ireland! It was also neat because when we were exploring the abbey, we got a chance to talk to some of the nuns that run the school, who told us that it was a school as soon as last year, although they haven't had boarders for the last three years. They seemed very sad that it was turning permanently into a museum.
After our visit to the gardens and the museum, Stacey and I went to grab some lunch and look through the gift shop. We both had soup for lunch and mine was some kind of potato soup, it was amazing!!! Then when we went to the gift shop I decided I wanted to buy a Claddagh ring. For those of you who don't know the story of the Claddagh ring, it was made for a woman by a young Irish sailor who was madly in love with her but was sold into slavery. Upon his return to Ireland, years later, he gave her the ring, forged with the skills he learned during his imprisonment as a token of his enduring love. It is supposed to represent the ultimate expression of love (the hands with friendship, the heart for love, and the crown for loyalty). When you wear it with the heart point facing outwards on your right hand, it signifies that your heart is available to be taken. When you wear it on your right hand with the heart point facing inwards, it means that your heart is currently taken by somebody. And then when you switch it over to your left hand, it means you are engaged/married! I've always thought it would be a really cool piece of jewelry to own, and I figured what better place to get one than in the region it originated in!
From Kylemore Abbey, we drove through many beautiful landscapes as our tour guide told us about the history of farmers "working the bog." Apparently, farmers have been using a special tool for years to take pieces out of the bog so that they can then dry and be used as firewood. Unfortunately, last year the European Union outlawed this practice to preserve the Irish landscape. I have a feeling that since some of them have been doing it for generations, it probably still gets done (I also say this because we passed about 20 examples of it on our drive back to Galway). During our drive we went through the Gaeltacht region of Ireland, where Gaelic is the first language people learn and English is the second. While we were here we got to stop to see some world famous Connemara ponies and take some pictures at a beach on Galway Bay. Then we drove along the water as long as we could before finally getting back to Galway. This is where Stacey and I pretty much immediately got on the next bus back to Dublin so we wouldn't get there too late!
We got into Dublin about 9 pm and immediately found a pub to have dinner in. It was on the famous O'Connell St and I had bangers and mash, a traditional Irish dish with mashed potatoes and sausages. From there, we decided it was time to make our way to the girls house that we were supposed to be staying in as she lived about a 20 minute walk away. About 5 minutes away from her house, we stopped to get 2 6-packs to thank her for letting us stay with her. Unfortunately when we finally found her house, she was no where to be found! We tried calling the number she gave us but no one was picking up, so we just ended up sitting outside for an hour and a half drinking beer and waiting. At around 11:30, we finally decided to head back into the main part of town to try to find a hostel, luckily the first hotel we went to we decided to check their rates and he was able to give us a room with two beds for 40 euro! Which wasn't too bad since that's probably what we would have spent on a hostel anyways! We were a little concerned about the hotel since the front desk man who sold us the room appeared to have a blood stain on his shirt, but when we got up to the room it was surprisingly nice! We were glad to have our own bathroom as well as the first English TV we've had since we've been in Europe. Of course, twenty minutes after we checked in, I get a call from Aideen (the girl we were supposed to be staying with) who said she'd been waiting for us to call (I guess I was dialing the number wrong). She insisted we go try to go get our money back, but we told her we would just meet up with her in the morning.
On Saturday, Aideen took us on a walking tour of Dublin, which started with a traditional Irish breakfast of course! Bacon, sausage, eggs, black and white pudding, and brown bread; we found out afterwards why no one would tell us what was in black and white pudding until after we tried it...after we determined that it wasn't as bad as we thought it would be, Aideen finally told us that there was sheep's blood in the black pudding. We then went on our walking tour, where we saw the Irish Memorial that the Queen of England visited when she was in Ireland, as well as the Dublin Spire, the General Post Office (that still had bullet holes in the columns from the riots that happened when Ireland was winning it's independence), the Ha'penny Bridge (it used to cost a penny to cross the bridge as it was the only one over the Liffey River), the Temple Bar area, the Christ Church Cathedral (where we saw the bridge that goes across the street so that the monks wouldn't have to go outside to visit the other buildings), Dublin Castle (which was actually City Hall), and finally the demonstrations at the Central Bank before making it to our first destination, the Guinness factory!!
Unfortunately, I am not going to tell you the entire process of Guinness because that would ruin your experience when you visit the Guinness factory for the first time, but I will tell you a couple of facts that I found interesting:
1) Guinness only uses the purest Irish water from the Kilkenny Mountains that are on the outskirts of Dublin.
2) It takes 119.5 seconds to pour the perfect Guinness.
3) In 2008 and 2009, Guinness launched a campaign in the United States to make St. Patrick's Day an official holiday.
4) Guinness has used a lot of different advertising campaigns, but my personal favorite is the "Guinness is good for you" campaign.
We learned all of this before heading up to the Gravity Bar on the top floor of the factory, where we got a great view of Dublin and our first pint of Guinness! I actually really enjoyed it, it had a very espresso taste and it definitely wasn't as heavy as I thought.
From here, we moved on to the Jameson Distillery, where we learned that the reason Irish whiskey is so much better than American whiskey or Scotch is because it is distilled three times as opposed to the American once or the Scotch twice. I also became an official whiskey taster! With a certificate and everything! Unfortunately they spelled my name wrong (Laura Pritz) but that's ok, it was really fun!
That night Stacey and I had a genuine Dublin night out that was supplied by three lovely Irishmen we met at our first Dublin Pub; Henry, Alan and Steve. It was a lot of fun and we got in so late that we pretty much had to leave for the airport right after we woke up at Aideen's house at like 2:30 in the afternoon haha.
Sorry I can't write more for this post, but unfortunately I put it off until the last minute and I just realized I only have 50 minutes left until I have to leave for Morocco!! If you want a more detailed description of the Jameson factory/our night out, just go to my facebook and there is a caption on every picture :) I promise I'll add in more info when I get back!
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