Day in Dublin and THE USED!!!!

Well, I'm going to start off this post with excuses. The reason I haven't updated for nearly a month is because I haven't DONE anything for over a month. Before yesterday, St. Paddy's Day was the last time I did anything exciting. The majority of my life was literally spent in my bedroom writing essays, and will likely be again for the next week/ week and a half. For those who say that college is easy, write one of my essays. I dare you. No, I double dog dare you (*le gasp*). But everything will get more exciting after next week, because I leave for London on the 3rd of May and I have a lot of fun stuffs planned. I won't go into too much detail, so that I don't ruin the surprise. XD

Yesterday (technically two days ago because it's 2:30 AM here), I woke up after only three hours of sleep to trudge my butt to the bus stop for a three hour ride to Dublin. I got to see some of the prettiest scenery around as I looked out the window. One yard even had about 20 baby bunnies chowing down on the grass. I admit it. I AWWWWW'd at the sight of them. I think the other people on the bus thought I was a lunatic. The rest of the animals I saw were sheep. And cows. A whole freaking lot of cows. More than in Lancaster County, PA, and I thought that was impossible. 

Once I got into Dublin, it was a matter of finding my way to St. Stephen's Green, where my Viking Splash Tour bus was set to leave. After gaining my bearings in the city, I managed to get there about 15 minutes before the bus was supposed to leave. The tour was led by a really nice guy named Pat, who led us around the city while telling us about the city's history and roaring like a Viking. They provided plastic Viking helmets for us to wear (as you can see in the bottom left of the picture), but I abstained from wearing them, as my hair (which I had to keep down to fit into the helmet) kept getting in my face with the wind blowing it around. 

We drove around Dublin for a while, passing by some interesting buildings and statues that were central to Dublin's history, including a museum full of artifacts from when the city was partially inhabited by Vikings. We also got to see town tourist sites like the statue of Molly Malone (infamous from the song), Trinity College and Oscar Wilde's birth home. Aside from the landmarks, the city is filled with beautiful architecture from several different time periods, including an entire mile of preserved Georgian homes. There were also a row of homes that were built for American occupancy during WWII. These homes were built by women and expected to last 6 weeks. They're still standing after nearly 70 years. Did I mention they were built by women? That's right. Female empowerment!

After a while, Pat took us toward a dock, where we all put on lifevests. The bus then drove straight off the dock and onto the river that flows through Dublin. While we didn't get to go very far on the water because of the levies installed to allow barges to travel through the water, we did get to see the Bord Gais Energy Theatre and some boats made of concrete. How they float, I'm not sure, but they were pretty interesting to look at. Apparently, the part of the bay we were on is used to give surfing and windboarding lessons. If it weren't so cold here, I may have signed up to take one. But since it is, the thought didn't even cross my mind.

Building inside Trinity College

Once we were done with the Viking Splash tour, I headed up Westmoreland Street to find Trinity College, where I could get in to see the famous Book of Kells, which was originally created by monks over 1200 years ago. However, once I got to the courtyard of the college, the line to get into the building were the book was held was probably over 500 people long. Rather than waste my time standing out in the rain to see the book, I headed to get something to eat and sit out the rain. Admittedly, I did stop along the way to pick up some souvenirs for my family. I'm a shopoholic like that.

A couple of hours later, I figured that I should at least try to find the building where the concert was being held. So I started walking and found myself standing outside of the Button Factory, where a line was already beginning to form four hours before the doors would even open. There I met a couple of girls from Belfast who were also waiting to see The Used. We talked for a little while, mostly about the differences between Ireland, America and Scotland (where they had just gotten back from). It was then that I found out why everyone had been so early getting to the concert hall. 

For anyone who showed up between 5:30 and 6:00, the band held a meet and greet where you could get autographs, hugs and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches from the band. Now, understand that I've been in love with this band since around the 7th grade, so this got me really super excited. As it got closer to the time when they would let us in to meet them, Chloe and I just kept looking at each other like "THIS IS AWESOME!!!" Somehow, we managed to form a group of awesome people that were also waiting for the band to start, including Tommii.

