Dublin, Doolin and Devin

March 22-28 1:00 p.m.

Sorry everyone for the delay on blogs!! I know I haven't updated anyone on galway or st. paddys, but i journaled it so I promise I remember!! I know many people are anxious to hear how my week went this week due to a special someone coming and visiting, so I figured I would update everyone!! Monday morning I woke up extremely excited at 5:30 in order to get ready and catch a bus to the airport to meet Devin who was due to arrive at 8:00. I checked his flight and it said it was going to land at 7:30, I almost had a heart attack. He did not know that I was going to meet him there so I had given him instructions on what bus to get on and where to get off ect. ect. and I knew that he would be on a mission to get on that bus right when he got there and I wasn't due to arrive at the airport until 8:00. Oh wow...but anyway I waited for him and when I saw him come through the doors I went to go run after him. Well...there were many tall skinny dark haired men on his flight so I had a bit of a problem trying to locate him..finally I saw him walking through the doors towards the buses so I took off in a sprint after him. I was out of breath after getting him...but the hug he gave me made up for it. During the bus ride to my apartment he was in awe at the surroundings..the way I was at the beginning of the trip.
He was a sleepy boy by the time we got back to the apartment due to not sleeping at all the 9 hour plane ride here, but after a short rest he was ready to go. My roomates were walking back from class when we left to go to the Guinness Factory so he got to meet them which was really nice...I'm sure they all already feel like they know each other from how much I talk about everyone to everyone else!
The Guinness Factory was really neat!! It was 6 levels going up in a cylindar shape. Each level had a different part of the guinness story behind it. One level was the history behind guinness..we saw the lease that Arthur Guinness signed for 9,000 years for 45 Great British Pounds a year..insane!! The next few levels were ingredients and how Guinness is made and one level was advertising. The best level by far though was the very top, the gravity bar. It is a 360 degree view of Dublin which is breath taking.
After the Guinness Factory we walked around Phoenix Park, a huge huge huge park where the President of Ireland lives. The swans and ducks are out now and the weather was beautiful. We stayed there until dark and then came back, ate supper, and went to sleep.
Tuesday we got up decently early in order to do some sightseeing before I had class! I showed him the Dublin Castle, in order to save some money, I just gave him a tour of the outside from what I remembered. After the castle we went back into the Chester Beatty Library. After reading my blog on its religion exhibits Devin became really interested and wanted to check it out. So we did..and I loved it just as much the second time as the first time, I even caught some details that I did not realize before, such as different aspects to Islam.
We walked around a little bit after that, i pointed out different parts of the city, some historical, and some that were just important to me. I have discovered that I'm not that great of a tour guide but thats ok! I brought him to my favorite coffee shop, the Bald Barista where we split a sandwich and had our mochas before heading off to class. The original plan was that Devin was going to go find Ireland's soccer stadium while I was in class..but it was quite the walk away so he decided to come to class with me. It was Abnormal Psychology and I think it might have swayed him to become a psychologist now...haha just kidding. After class we went souvenier shopping, then for a walk in St. Stephen's Green Park where there were more beautiful swans and ducks. We sat in the park awhile and just chatted which was really nice. By this point we were hungry so we went to the Purty Kitchen which is supposed to have good Irish food but their kitchen was not working so they were not serving food. So we ended up having wood oven pizza at this cute little place that I didn't know existed...it was wonderful! After the pizza we tried going back to St. Stephens Green to walk it off, but it was closed up, so we just walked around Graffton Street a bit then headed back home..we had an early morning the next morning!
The next morning we had scheduled to take a tour of Wicklow and Glendalough in the mountains. So at 8:30 we treked over to O'Connell street to meet the van that was scheduled to take us. We had a really cool informative tour guide which was awesome! A few more people joined us. There was even a family from Arizona, they were fun! The tour guide kept making reference to me since I had told him I had been there since January. Everytime he brought up a pub he would ask who had been there..I raised my hand for all of them...so now everyone probably thought that I was an alcoholic on there but thats ok..In reality I had either had food or went to listen to music at all of them, but people will think what they will think! So much happened on the tour I know I wn't be able to describe it all...but everywhere was absolutely amazing. Glendalough was beautiful..it had an extremely old christian cemetary and tower where monks used to hide and vikings used to kill them. The ruins of an old monastary was there and he walked us trhough, really bringing the story alive for us. In the backdrop were beautiful mountains and trees and flowers...the pictures are beautiful but do no justice to the beauty of Glendalough. From there we went up to lunch in a nearby town then headed further up into the mountains. He stopped the car every now and then to let us get out and take in the beauty around us. Fields of soon to be blooming heather were everywhere, and bogs with bog cotton surrounded us. I even stood on the bridge/street where P.S. I love you was filmed!!!! pretty much famous now :) We saw a mansion where Michael Jackson and Tiger Woods had rented out before..it was originally a wedding gift from a member of Arthur Guinness's family to his new bride. It was beautiful, set along a lake....we saw waterfalls and every natural beauty you could imagine. A lot of sheep as well...we even had to stop the van for them a few times to let them go across.
