there's nothing nicer than a Galway hooker

Finally, after more than a year and a half, I have finally returned to Ireland. Now to back up, for those of you that don't know, I lived in Ireland (Dublin, more specifically) for two months during the summer of 2012, and I loved every second of it. I couldn't wait to go back, and Paddy's Day seemed like an appropriate time to do it. I even got the Tufts-in-Tübingen crew to come with me. Well, all of them minus Marlena. 

On Sunday, the day before Paddy's Day, we flew from Frankfurt into Dublin. The flight was short and painless and had free wine, and we got into Dublin around 17. Instead of taking that stupidly expensive Airlink bus, I brought us to the Dublin Bus stop. However, that's when our problems started. I had hoped there was money on my Leapcard (a card that, when loaded up, is good for transportation all around Dublin), but unfortunately there wasn't. The Dublin Bus, while a decent bus system, is possibly the largest pain in the ass if you aren't from there. They accept only coins, and the ticket machines are very rare. (And when they do exist, they rarely work.) After Julius, Theron, and I got on the bus; Elizabeth and Yasmine were sent to the ticket machine that didn't work and then left at the airport. So that wasn't ideal. But we all ended up meeting up in city centre, because the Spire is wonderful and a great meeting point. 

After that little debacle, we continued onto our second debacle: the hotel. We booked this little adventure in January, and by then, there was not a single hostel in Dublin with availability. So we found the cheapest hotel that we could, booked a two-person room for two nights and hoped that we could sneak all five of us into it. When I google-mapped the place before, it seemed easy enough. Right on the Liffey, just have to keep walking East. But, as it turns out, the hotel changed its name without letting anyone know. So we went a little bit further than was originally planned and only ended up finding it because we went into the Spencer to ask where the Clarion was. "This is the Clarion," they responded, as if that should be completely obvious. After sneaking five people's-worth of luggage up to our hotel room, we went to something I had been looking forward to for months: The Counter. The Counter is a wonderful burger joint on Suffolk Street, right near Trinity College and Grafton Street. From the outside the place is pretty unremarkable, and you can easily walk by without even noticing it, but they make a mean burger, and having lived in Germany for the past 7 months, I have been craving a good American-style burger. (Because German burgers, while good if you don't have anything to compare them to, just don't stand up to American burgers.) So I brought the Tufts-in-Tübingen crowd and Yasmine's friend, Tori, who is studying at UCD for the semester, to The Counter. We had burgers and cosmos (my old Counter tradition), and it was wonderful. I also met up with Megan and Bri (two of my housemates from when I lived in Dublin) there, and that was a surreal and really great reunion. 

I didn't get to talk with them much that night, though, because after the Counter, we all decided to head up to my friend Shane's place. Shane sublet from my friend's in Boston this past summer but is Irish and lives in Dublin. We had agreed to meet up while I was there, and he invited all of us over to his house to hang out on Sunday night. And strangely enough, his house was about a five minute walk from where I had lived, so getting there was pretty simple. We ended up hanging out with him and his friends until about 3AM, when we caught a cab back into town in order to wake up early for the Paddy's Day parade. 

The parade started at noon, but we woke up early. We got there around noon, just as it was supposed to be starting but the entire place was absolutely mobbed. There was no way to see the parade, unless you were four years old and sitting on someone's shoulders. But we made our way towards Trinity and found a decent place to stand by the statue of Henry Grattan. The parade got to us about 45 minutes after the start time, and we didn't stay long on account of not being able to see much and the desire to get back to The Counter. Yes, my friends enjoyed The Counter so much that they wanted to go back roughly 18 hours later. I felt accomplished. 

After our delicious, second-round of burgers, we waited at the head of Grafton Street for our Irish friend Eimear, who studies with us in Tübingen. We caught up with her and walked around Stephen's Green and Merrion Square (where I had worked whilst living in Dublin). We went our separate ways, though, after Julius managed to attract an entire group of 14 year-olds, who swarmed us like pigeons. Shortly thereafter, Yasmine, Theron, and I did the same and went back to the hotel to take a nap. Elizabeth and Julius got back a little while later, and after a little while, we met up with Shane at the Spire. He took us to a bar south of the Liffey but in the eastern part of town called O'Reilly's. It a cool little bar built under the railroad tracks that has pints for very cheap. It was pretty cool, but Shane had to leave us for a little bit, because his drunk housemate lost his keys. We were supposed to meet up at a club in Temple Bar called the Button Factory, but that didn't end up working out. Temple Bar was absolutely disgusting that night with drunk people and garbage everywhere. We tried to get into the Button Factory, but it was a mad house. So instead of staying amongst the garbage and absolutely packed bars and clubs, we decided to go back to the hotel. 