Tommii and Chloe

 Now, Tommii was just as ridiculously excited about the concert as the rest of us, and he didn't even know about the meet and greet. Telling him will remain one of the funniest moments of my life. His excitement level went from about an 8 to a 20+. After his heart calmed down, we all started trying to pass the time by singing along to our favorite songs, naming bands we're obsessed with, listening to the band do sound checks, and looking at the time every 20 seconds. The time finally arrived when they let us in to meet the band. I didn't have my ticket yet, so I had them sign an envelope I had in my purse (lame, I know). Chloe and Tommii both got hugs from Quinn and Bert, and I was green with envy.

Jodie Has a Hitlist (Well, half of it)

After the meet and greet, they stuck us back outside to wait another hour and a half. Of course, it started raining like cats and dogs, so we were all soaked when we finally got inside. They had a coat check, but of course I don't carry cash so I couldn't check my purse or coat. I ended up stuffing my coat into my bag and leaving it on a couch with all my valuables in my pocket. Remarkably, nothing was taken. I guess everyone was too busy enjoying to concert to take the opportunity to steal. The opening band, Jodie Has a Hitlist, started playing at around 8 o'clock and the fun times started. They were good, but everyone was just too excited to see The Used.

Bert McCracken

The crowd started screaming ridiculously loud when the band finally came to the stage (myself included). The real moshing started when they played the first song "Take it Away" (one of my personal favorites). At first, Tommii tried to make sure that none of us girls got hurt. Of course, that didn't last long, and I ended up plastered to the back of another one of the guys who joined our band of misfits while we were waiting outside, Paul. We stayed that close for about three songs because neither of us could find the space to separate. 

Quinn Allman

We were like sardines in a can, and Chloe kept getting knocked back. Since we were so close to the stage, I guess that's to be expected. After the first few songs, everything calmed down a little bit. We got everyone back into the same little area and prepared to dance the night away. We kept looking at each other and screaming along with the music or just screaming in general. Thankfully, Paul made sure to watch my back so that I didn't get injured from that angle, which was a very distinct possibility with how excited/ridiculously crazy everybody was. 

Jeph Howard

Anyway, they played a couple of songs from the new album, but most of them were from the older records, which made me originally fall in love with the band. So, as we were singing, jumping and moshing, I just realized how lucky I am that I got to see my favorite band, especially since the last few months are already going to be engrained in my memory for the rest of my life. The fact that I got to meet them, and actually talk to them, after the last nine years listening to their music, is something that I will likely never again be able to replicate. I am so grateful that I got this opportunity and got to meet some really great new friends in the process. It truly was spectacular.

I actually had to leave the concert about 10 minutes before the end so that I could make my bus, but apparently they allowed to crowd to get pictures with them after the show. Chloe got pictures with Quinn and Jeff, as Bert left early to rest his voice. I am incredibly jealous, but glad that she got the opportunity she was so excited for. After getting some really poor directions from a couple of Dubliners, I finally found my way to the last bus heading to Limerick with about 30 seconds to spare. I managed to get a shower before passing out around 3 AM. I then spent all day in bed today because my feet were like "You're not putting any weight on us today, buddy." I'm just now starting to relax enough to fall asleep, so I'm going to sign off until next time, which will hopefully be May 3rd or 4th.

Until then,

Brooke

As Promised....

...but a day late. I'm finally getting around to writing up the blog post for my day in Dublin for St. Paddy's. While it was highly entertaining and just a little bit fuzzy in my mind, I don't think I will ever truly forget how interesting it was watching how much pride the Irish have on this holiday, the only real holiday set aside just to honor them. It was a beautiful thing to see.

The day started out with a bunch of us international students either waking up still drunk, slightly hung over, or (for losers like me) too early for comfort. We left the school at 7, which meant that I woke up at 5 in order to get everything packed and ready. We then all boarded the bus for Dublin, decked out in all of our greenest finery and ready to have a blast. Most of us hadn't had breakfast, so we stopped at a gas station to get some food and for a bathroom break. All in all, the trip took about 3 hours with breaks and traffic.

And this was before most people got here

They dropped us off in front of the oldest pub in Ireland, The Brazen Head. We were then instructed on how to get to O'Connell Street, where the parade was due to run, and let loose in our groups to find a spot to watch. Keep in mind that we arrived in Dublin at around 10 o'clock and the parade didn't start until 12:30, so a lot of us just headed to a pub to relax until the parade. However, the group that I hung out with headed straight to O'Connell Street in order to secure a good spot for the parade. I have never seen so much green dotting a street in my life.

