Again, it has been a few days since I last blogged about my experiences this January, but this is what has happened for the past couple of days!!
Friday 1/13 was spent traveling from Derry to Belfast, then from there to Dublin. All in all, it was only about 4.5 hours of travel time via bus which wasn’t too bad, plus the Irish countryside was gorgeous to see! Once arrived in downtown Dublin, Anna, Becca, and I made our way toward the Temple Bar area, where we stayed at this rad little hostel called the Four Courts. There were lots of young adults staying there and the whole atmosphere there was SUPER neat! They had a movie room, pool table, mess hall with a huge kitchen - it was like how the movies portray hostels, which was cool. After settling in, the three of us decided we would go explore Temple Bar and check out the nightlife. Imagine a cross between Bourbon Street with a small European city, and then sprinkle in lots of Irish music and that’s about what Temple Bar was like haha. The first place we went was called St. John Gogarty’s - a four story pub that played live Irish music. We then went from there to a place called Farrington’s, where there was more live Irish music - AWESOME. I ended up meeting a 35 year old dude from Manchester named Manny, whom I spent the rest of my evening talking to about life and traveling and such. The best part: every time my glass would be empty, he would go get us another beer so that we could keep drinking and chatting haha. I ended up taking off after a bit and heading back to the Hostel to crash. Apparently, people from Manchester can put it away haha.
Saturday 1/14 was spent exploring the city and seeing as many sites as we could. We began by walking around and seeing Trinity College, where we stuck our heads in to take a peak at the Book of Kells, a famous religious manuscript. It was absolutely beautiful there and I found out that it’s the oldest University in Ireland (I believe - it could’ve been the UK though?). We then walked down the main drag called Grafton Street, where there is lots of musicians, street performers, and shopping. Some of the buildings there were from like the 1400’s! Along a sidestreet of Grafton is this little cheese shop that we went into and literally ate the BEST cheese ever…it was one of the most extensive ones I have ever been too - they even had the real deal Cheddar from Cheddar! After that, we visited the Dublin Saturday Food Market, where I ate a Freeranger Baguet, a bun filled with onions, sauce, and freerange pork that had just been butchered that morning, which was DELICIOUS.
After that we decided to take a “hop on, hop off” bus tour of Dublin (similar to what I did in London last year) and see all of the sites - plus I figured it would be a nice way to get a feel for the city! On the tour we saw everything from the Guinness Storehouse, to the President’s House (which they call something else that I am currently blanking on), to Phoenix Park, to the Post Office where the Easter Uprising began, to St. Patrick’s Cathedral. It was a really neat tour!! By the time we finished that, we decided to head back to the Guinness Storehouse and go have a tour. Anna and I spent almost three hours there and the tour ended with the pouring of your own pint of the deliciousness that is Guinness - I handled like a champ haha. The other neat part about the Storehouse is that the whole touring area is shaped like a giant pint glass, at the top of which is the Gravity Bar, where you can get a complete 360degree view of Dublin!!! After that, we headed back to the hostel where Anna, Becca, and I met up with Stacey and Lauren from our class as well in order to get some dinner at a place called the Porterhouse, which had of all things my favorite beer in the whole world, AUGUSTINER BRAU! (turned out they were all out though…sad day!)
Following my meal of Irish stew and potatoes, we then got ready for another night on the town. Since the night before, we had a gained another roommate named Jeff, who was from Chino, California, which ended up being great because he came out with us later on. We spent the rest of the night adventuring in Temple Bar, listening to music, having drinks, and meeting some real characters. We met a Spaniard named Joseph who fell in love with me and kept telling me, “You are so beautiful! Aha look at this man - he has such nice teeth!” hahaha. That was an interesting experience that ended with him getting our email addresses so that he could have us all visit him in Spain, north of Madrid too! We also met a group of people that were from Philly and student teaching in Dublin, which of course happened while we were getting our standard late night Kebab haha. We ended up staying out until almost 4am when the bars were finally shutting down - it was a great night to say the least!
Sunday 1/15 was our last day in Dublin, so once we roused ourselves from bed, Anna, Becca, Stacey, Lauren, and I went out to explore some more. Fortunately for us though, nothing opened until noon though so we recovered and still got to spend a full day seeing the sites! We began by stopping by Grafton St so that I could pickup Andrea her present ;] which I am THRILLED to give her, followed by some breakfast, and then a nice long walk to the Museum of Natural History. The museum was not far from Oscar Wildes’ house so we got to check that out and walk around the Green as well. The museum was literally one of the most extensive collections of animals from around the world I have EVER seen!! It was so cool to see obscure creatures from all over up close - pretty much all of them were taxidermic which made it even crazier because they were the real thing! We then went and saw Dublin Castle, followed by St. Patrick’s Cathedral, which were both amazing to see! Unfortunately we couldn’t go into St. Patty’s though because it had closed early for an organ recital. To end the evening we adventured around some more and ate at a quaint little place called Mes Amiz, followed by some journaling and a much needed night of sleep.
Today, Monday 1/16 was spent traveling from Dublin back to Belfast so that the five of us could reunite with the rest of the class. After arriving at the Farset International hostel and settling in, we spent the rest of the afternoon with a guest speaker named Marie-Therese O’Hagan, the Trauma Training Coordinator for the Northern Ireland WAVE Trauma Center (of which there are five scattered throughout NI). She spoke with the class for more than two hours and it was amazing to hear some of the stories of community building and grassroots involvement. We then had a nice dinner and awesome drinks at a place in downtown Belfast where you could “beat the clock” and get fancy food for 5, 6, or 7 pounds depending on the hour you make it in by between 5-7pm. I think I found a new favorite drink: The White Russian (definitely can see why its a favorite of my boss haha). Tomorrow will be another long day spent seeing as much as possible in Belfast! Cheers :]
