My semester in Ireland: Galway Girls!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Lcnvd8BNFE (if you're really feeling into it)

So first off I should start by saying we could not have asked for better weather this weekend. Sunny as anything, without one cloud in the sky! On our tour bus the bus driver said they had only had four days, prior to this weekend, this summer that had been as nice! All of Lauren's hard planning paid off, because I honestly could not have had a better time.
We started this weekend by picking up a bus to Galway from one of the campus' parking lots. I had scribbled down some walking directions to our hostel before we had left. (good last minute thinking.) It was about a two hour ride to Galway. We were thrilled we were actually going some where and the planning was actually happening now! We had full confidence on the bus, we were going to Galway! We did it! We got off the bus and were dropped off right in front of Eyre Square. There we were 7 Americans (yeah, Mal's not from Canada anymore, we told her she should be from Maine. No one really knows the difference anyways.) standing clueless on the sidewalk with a crumpled piece of paper with abbreviations and arrows scribbled across it. We were definitely not in Kansas anymore Todo. Just before I was about to crawl in the fetal position and rock back and forth, I decided to breathe and take a look at my crumbled, now sweaty directions. "Look for Dunnes Store and Dunnes Liquor" I read aloud. Lauren pointed to a store across the way and away we went. The panicky feeling began to fade as the directions started to make more sense. After taking only one wrong turn, we finally arrived at Woodquay Hostel. Not bad for first timers...

I have never been to a hostel before so I was a little nervous what to expect. We walked in and we were greeted by the owner. He reeked of booze, and was a little odd. He was a little high strung. He tried to crack a few jokes, but they were basically "stupid American" jokes. Naturally, we didn't find them amusing, but laughed away at them either out of sheer nervousness or awkwardness. He showed us upstairs to our room, and then told us to come down before we went out and he would show us how to unlock the door. Our room wasn't bad at all. There was 4 bunk beds spread throughout the room, and a bathroom with a shower. Of course none of us used the shower. We thought we would "rough it" this weekend. Now realize that 7 girls' term of "roughing it" should be used very loosely, and I'm more than certain that if we had known ahead of time we could shower we would've packed the towels and hair dryers too.

(us in the TV room of the hostel)

After getting situated, we went down to learn how to lock the door and then to try to go out for dinner. The drunken hostel owner said he'd show Mal, the Canadian, how to lock the door. He said 3 numbers and told her to enter them from the right. Mal did it and the door didn't open. He then proceeded to crack jokes about Mal not knowing her left from her right. He then said tried to show her left from right, and said something along the lines of hoping they don't ask her that question at immigration so she can stay in the country. Guess we lucked out, two for the price of one: a hostel and a comedy club! Mal eventually got the door to unlock, and we were on our merry way.
We walked up and down the streets looking for a cheap place to grab some food. We eventually settled on a pub called Paddy's. Our waitress was so nice. She was from Greece, and that night was her first night of work. She spoke broken English and apologized to us for it. She told us she was really nervous and to bare with her. Being in a new place, and not understanding things... yeah, none of us were able to relate...

We all ordered burgers, beers and chips (aka fries). We were in the mood for some good American food after all the traveling we had done. Although I must say I'm a little frustrated with the lack of mustard on sandwiches or burgers here. Mayo comes on everything, but you have to ask for mustard or put it on yourself. I'm contemplating bringing a little bottle with me now. After using all the ketchup and mustard packets on the table we saw a condiment called "brown sauce" and decided to pass it around for a taste. Not something I think I'll try again. After reading the ingredients and seeing dates listed first we all understood why it was so gross.

After the waitress took our order I realized she didn't ask us how we wanted our burgers cooked and got nervous I was going to get undercooked meat. Our burgers finally arrived, and I realized after my first crisp bite, that was an impossibility. Christy interrupted our chowing down time with "guys there's foil on my burger." She peeled it off and continued to eat. At that point we were all way too hungry to care about crisp or foiled burgers.

After we were done stuffing our faces, we sat for awhile, talked, and finished our beers. Our discussion was interrupted when 3 children walked into the room. 2 boys probably around 7 or 8 and 1 girl around the same age. They were all excited and were blowing up balloons. One of the boys balloon accidentally flew out of his mouth and shot at the end of our table by Christy. We laughed and gave it back. The other boy looked over and said "ARE YOU AMERICANS?!" ... were we that obvious?! The little girl looked up at me and said "we're Irish" trying to be polite I answered her with "oh really?" what else was I supposed to say to that. In the mean time the boys had been scheming. One of them came right up to our table and drew direct attention to himself as he blew up his balloon and proceeded to let it go... in our faces. Kim and Erin jumped and screamed. The rest of us i think we're just in shock of what was going on. The balloon zoomed around us and landed in my lap. The boys at this point were loudly laughing and talking about their prank. I handed the balloon back to them, (yeah good idea kel, give the ammo back) laughing. As the boys ran out of the room still giggling and yelling, I couldn't help but think we had just been mocked by a group of Irish 8- year -olds.