Group of girls doing traditional dance

We then proceeded to wait for nearly three hours for the parade to begin, with the heavens opening up once for about five minutes to thoroughly soak all of us spectators. Stupidly, I left my coat on the bus, so I was completely freezing at this point. But the cold and the rain was quickly forgotten as the parade started. We saw all of the traditional parade elements like bands and dancers, even some from the United States. Some acts included an Irish flair, like women doing Irish dance down the street and a flock of bagpiping gentlemen decked out in kilts. There were even a couple of dogs wearing traditional togs.

However, once we got all of the more traditional stuff out of the way, it was time for the strange to begin. Apparently, they gave a lot of creative freedom to some of the art schools around Ireland to make interesting acts of their own. Each school then picked a question around which they would center their theme, such as "If the world is spinning, why don't we fall off?". The props and parade dancers ranged from beautiful, to colorful, to downright strange, but all of them were incredibly well made and very entertaining. Although, a couple of times, the members of my group all looked at each other and speculated about the parade would look if we were high.

One of my favorite acts included a girl riding a beautiful white horse. This was the gravity act, so of course she wasn't just riding the horse with a saddle. No. Instead, she chose to ride either standing on the saddle, in a handstand, or dangling off the side of the horse with one foot in the stirrup and a hand touching the ground. And this was while the horse was moving. As someone who has no sense of balance and can manage to trip walking across a flat surface, this truly astounded me. The sheer amount of courage and training that went into doing these stunts had to have required quite a few painful falls.

Another interesting float, though I completely forget the question they used as their theme, included a giant rhinocerous in a wheel chair. Thinking now, I can't even conceive of what idea would make someone go "Let's build a giant rhino! And I know! Let's make him a parapeligic!" Really strange, but very creative and entertaining. It must have required a lot of work to make a float of that size, let alone one that allowed for the head to turn to look at the crowd. All in all, it was the most interesting parade that I have ever seen, and it was due almost entirely to those art schools who astounded us all with their talent and creativity.

One bar's Irish decor

Once the parade was over, it was time for the drinking to begin. I followed the five or six people that I had been standing with at the parade to several different bars. I really had only ever met two of these people once or twice at orientation, but we seemed to get along all right if a little awkwardly. All of the bars were decorated with an Irish theme of course, and packed to capacity with people just celebrating the day that everyone in the world is Irish. Say anything you want about the Irish, but they sure know how to throw a fantastic party on such an enormous scale.


We hopped from one bar to another for hours, trying to catch a glimpse of the Ireland/England game, which ended in a highly disappointing loss of 9-30. Once the game was over, we headed to one more bar before packing it in for the night. The bar had great live music, but was so crowded that you couldn't stand in one place for more than a minute or two without someone inadvertantly molesting you. At least, I hope it was inadvertant. At least two guys got a little too touchy feely for my comfort....but anyway.

When everyone else headed to the next bar, I attempted to find where the bus would pick us up to take us back to U.L. and my warm, dry bed. However, the bus driver told us the entirely wrong place to pick up the stop, and at least 10 of us were left standing outside City Hall waiting for over an hour for the bus. When someone finally called the head of the International Society, it turns out that we were on the wrong side of the city and would have to wait for the next bus. At this point, I can't feel my legs because I'm so cold. Yet, I somehow still found myself the leader of our little herd back to O'Connell Street to catch the next bus home (probably because I had a map of the city). We finally made it to the warm bus and I was reunited with my coat. The bus filled up quickly, and we were back at the University of Limerick at around 2 AM. Overall, a long, strange, but very satisfying day in Dublin. It is perhaps one of the most memorable experiences that I will have here and I wouldn't trade it for anything.

As always, the rest of the pictures will be added to my Flickr account soon, because today is the first of the month and I have free space again!!!

Best,
Brooke

Finally Catching Up

Bunratty Castle

I've severly been neglecting this blog....but in my defense, I've written about 25 pages for different assignments in the last three weeks and had two presentations. I've kinda wanted to jump off a tall building. Oh, well. I'm going to update on my weekend trip to Bunratty Castle and the Rock of Cashel, the second half of the trip I talked about in the last post. I will also try to update on just how crazy St. Patrick's Day in Dublin was and how the last few weeks here have been later this week, since I'll be off for Easter Break!

