This time it was off to the grand country of Ireland with a great group Me, jackie, kelsey, and allison. We left Rome late friday night around 9 so didn't get into dublin till about 11:30.
A little rough flight.. screaming babies...
Loved the english speaking and accent right off the bat when we landed even thought we were tired we knew we were in for a great weekend. We checked into the Abigail Hostel very close to the Temple bar area, but instead of hitting the town crashed since we had a 7:30 am train to catch. This was our first encounter with what seemed like a parade of snorers for the weekend to come... we didn't get too good of a night sleep but adrenaline and excitment carried us through the early morning and we made our way to Hueston Station a short taxi ride from our hostel. The trains were very clean and comfortable.
The excitement started on the train when we noticed the entire car next to us was reserved and everyone in it was wearing a red spandex suit with weird tentacles coming out of the top... we were a little weirded out but then just thought there must be some sort of festival going on in the one of the cities. We brushed it off till well into the train ride when the food cart came around the people started crawling around on the ground following the vendor man. It was extremely weird so we asked the vendor guy what the heck was up! he tried to explain to us that they were part of a very popular ad in the UK supposedly for a snack called figrolls... they were supposed to be tastebuds and as a type of advertising campaign the "tastebuds" rode the train. When we reached galway around 10:00 am they all stampeded off the train through the town and at the center of a near park was a large cardboard cut out of a figroll package. They gathered around it chanting and practically worshipping the thing! it was by far one of the weirdest things I've seen in my life... I guess it was successfull advertising! haha
OK enough bout that..
Galway! by far the cutest small town I've been to yet in Europe... Although the weather is gloomy the people and colors there are definitely not!!! The Colorful section of town known as the Latin Quarter is full of pubs and restaurants and some of the best street performers we have seen so far. Rather than a man with a guitar on a street corner there were full out bands playing on the corner. Violins, chellos, harps, traditonal irish music and rock bands... With my love for music it was Absolutely amazing to see so many talented performers.
Our first afternoon there we walked around for a couple hours exploring the town, found a neat market of homebaked goods and crafts and grabbed a falafell, delicious full of humus and veggies! We checked into our hostel the Galway City Hostel, it was a great place very friendly staff and right across from the train station so very easy to navigate. We showered then went out to explore more, we found the galway cathedral and scoped out places for later in the night.
We ended up eating at a place called Mustard, very cool atmosphere in the basement of a building and had all the old decor of an Irish Mill. The food was ok but not quite up to the par we were expecting... We hit up very fun pub called the King's Head arfterwards! Double decker pub and later in the night it had an Irish Rock band called unstable, they covered a lot of american music but still did some fun irish rock. They played a lot of kings of leon which we loved! and one of the guys did an insane impersonation of ACDC it was great. Me and kels stayed out later than the others and danced the night away in the pub. lots of fun!
me and kels first afternoon in galway
sweet wall on the streets of galway/street performers
weird tastebuds in action
nun's island?
bad ass fwiends :)
Next day we were up early again.. lots of snoring during the night.. ugghhhhh.. mixed dorms at hostels will be the death of me... dang men snore wayy too much haha
Today we hopped on a bus tour that took us out into clare and galway county to see the cliffs of moher and lots of pits stops on the way to ruins of castels, the burren, neolithic tombs!
The Irish countryside was absolutely breathtaking... I believe kelsey described it as "Grass on steroids" it was sooooo greeeeeenn! I'll put lots of pics up from the tour but way too much to write it all out. It was a great day tho and we had tons of fun sightseeing/being complete goofballs in our pictures... I love the girls I traveled with this time it was the perfect mix and we all got along so well we referred to our little gang as the "Galway Girls" after the song :)
We arrived back in galway around 6ish we took a little nap exhausted from a long day then showered and this time found a GREAT local place that served traditional irish food! It was right in the Latin Quarter and we got a 2 course meal plus tea for 12euro! deal! I had seafood chowder and shepperds pie. Irish mash potatoes=god's gift to earth! We headed back to the hostel after dinner pooped from a long day. On the walk home we came across a great band playing on the street called Keywest, we stopped for just a few seconds then they said this would be ther last song and of course what did they play Galway girl :) it was the perfect end to our time there. we listened did a little jig in the street and headed back
my cool friends
abbey ruins in clare county
kels, alli, me entering the burren
pure excitement
cliffs of moher
view of countryside
gangstas ?
O'brien lookout castle at Cliffs oh Moher
up at 6 am
train to dubbs
drop our stuff off at our next hostel Abbey court, another good hostel and very affordable, great location right by temple bar area again.
Walked around dubs explored a sweet park in the city center, walked to see the dublin castle, did a little shopping on the way. Absolutely love the style of people in ireland, alot of the young people are very punk also lots of fun layers and patterns, they wear wayyy too much makeup however haha which I thought was strange for ireland.. Awesome shopping in dublin Favorite places, River Island and Top Shop. Bought a clad ring at one of the street vendors! had starbuck coffeeeeee :). In the afternoon we toured the old jameson whiskey distillery. fun tour not really a factory more of a historical building. tried a jameson and cranberry Delish! Alli got to be part of the Whiskey tasting contest... it was pretty funny they made people compare jameson to irish scotch and Jack Daniels. Ali thought Jameson was way better than both as did most....
Headed back to hostel showered to prepare for reservations we had made at the Arlington Hotel that night... met our cute german roomate kevin he was adorable he looked like a german zac efron :) haha
Our last night was probably one of the funnest night I've had in europe yet. We had a three course Traditional Irish meal veggie soug/bangers and mash/baileys cream tart with bananas!
We were seated right next to the stage since we had made reservations earlier in the day and it was a monday night... The food was amazing! the beer was great! the performers unbelievable!!!! At first it was a group of older Irish men singing alot of traditional music but they were also sort of a comedy act and interacted with the crowd a lot. we were some of there favs since we got into it and were pretty much some of the only people in there under 40... haha We requested Galway Girl and they gladly played it for us! Later on a group of River dancers performed and when the time came around for audience participation of course I got dragged up.. haha it was very fun they tried to teach us some stuff but of course I was a complete failure.. but hey I got a certificate! and some very funny photos!!!
4:45 alarm
6:00 flight to rome...
Grand weekend lads!!!
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