After dinner we decided to head back and get some sleep because we had a long day the following morning! 7 am came early, and we got out the door as quick as we could. We grabbed breakfast at this bagel place and ate it on the square. We walked back to the hostel and got picked up by the tour company for our day! The countryside on the ride there was amazing. Little did I know what laid ahead that day! Our tour stopped at several places before the cliffs. At Poulnabrone Dolmen Christy got her foot wedged in between some rocks and almost took a digger. After some wiggling, she was freed and we continued on our way. Everything was so interesting, but I couldn't help but feel anxious to finally see the cliffs! They were the last stop on our tour. We had been traveling around all day and we were all pretty tired. Despite these factors I think we all did a full out sprint to the top of the hill to see them. Now I know people use that expression "breath takingly beautiful". This was the first time I have ever experienced anything like that. I literally stared in complete awe at them. I could've stared all day long. We traveled up and down them taking pictures from all different angles and with all different poses. We got to the end that said "Do not go beyond this point" with several warning signs with people tumbling off cliffs. Mal and I decided our lives were pretty important. We chose to stay behind and take pictures of the girls in our group who decided to go on the un-railed side of the cliffs. Fortunately, none of them decided to take the plunge, and we all headed safely back to the bus.

( @ Poulnabrone Dolmen)

(christy with her foot lodged between the rocks)

Once back in Galway we decided we would grab a quick and cheap dinner before our night tour. I had brought some coupons they handed out the first day here for Domino's and Subway. We grabbed a pizza and subs and ate them again at the square. While we were waiting for our pizza to be ready we grabbed some Irish candy, which was absolutely delicious. There was also a car show that night on the square so we were entertained while we ate. (not that any of us knew much about cars but we like the variety of colors!)

After we ate we had some time to walk around. We headed down one of the main streets with all the pubs on it. We wanted to get a preview of what it was all about since we are planning a return trip for Erin's Birthday! On our walk back up the streets and to our Hostel, this old, drunken, homeless man came up to me. There was a group of boys behind us who started to yell at him and tell him to leave us alone. He grabbed my arm and told me to come with him. Normally, I would've been a little frightened in this situation. I was so exhausted and slap happy at this point that I just stuck my hand out, shook him off me and said "Naaaaahhh... thanks". We realized minutes later how ridiculous of response that was to something like that and broke out laughing. It's not like he was handing me a brochure, he was trying to steal me. Lauren-"Nahhhh, walking down that dark alley with you, a homeless drunk man, isn't so much for me. Thank you for that option though."

I think we laughed the entire way back to the Hostel, where we then got ready for our night tour. Decklin was the tour guide Lauren had been emailing back and forth to set up arrangements. We had several ongoing jokes that they were dating due to the amount of times Lauren ended up emailing him about questions. Once after she apologized to him for sending so much mail he sent back a wink face and said it wasn't a problem. We were all in our hostel room chatting away and had lost track of time when we heard a knock on the door and a man's voice say "Is Lauren there?". Imagine our excitement to learn this strange man was Decklin himself and he would be driving us to our tour bus. Now in our jokes, Decklin had been some old, bald, awkward Irish man. He wasn't really any of those. He was older, probably in his 40s, and he was a riot. He said something about Lauren being his special friend, and Erin jokingly responded with "why does she get to be your special friend?" He turned around and gave her a big hug and continued making jokes about their "special" friendship for most of the ride over. He turned on music and told us all to start dancing, and then he started to turn the bus lights on and off to create a strobe light. He drove like a mad man, and openly admitted to almost smashing into a woman in a cross walk on the way. We were pretty pumped up by the time we had gotten to the other bus. This was a good thing because the night tour was on the history of Galway, and I probably would've been to tired to really listen had it not been for Decklin. The night tour was really cool. It took us by cemeteries, told us about certain executioners, the story of the Lynches, and even a true scandal story about a University in Galway. We kicked the wall at black rock for good luck, and drove by some of the main streets and got a feel for the night life.