Blacksmith's Forge in the Folk Park

Okay, well think back to Sunday, March 10th. It's a strain, I know. Especially if you were like me, and had a little bit too much to drink once or twice between now and then. Our morning started out at around 8 AM, so another early day for me. The bus took us to Bunratty Castle, which is in County Clare. It's not too far from Limerick, but the bus ride still kind of felt like it took forever. First thing off the bus, they ushered us into the Bunratty Folk Park, which was a collection of cottages that had been built to replicate the homes that the peasants would have lived in when the castle was first used. They even had authentic-looking furniture in the homes! Of course, everyone else stopped to look at these. Not me. I made a beeline right for the castle.

You can see just how narrow and twisting the stairs are.

The castle had just opened, and my tour group was the first one there. So, I had the castle all to myself. It was kind of nice not having to dodge other tourists on the narrow spiral staircases. Speaking of which, if I keep having to climb these staircases, I fully expect my thighs and calves to be completely toned by the end of the semester. At least these stairs had a metal handrail the whole way up and down. Blarney Castle's was kind of on and off. Not fun when you're squeezing two people onto those narrow stairs, but I digress.

The Dungeon. (It was railed off)

I entered the castle and headed up the stairs to find myself in the dining hall, where they still host authentic medieval banquets for the tourists. There was a man lighting candles in the hall, and he let me venture into the dungeon, where apparently they still stick two or three tourists during the banquet for "offenses" against the actor that plays the lord of the castle. I was definitely feeling a little bit claustrophobic, and I wasn't even in the main pit! The floor rushes you see at the bottom are authentic straw grown in the Folk Park to be as authentic as possible. It was seriously impressive, but still kinda chilling to think of how real prisoners must have felt.

Dining Hall, complete with antler chandelier

From the dungeon, I continued up another staircase to find the winch where they would raise and lower the drawbridge. They didn't really have the drawbridge anymore, but it was still fun to imagine. There was a door off this staircase that gave an eagle eye view of the dining hall. I imagine this view was probably either a guard position or for important guests like nobility. You can see the opening to the dungeon in the lower left corner. This was probably torture, as the prisoners could smell the food being served in the mess hall. I'm willing to bet they weren't given the same quality of food as the guests...if they were given food at all.

The High Table, complete with the Lord's chair

Directly over the dining hall was the Great Hall, where the lord of the castle would settle disputes between peasants and hold audiences with anyone who wanted to speak to him. I'm not sure if the chair they had set up in the hall was the authentic one used by the original lord, but it's highly unlikely. The room was absolutely humongous, and there were authentic tapestries from the castle on the walls, as can be seen in the picture. In one corner of the room in a window, there was an image inlaid into the stone of the wall that was from the original walls of the castle. Pretty cool, if I do say so myself.

Parapet where I dropped my camera...

From the Great Hall, I headed up to the battlements of the castle for some landscape viewing. This is where tragedy struck. I was not looking at my feet (because I was looking at the amazing views of the countryside) and thus did not pay attention to the small trench that ran along the edge of the parapet. Thus, when my foot dropped into it, I had a minor heart attack and threw my wrist out to catch my balance. Since my camera was in my hand when my wrist struck the edge of the parapet, it bounced right out of my hand and off the side of the castle. Cue the dramatic "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO" from me as I watched it fall off the edge of the 15th century castle and onto the street below. If it had landed on the grass, it might have survived. Instead, it bounced off the concrete and was completely destroyed. I had to climb the whole way down the castle and walk around the grounds to find where it hit so that I could retrieve the battery and memory card.

Slightly depressed about my camera, but overall still in a good mood, I took the rest of the pictures in this post on my cell phone, which is why they may look a little weird. After I got the remains of my camera back, I  walked back into the castle and explored some omore of the inside. There were so many different rooms that I can't explain them all, but they were all set up like the inhabitants had just left. They even had a couple of the original garderobes open (though not for use. That would be disgusting.) This is one of the guest apartment bedrooms. The bed would have been considered rather luxurious. Yes, that is a body print in the mattress. Possibly more than one.

Once I was done exploring the castle and the folk park, they shipped us off to the Rock of Cashel. The Rock of Cashel was originally the site of a large manor house, but the lord of the castle gave it and the land it rested on to the Church. They then proceeded to build a large cathedral on the property. This is one of the most beautiful locations I've been to here in Ireland just because it has fallen into ruins. For some reason, it just made everything more special. There were conservation efforts going on to maintain the integrity of the grounds and the structure so that nobody gets hurt, but I'm actually glad to have gone while the cathedral opened up to the sky.

