Ireland

Even if I were to type in my abbreviated notes that I wrote during the trip, it would still only fit in a nutshell the size of you ego.

Yes, yours.

Don't act like you don't know.

Anyhow. So I guess I'll give you a fleshed out version of the trip, since it'll be a long story no matter what. You should probably use the bathroom now or finish cooking that turkey before you read the entry, because this tale is so enthralling that you will not want to leave your seat.

Day 1: March 14th
We left Freiburg for the Baden-Baden/Karlsruhe Airport and arrived in Dublin, Ireland, in the early evening. We descended upon a bagel shop ( there would be much bagel-eating on this trip, as Germany ... doesn't do bagels so much ) and got our car. Sarah S. would be the driver for the trip. We spent a good time in the parking lot figuring out how to change gears ( on an automatic ) and finally got onto the road. I was the official map reader.

I think Mitch Hedberg described the following 10 minutes best when he said, "I rent a lot of cars, but I don't always know everything about them. So a lot of times, I drive for like ten miles with the emergency brake on. That doesn't say a lot for me, but it really doesn't say a lot for the emergency brake. It's really not an emergency brake, it's an emergency "make the car smell funny" lever." It also took us a while to get out of Dublin, figure out what the signs were saying, but finally we got out of there and to Glendalough.

Now, though Glendalough may be on a map of Ireland, I don't think it would have made it on a map of Delaware. It's in County Wicklow and is the "Garden of Ireland".



But we couldn't really tell, since it was late and the sun had set.

Day 2: March 15th

Sarah Mc., Mary, and I started the morning early. I think we were out of the hostel ( which was overrun by a group of French students, which was a common site throughout the whole of Ireland ) by 7AM and walking down the street to find a bakery or general store to buy breakfast. It was a good 30 minute walk and very scenic. Rabbits, sheep, shepherd dogs, the ruins of Trinity church, and the landscape in general was our first introduction to Ireland.





We did a bit of walking around the lakes in Glendalough and then headed out of town around noon. We got to Kilkenny shortly after stopping through another town for supplies and horse-petting, as well as more hanging-around-ruins.



After a few hours in Kilkenny we arrived in Cashel, where we stayed the night. We had dinner in town.

Day 3: March 16th

We visited Hore Abbey ( insert laughter ) before going to the Rock of Cashel. The cows surrounding the abbey sorta freaked me out.

We went to the Rock of Cashel, where St. Patrick supposedly converted a pagan king. It's a church and long guardhouse ... thing ... as well as a cemetery perched on top of a hill. There were jackdaws swooping in and out of the ruins of the church ( Ireland has a lot of ruins, if you haven't noticed by now ) and making a lot of noise.



After the Rock of Cashel we went to a small museum on the history of music in Ireland and then left for Killarney.

In Killarney ( which reminded me a lot of Houghton Lake ) we went into town for to see some traditional music performances and I am not ashamed to say that because of the Ren Fest Podcast I knew some of the songs.

Day 4: March 17th: St. Patrick's Day

It was a mixed day. It started off with Sarah S. not feeling good. The two Sarahs and I went to Killaryney National Park and took a ride on a jaunty through the park to see the mansion there ( built by a Californian man who had married an Irish woman ) and the waterfall.



It was one of the most beautiful places I've been to. It was so perfect you think that each fallen, moss-covered, rotting tree must have been intentionally placed on the stones that fell out of the side of the hill, but it's just the chaos of nature, and that's the true beauty of it all.

Then we drove out to Six Mile Bride outside of Limerick and both of the Sarahs stayed at the hostel for the evening because they were ill.

Mary and I went into Limerick and found a used book store, where we talked with this guy

for quite some time ( he lost track of time and realized he should have closed the store a while ago! ) and I bought The Vampire Lestat for 4 Euro.

It rained and we couldn't get into any pubs because I was 10 days too young to enter, not that I was going to drink because I was driving, but we wanted to see some live entertainment. So we headed back to Six Mile Bridge and found a smaller, quieter pub in town and watched the Irish equivalent of American Idol.

Day 5: March 18th

We left for Galway, the Sarahs feeling much better, though I was still driving ( technically we didn't have a second driver signed up, but I don't think the car rental place would have minded given the situation. So I like to think. ). Our first stop was the Cliffs of Moher, otherwise known as the CLIFFS OF INSANITY


( Speaking of the Cliffs of Insanity, did anyone see the PotC:AWE trailer? Will seems to be going for the Dread Pirate Roberts look. )

There were insanely high winds that were seriously a bit unnerving, especially crossing the road to the tourist center, and we were being bombarded by tiny pieces of hail. But it was an amazing view once we got to the cliffs, which overlook the Atlantic Ocean. Foam gathering at the bottom of the cliffs was sent flying hundreds of feet into the air to descend upon the car park. A small waterfall never reached the ocean because of the winds. And if I may be poetic for one moment, the sea was like rolling marble with veins of limestone. Okay, I'm done.

We got to our hostel in Galway. Two of my roommates suggested that our party go to the Crane to see some jam sessions, so we did. The first act was amazing, made better by a highly intoxicated and loose-tongued audience member who kept giving her opinion on everything. We talked with an older couple who tought me how to say 7UP in Gaelic ( seachd shuas ).

Day 6: March 19th

We left Galway for Dublin, but first stopped on Connemara, a nature reserve, for a qhile. We stopped by the sea and got pelted by more hail, but had fun climbing on rocks and hanging around. We got to Dublin, checked into our hostel, and walked around the Liffey River. There was a carneval going on in the street, but we didn't partake in any activities, because it was damn expensive ( 4 Euro for a ride! ). We found the locations of museums we wanted to visit.



You see our dismay.

Day 7: March 20th

The Sarahs returned the car while Mary and I went to the Museum of Natural History, which was like a macabre zoo behind glass but delightfully "old school" and the Museum of History and Archaeology, which had three bog men on display. We stopped by another used book store where I picked up Bram Stoker's Dracula for 2.50 and sent off some postcards at the post office in the back of the store.



Then we went to a Georgian House Museum, which was a restored - you guessed it - Georgian house.

We took a few walks around parks and I took too many pictures of magpies.



Day 8: March 21st

We saw the Book of Kells at Trinity College and Mary and I found out that we had been to the same presentation of a senior thesis on how to create a medieval bestiary at MSU's library.

Then we went to Kilmainham Gaol on the outskirts of Dublin and it was basically a crash course in modern Irish history, as many political prisoners had been held there, as well as a lesson in the politics and reforms surrounding the architecture and managing of a prison in the Georgian and Victorian eras.




The Sarahs departed for Belfast later that day and Mary and I went to Marsh's Library near St Patrick's Cathedral and saw an exhibition of maps of the Americas and then to a service at St Patrick's. On the way back to our hostel we stopped outside of a bookstore that had been closed for the day and had 15-20 large plastic bags of FREE BOOKS sitting in the rain, with a purple-haired Goth girl and an older man sifting through the bags. I found three that caught my attention. It was a good day!

Day 9: March 22nd

We woke up at 4AM and got on a plane to Frankfurt Hahn, which landed around 10AM I think. I was pretty tired by 9PM and slept 12 hours last night.