(kicking the wall @ black rock)

Now after a day like that, you think we'd crash as soon as we got back to the hostel. Instead we got to talking, and realized Mallory knew quite a bit about the U.S. Quite honestly, none of us knew more than 3 things about Canada. Which we made a list about for Mallory entitled, Things we know about Canada. "one: "OH CANADA..." two: you like hockey... three: there's a red maple leaf on your flag." You'll be happy to know that after a good hour of grilling Mal with questions, our list is now far into the teens. ("what is it like topographically", "now, how big is Canada is cubic meters", "if I was to go into a restaurant, what would they place in front of me") Mal also informed us extremely nonchalantly that she owned a farm and had 3,000 pigs. Lauren responded with "Mallory... You have 3,000 pigs, and this is something you're just telling us now. I feel like that should've been that statement directly after "Hi my name is Mallory.""

The next morning we pulled ourselves out of bed to grab tickets for the bus and ferry to the Arann Islands. We were disappointed and shocked that our delicious bagel place was closed, and wouldn't open until noon time! We grabbed a muffin and coffee at a Spar down the road, and headed to catch the bus for the Ferry. It was an hour bus ride there, an hour ferry ride over, but it was very well worth it. We decided to go to Inishmore, the biggest and more touristy island. Now we didn't quite catch the concept of what to do on the island before we got there. I pretty much just assumed we would walk around and maybe shop a little. So we get off the ferry and see shops lined up. Before the shops there was bus tours, 2 bike rental shops, horse drawn carriages waiting. We didn't really pay much attention and just headed into the tourist information desk. While there we realized to get to the top of the island to see the sites, it would be an hour and a half walk, or you could take a tour or ride a bike. We all were pretty toured out, and Helen couldn't ride a bike, so walk it was. It was a beautiful day, and we liked the idea of taking our time. Until about 20 minutes into it when we realized we couldn't take our time because we would miss the ferry home and wouldn't have time for lunch. People were whizzing by us on bikes, and bus tours. I kinda started to lose faith in our decision to walk but continued anyways. About halfway up the island we found a path off the main road and decided to walk up it, the view was already incredible. We noticed a tower in the distance and looked on the map to locate it. This was the highest point of the island and we started debating whether or not to keep trucking along to see it. We had all our stuff from the hostel and purchases from days before with us and we had already been walking for a fair amount of time in the sun. As tired as I was I knew that would be an amazing opportunity. Lauren, Mal, Helen, and I decided to keep going! It was so weird because eventually it just went from being touristy to people's homes. I couldn't imagine living with that view in my backyard everyday. It was incredible. We finally made it to just outside the tower. The only thing that stood in our way was one of the largest and steepest hills I have ever seen in my life. At one point while climbing up it, our bodies were parallel to the ground. Every muscle in my body was burning, and I was actually panting. At one point Lauren cracked a joke, and I told her to stop because laughing exerted too much of my energy. We finally made it to where it leveled out. I could see the entire island! We took some pictures, and a seat. Then we looked up at the tower and decided we had made it this far we might as well... one small problem Lauren and I are a little afraid of heights. We went inside and climbed and old rusty spiral staircase. I'm not sure what I was expected to be at the top of it, but that was definitely not it. I came out from the entrance at the top and there was literally enough room for my one body even pressed tight against the concrete wall behind me, and then an old rusty railing holding you in, about 200+ feet in the air. I felt a little panicky, but the view is something I have never seen before in my life. You could see the mainland from that high up. I was so happy I had climbed to the top of that. That experience is one I know I will never forget, and definitely one of the best I've had.

(view from the highest point of the island!)

As the adrenalin finally wore off we headed back down the hill and down the island. On the way we stopped at Joe Watty's. A pub that was recommended in one of my travel books. I ordered a chicken ciabatta sandwich with pesto and vegetables in it! It was so good. I washed it down with my first of many Smithwicks! (Dame, best beer I have ever had...) After lunch we headed back to shops where I bought some gifts and souvenirs. We went to the beach for a few and waited for our ferry. The water looked so tempting that we had to go stick our feet in! It actually wasn't too cold, and at that point it was refreshing. Our ferry came and we headed back an hour, then an hour bus ride, followed by a 2 hour bus ride back to Limerick, and then a 10 minute taxi ride back to our apartments. Talk about exhausted! I crashed almost instantly and woke up at 1 in the afternoon today. Even as tired as I was, it was still one of the best weekends I have ever had. I had so much fun, and I felt a lot more independent. (Thanks Lauren for all your arrangement making!) We're meeting in the next couple of days to decide we're we are off to this weekend! I'm sure it will get easier as we go! As for now I'm off to bed, class at 9 am tomorrow!