One of my favorite pictures I've taken

When we first got there, it was ridiculously freezing and the winds were enough to blow you off the rock. Luckily, it was possible to find some measure of safety from the elements inside the ruined cathedral. And this is where my breath was taken away. The roof of the cathedral had either collapsed or been blown away, leaving the inside exposed to the elements. Now, this had ruined a lot of the paintings and details on the walls, but I feel like the amount of architecture that was exposed to natural sunlight may have been just as beautiful. Much of the cathdral looks like this, with the tops of the walls sort of crumbling.

Around the outside of the cathedral was a graveyard, with a lot of really antique gravestones marking the passing of their owners. My favorites are those with the celtic cross on top in the background of the picture. I just wish that I had noticed the hose in the bottom left so I could get it out of the picture...
This area was gated off by the conservation crew, and people were trying to get into the main cathedral to see some of the decorative elements they were restoring on the inside of Cormac's Chapel. So I didn't have a lot of time to take pictures here. Inside, however, were some really interesting artifacts from the past.

The first thing I saw when I walked into Cormac's Chapel was a tomb that had been cracked open and cleaned out, so there wasn't anything inside. It would have been interesting to see the original contents, but I guess I'm morbid like that. The sheer detailing on the outside of the tomb was so beautiful. I feel like you could spend hours tracing the intricate knotwork shown on just one side. It was really dark in this room to prevent the growth of organisms on the roof in the other room, so I was glad to catch this bit of sunlight as someone walked in. My cell phone's flash just didn't really cut it.

Once I was done exploring the rooms they were renovating, I ventured back into the cathedral to take some more pictures and try to regain feeling in my hands. Here's another view of the inside of the enormous cathedral. This particular archway is shown in more detail in the picture above, but for some reason, I just kept coming back to this section. A huge piece of the cathedral in the left tophand corner had fallen off and was laying on the ground outside. Of course, this prompted a round of people taking gag pictures of themselves "lifting" the rock. I didn't really desire a picture, but I'm sure you can find them somewhere online.

I continued my exploration of the ruins by heading back inside the reception building, where they had replicas of some of the artifacts they found while excavating the cathedral, including dragons carved into the original castle walls and some Bronze age weapons and tools. Also on display was another tomb, which I presume is also empty. The stone slab on the top is supposedly carved into the relief of the tomb's inhabitant. This sarcophogus was sitting in the back of the museum known as Victor's Hall. It was lying directly beside the original St. Patricks' Cross, which was assumably brought inside to protect it from the elements.

Replica of St. Patrick's Cross

 There was a replica cross placed outside, which is the one I got the clearest picture of. For some reason, a lot of the pictures I took with my cell phone came out really fuzzy.


Well, that was my March 10th. Hopefully, either tomorrow or Saturday I'll write about my adventures in Ireland on St. Paddy's Day. I was in Dublin for the holiday, so you can assume that there were some crazy shenanigans going on.

As always, much love from the land of the leprechauns!

Brooke

Crazy Days

I had the most ridiculously exhausting weekend. For 20 euro, the International Education Division and the International Society managed to keep me competely entertained over the two day period, from the time that I woke up until the time that I stumbled back into my bedroom here in Kilmurry Village. However, I'm only going to tell you about Saturday in this post. Mostly because I don't have most of the pictures from Sunday yet, as they were taken on my cell phone.

So the bus left from the University of Limerick at the ungodly time of 7:30, which meant that I had to be up at 6 in order to get everything ready to go. I was not a happy camper, but I was a hyper one. As the tornadoes ripped through Tennessee this weekend, I was here worrying about my family. Particularily my father, who is a truck driver, as he made his way home. The early hour combined with the lack of sleep to turn me into Miss Talkative, which I'm sure annoyed my roommate Sydney to no end. Once we made it onto the bus and we were on our way, I began to think. I gazed out the window and marveled in the spectacular beauty that is Ireland. Every day, I fall more and more in love with this country. I know deep in my heart that I'm supposed to be here. I could spend every day here for the rest of my life and always find something new to fascinate me. The thought of leaving makes me sad, but I know that if it is right, I will find myself back here in the future. I feel so at peace here, both the land and with myself. I've never felt this way before. After feeling empty for so long, I finally feel like I belong somewhere. It's a great feeling.

The waterfall that the hotel takes its name from.