Upon returning back into Dublin it was decently late and we were sleepy from traveling all day..so i made some paninis and we went to bed early because we had yet another early morning ahead of us
Thursday morning we got on the 7:00 a.m. bus to Galway. It was a 3.5 hour bus ride..but very worth it..we were meaning to get a connecting bus to Doolin from there. The only buses that leave Galway to Doolin were at 10:30 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. Our bus got in at 10:34 p.m. So we had several hours to kill in rainy Galway. But we had a great time just relaxing in a coffee shop and when it cleared up we hung out in a park. It was a good lazy day. At 6:00 we got on the bus to take to Doolin, thinking it would take a 1/2 hour. WRONG. It was an hour and forty five minute jaunt up curvy mountain roads right next to the ocean. It was beautiful and would have been wonderful besides the point that Devin and I had eaten fries with a very strange sauce on them right before we got on the bus and that caught up with us. I was ok besides stomach pains, but Devin had to lie down on my lap awhile while i put water on his head in order to cool him down...those roads were nasty! We finally arrived in Doolin, the bus driver was sweet enough to drop us off right where we needed to be. We hadn't even been walking a minute when I car came down and a man asked us if we were looking for the Daly House we said yes and he told us to hop in...and he brought us the rest of the 30 second walk back up to the Daly house. As soon as we walked into the door Paul (the man who brought us up) and Susan made us feel so at home. Susan went and made Irish coffees and brought us those and cookies while chatting with us about our trips and our travels. They were so sweet!! It was 8:30 by that point and both of us were still feeling sick so we went to sleep and got up early to have breakfast at 8:00. In the brightness of the beautiful day we could see how beautiful little Doolin actually is. From where we were eating breakfast you could just look out and see a 13th century castle, Doonagore castle. And everywhere you looked, earth's natural beauty was there to behold. Beautiful blue ocean that rose up to meet beautiful green mountains. Horses, cows and sheep dotted everywhere you looked and with every turn of the head new old beautiful historic ruins were there to behold. After eating an amazing breakfast prepared by Susan we went out walking to discover how tiny Doolin really is, a town of two roads really. It was a beautiful beautiful day and the sky was clear. We walked around all day. At noon we went on a tour of the Doolin Cave. A cave that opened up only two years ago. It is 200 feet underground and holds the biggest stalictite in the world! An inch forms every 1,000 years so that baby had been growing a long long long long long time! Thank goodness for the hard hats because we hit our heads on several occassions!! It was very very neat getting to see that. Afterwards we went to McGann's pub to have lunch then set out for the Cliffs of Moher. Paul was kind enough to drive us up and drop us off at the Cliffs. I can't even begin to describe how amazing this place is. The very edge of Ireland that drops 800 feet into the Atlantic Ocean...its beautiful! O'Brien's Tower sits on the edge of the Cliff overlooking the water. Devin and I just stared in awe for awhile. We took a lot of pictures but none of them capture even 1/3 of the beauty. We even saw a couple taking engagement pictures by them, i'm sure those will turn out beautiful!
From the Cliffs it was a 5 mile trek back to Doolin but thats ok, the views on the way back were amazing. Ocean, Doonagore Castle, sheep, cows, people...it was great! When we got back we went to O'Conner's pub and listened to some music. Doolin is where the traditional irish music started! We ate some fish and chips and jammed out for a few hours. You will have to ask Devin about his Irish girlfriends...
The next morning we unfortunately had to leave. We wanted to catch the 12:30 bus only to discover that the 12:30 bus didn't run that day..so we had waited for quite awhile for nothing but thats ok! The next bus wasn't until 1:45 so we went to O'Conner's to try their famous guinness stew....WOW it was AMAZING!! Huge chunks of beef, potatoes, and carrots, in this delicious guinness sauce. If you ever get the chance to try it..DO IT!!
We caught the bus and then were traveling back to Dublin for the next several hours but we had a great time listening to music, looking at scenery, and laughing...when we got back I took him to a pub called Fitzsimons to listen to music. The time change happened that morning so we didn't return home until technically 2:30..we had thought his flight was at noon, but we discovered when we got back that it was at 7:00 a.m. So we didn't get to much time to say goodbye due to having to rush to the airport..but its probably for the best...less time to be sad when we were together. It was an absolutely amazing week and I can't wait to see everyone again!