After that revelation, I finally started to drift off into sleep, only to be woken up when we arrived at our first destination, the Ennistymon Falls Hotel. Here they provided us with some tea (which was fantastic) and raisin scones (which were good once I picked out the raisins) before they made us dance. Yes, we are officially dancing bears. It was difficult to force our feet into the right patterns, but once you got the hang of the steps, you were good. It was a great workout too, which made me really happy that I brought a change of clothes. Once we finished dancing, they stuck us back on the bus and headed off to Lahinch.

As you may remember, Laura, Sydney, Steph and I had already been with to Lahinch with the OPC. Since we had some more time this go around, we ventured away from the sand and the sea to the cliffs in the distance. No matter how many times you see something, the site of such a beautiful place will never fail to take your breath away. Of course, since it rains so freaking much here, the cliffs were kinda muddy. Being the clutz that I am, I of course had to slip in the mud and end up with one leg entirely covered with the brown gook. This made me doubly glad that I packed an extra set of clothes.

After we were done at Lahinch, we all stuffed ourselves back into our coach buses to head back to the hotel, where they plied us with quarter sandwiches, soup, and our dubiously dubbed "yellow drink." None of the people at our table could figure out what it was, but it was delicious. The sandwiches weren't half bad either. Of course, we were one of the few tables who thought so, as almost everyone else still had sandwiches on their plates. Of course, since we couldn't let food go to waste....we brought their plates back to our table where the rest of the sandwiches were quickly devoured. Yes, we are pigs, and we are proud.

The shiny rock in the picture is exposed limestone.

It was then time to get back into the buses and head for the Burren. Which I have also been to before, but we headed to another side. The OPC trip focused mainly on the cliffs, while the International Education department trip headed more inland for a more nature based experience. Each of the four buses got our own guides, who told us more about the history of the area as we drove through. Originally, Ireland was mainly underwater, which left huge deposits of limestone at the bottom of the sea. As time passed and the water receeded, these large fields of limestone were revealed at the Burren, which is the largest collection of limestone rock in the world.  Forgive the quality of the picture, it was taken from a moving bus.

At this point, I was thoroughly exhausted, and kept drifting off. However, I did wake up long enough to take pictures of Mary O'Brien's Castle. We had to take pictures from the bus, which explains the random handicapped sticker floating in the frame. Legend has it that, when her first husband died, she married another man the next day because women weren't allowed to hold land. When she birthed her first male heir, she supposedly pushed her husband off of the roof of the castle in order to be able to control the castle as the proxy for her son. Female empowerment at its most violent.

A bear pit and some remains believed to be 2,000 years old.

The trip took us further into the Burren until we arrived at Aillwee Caves. They were discovered in the 1940's by a local farmer when his dog disappeared. He found the dog at the entrance to the caves, which had been covered for millenia. Remains of brown bears and indentations of their nesting sites were discovered close to the entrance, which is understandably exciting, as brown bears have not been seen in Ireland for nearly 2,000 years. They are a third of a mile long and have some really impressive natural cave formations present, including one that looks like a pair of hands in prayer. There are also several waterfalls in the caves.

Once we were all through the tour of the caves and had done a little frivolous shopping, we headed back into the bus for the remainder of our tour of the Burren. We came across the Poulnabrone Dolmen, a portal tomb created 4000 years ago as a grave chamber in a cairn of stacked stones. This dolmen is believed to be the oldest set of stacked stones in the world, even older than the more famous Stonehenge. This picture was taken from Wikipedia, as I was too slow to catch a picture of it from the bus. I wish we could have actually seen it this close, but maybe some other time I'll get the opportunity.

Once we were out of the Burren, we headed back to the Falls Hotel and Spa to eat some dinner. I ordered the chicken in a mushroom sauce, and it was absolutely delicious. Honestly, I think I could have eaten two or three more plates, even though I was completely stuffed by the end of the meal. It was that good. Plus, they served ice cream in a waffle bowl for dessert, which was amazing. By the time we were all back in the bus and headed home, I think we were all in a sort of food coma, as it was very quiet. The majority of people slept, but I just couldn't get comfortable. Overall, it was one of the best 5 euro I've ever spent!

Well, that was my Saturday. Sunday was slightly more exciting and a little more tragic. I'll explain that comment in the next post, however. As always, more pictures of this trip are available on my Facebook page, though quite a few of them are mysteriously blurry for some reason.

Best,
Brooke

A Bunch of Blarney

Hello! My life has been positively crazy for the last few days as I desperately fought to have the internet repaired in my house. It was finally finished today, nearly a week since I reported the problem. But I guess that is life. I should be glad that it was fixed that quickly, I guess.

Well, this weekend, I travelled about two hours to the illustrious land of Blarney Castle in County Cork, Ireland. Honestly, though the drive was long and the person next to me would not stop talking (even to let me contribute something), I had a great time exploring my second castle since I've been here. I met a couple of really cool people, and I reunited with a couple of people that I met while drunk in a dark bar. They were drunk, not me. I'm too classy. XD For 15 euro, we got the bus to and from the castle, entrance into the grounds, and a trip into Cork for a little shopping (which I really didn't get to do). Everything was worth it, however, when I walked into the grounds and caught my first glimpse of the castle. Absolutely gorgeous.

I wandered around the grounds for a while, until I found the dungeons. There really wasn't a whole lot to see if you weren't willing to crawl on your hands and knees into the actual cell, but it gave you the general idea of how miserable it would have been to be a prisoner. Not fun, and really damp. I ventured back out of the dungeons and finally found the entrance to the castle itself. Of course, once you are inside, the stairways up to the battlements are narrow and spiral, so its kinda scary when you are trying to go up when someone else is coming down. And steep as all get out. When I got to the battlements (where the Blarney Stone is located) by thighs were burning.

But along the way, there were various little nooks and crannies where you could pop in and explore the castle the way that the original inhabitants would walk through it. The rooms were veerrrryyyy small, with narrow hallways and shallow ceilings. They were obviously short and sylph-like in the 14th century (probably from walking up and down those stairs all the time). The decorations on the walls did not survive the centuries because of the open designs of the windows, but you can still almost imagine how the room would look when the lady of the house or a visiting noble would lay their heads at bedtimes.

At the top of the spiral staircase was an open and entirely beautiful view of the grounds of the castle. Luckily, it was a unusually warm and sunny day as there was no covering. You could either look out over the grounds or down into the great hall, which was where the family would go to eat and spend time together in what would be the warmest and most comfortable room in the castle. I did take a picture of the view into the great hall, but I'll put that up a little later. Here is the view out of the battlement on the grounds. I still can't get over how GREEN everything is here. In the middle of February, everything at home would be brown or white.

The Blarney Stone is the long rectangular stone at the bottom

Once I took my pictures of the grounds, I got in line to kiss the infamous Blarney Stone. In order to get access to the stone, you have to lay on your back (luckily on a plastic mat as the stones were still wet), grab two metal bars that were bolted into the wall, then slide your body backwards until you're relying entirely on your arm strength and the Irish guy who was spotting you to keep from breaking your neck. If you can get over your vertigo for a second, you can easily then kiss the stone and the guide will (hopefully) help you get back up. It's a vaguely terrifying experience, but it would have been ridiculous not to do it. It's something I can brag about for years to come. XD

Once I was done kissing the stone and the blood had rushed back from my head, I worked my way away from the opening in the floor and peeped down over a railing to the great hall. Here is the infamous picture I was telling you about. It's a long way down! All of the holes on the upper level were called murder holes. This was because cauldrons with boiling oil were placed in the holes. Should the castle be invaded, the occupants would tip these cauldrons onto the unsuspecting heads of the invaders for a likely rather uncomfortable bath. There were the remains of what would have been a really elaborate fresco on the wall under where I was standing.

Once I was done exploring the castle, I met up with some of the American international students that were staying in the same village as me and we explored the grounds. We wandered around a fern garden for a while, all of us talking about how beautiful and green everything is here. Matt, who is from Alabama, and Meg (Philly area) happened to find a really interesting nature loa in the garden, which was carved out of the trunk of the same species of tree that grew in the area. It was just one example of how the most unexpected things can appear when you aren't really looking for them. We didn't find any leprechauns, though!

After the gardens, we wandered around the grounds until we happened upon a cave located underneath the castle. It is said that this cave was where the owners of the castle fled under threat of an English siege, carrying with them a gold plate that the English lord thought to claim for himself as a prize. However, once the siege was declared useless (as the people were all gone), the lord left and the people came back. It is said that the golden plate, however, has still never been recovered. We didn't happen upon the plate, but we did get a few goose eggs from the low ceilings, and some mud on our jeans from exploring. Their roommate, Johlt, also found another pathway through the caves that Meg and I were too concerned with our clothing to explore.

After Blarney Castle, we headed into Cork for some shopping for a couple of hours, then took all of our thoroughly exhausted bodies back home, where we all crashed. Sunday, as it turned out, was a completely lazy day before my thoroughly exhausting Monday. As always, more pictures of my adventures both in Blarney and in the Cork City Centre are posted on Facebook. Any questions or comments can be added below.

Best,
Brooke

Hatters and Hares

As the title implies, the last two weeks have been MAD!!! Crazy, that is. The International Society and classes have had us poor exhange students running ourselves what feels like all over Ireland. And there may be some truth to that. We've had signups for trips around the country, signups for clubs, signups for classes and tutorials, and signups for other signups. Well, that last part may be exaggerated, but not by much. The preparation has paid off, however, as we have begun to take trips with our respective clubs and societies.

Yeah, the cliff behind the guy in red. 

For example, yesterday was the Outdoor Pursuits Club's journey to The Burren for rock climbing.  Being on this trip, I was expecting to make a fool of myself by not being able to make it the whole way up the cliffside. Just to give you an idea, here's a look at the cliff they wanted us to scale.

However, because the rocks were too wet to climb (because this is Ireland and it's always freaking raining), they decided that it was not safe for us poor beginners to attempt to climb this cliff. My thighs and my dignity thanked them.

Instead, we took a hike of the area, a set of cliffs that overlook the Atlantic Ocean called the Burren. While some climbing was involved, it was more like this >>
than the whole fall-to-your-death thing they had planned. Which was also a relief. Overall, we all had a great time slipping on rocks and risking our lives just to get a peep at where the ocean hits the bottom of the cliff. Really, it was a beautiful experience and one I will likely never forget. Because of strong headwinds, the guides had to keep telling us to back up. Actually, the way they phrased it was "We're not fishing Americans out of the ocean today, guys! The water is too cold." -_-

Having more balls than brains, I risked my life to get the perfect picture to summarize how beautiful this experience really was. The Atlantic really is prettier on this side of the pond. The sound of the water hitting the rocks was especially soothing. Particularily since it was like 10 o'clock on a Sunday morning after a Saturday spent out with friends at the bar. One of my new German friends, Thomas, took a picture of me on the edge, but hasn't sent it to me yet. I'll include it on the next post so that you can all applaud me for my bravery. XD

Since we were so unfortunate as to not be able to rock climb at the Burren, the guides decided that we could spend the rest of our day relaxing at the beach. Lahinch Beach in County Clare was the next stop on our fantastic Sunday voyage. However, it didn't really feel like a beach (probably because it was so freaking cold). But we took a walk on the sand and enjoyed each other's company. We picked up shells and skipped rocks as we walked along the shore until we reached a bridge at the end of the beach. As we waited for stragglers, one of the senior members found a balloon in her pack and balloon rugby was founded.
I didn't get any good pictures of some of the fantastic tackles that went on. Suffice to say, more than one person went home with sand in their shorts. Sadly, the balloon did not make it home, as it was tragically killed in the first play of the game. Its remains, however, were passed from one member of the OPC to another for several minutes after its demise. Once all of the stragglers were accounted for and we did a buddy check like good little fifth graders, we all stood by patiently for a group shot before heading back to the other end of the beach, where the town starts and the pub beckoned.

However, because some of the members are completely crazy (like the Thomas I mentioned before) they thought it would be a fantastic idea to strip to their underwear and go for a nice swim in the ice cold ocean. Did I mention that it was 9 degrees Celsius outside? That's about 48 degrees Farenheit. Not nearly warm enough for sane people to go swimming, but as I said before, the first few weeks drove us crazy. Or at least that's my excuse. Once they were done being crazy and were dressed again, we headed back to the bus for our dry clothing and went out to the pub to watch the Ireland v. Wales rugby game, which was lost in the last minute due to a penalty on Ireland's part. It was not a fun bus ride home. XD

Even though it was cold and exhausting, I still had a fantastic time on my first look of Ireland outside of Limerick and UL. And I still had enough energy to finish out the night at the bar with a couple of friends, so all was great. Hope you all had as nice of a weekend as I did, and hope your week promises to be a fantastic as mine. I'm leaving for Scotland on Thursday, so there will most definitely be a new post by Saturday at the latest.

As always,
Brooke