The next morning we woke up around 10 and commenced the packing process. We were hoping that getting everything out of the hostel would be as chill as getting it in, as we hadn't messed up anything with the whole cram-five-people-into-a-two-person-room thing yet. Fortunately, that all went off without a hitch. We then went, got bagels, and then made for Heuston Station to catch our train to Galway. 

We got to Galway and our hostel, Barnacles Hostel, without any problems. Barnacles is right on Quay Street, one of the main streets in Galway, and very close to the ocean. So after dropping off our stuff, we decided to go exploring and wander along the beach. It was a little cold and windy, but still absolutely marvelous, especially because we have been land-locked in Tübingen for so long. After our walk, we went to a seafood place about 20 feet from our hostel (and recommended to us by the hostel) called McDonough's, where we got really, really good seafood chowder, fish n' chips, and Guinness. Gah, the fish. How I have missed the Irish fish! After that, we went back to the hostel, took a nap, and headed out in search of Irish music, which we found at Taaffe's. I also had me a really good whiskey ginger. It was just a lovely night, but we went to bed early because we had an early morning for our Cliffs of Moher tour. 

Dunguaire Castle

I figured it would be better to do the Cliffs of Moher the first day. The trip required little planning because there were tours going there all the time and there were a hell of a lot of tours. We got to the bus station at 9:45 for our 10AM tour and got seats in the back of the bus. Unlike the last time I went to the Cliffs of Moher, this whole thing would take us to a bunch of different places, like The Burren and Dunguaire Castle. Our tour guide was a little Irish man named Gary, who used the phrase "in itself" way too frequently and nonsensically. (For example, "there you see the chimney, where the family would do all of their cooking in itself.") But we had a wonderful day of touring, seeing The Burren (a really interesting part of Ireland with limestone covering most of the ground), Dunguaire Castle (which is really just a lookout tower), Corcomroe Abbey (an old church), and finally the Cliffs of Moher. Other highlights include a really tasty beef and guinness stew at a pub in Doolin and finding a Milwaukee Irishfest bumper sticker at said pub in Doolin. 


Then there were the Cliffs. The Cliffs of Moher are pretty brilliant. Gary gave us the whole schtick about don't go where the signs tell you not to, but that's the best part. So Yasmine, Elizabeth, and I made straight for the Cliffs. (The boys went to the recommended, and in my opinion, over-rated O'Brien Lookout Tower.) We did some cliff-walking, which was windy and cold and wonderful. We were lucky the weather had held-up otherwise it would have been a lot worse. 

After the Cliffs, we drove along the Atlantic coast for a while, stopping briefly at another cliff, and then made our way back to Galway with Gary blabbering on about leprechauns and "in itself" most of the way. We got back around 19 and after brief contemplation, decided to get an Irish breakfast for dinner (an Irish brinner), as it may have been our only chance to have one. And that was a good decision, because it was absolutely delicious. 

Afterwards, we decided to hit up a bar called Monroe's because they were having "world music" (ie salsa and other fancy types of dancing) night, and Elizabeth really wanted to go. The pub ended up being really cool (with just enough similarities to the Loj to make me a little home sick for it), and Elizabeth taught us to dance (or at least, tried to, I am not the most graceful human). 

View from Dún Arainn

The next morning, it was rainy and miserable. We figured that our good weather (at least for Ireland) streak had run out. But we boarded a bus bound for the ferry bound for the Aran Islands, because it was our last day in Galway, and the Aran Islands are incredible. After a rough crossing, we made it there, and much to our surprise, the sun was out. We met Mister Oliver Faherty at the docks, and he took us around the island in his van. And strangely enough, it was only us. I guess we get rewarded for our perseverance. Anyways, I guess I should give a little bit of background info. Three islands make up the Aran Islands, which lie off the coast of Galway: Inis Mór (pronounced een-ish-more, the largest, 11miles by 3miles, population 800), Inis Meadhóin (pronounced: een-ish-man, population 300), and Inis Oirthir (pronounced een-ish-eer, population 200). They are a Gaeltacht (an Irish-speaking area). Seriously, the language used in the home and stores and stuff is Irish. It's really cool. The economy is based upon tourism, fishing, and a little bit of farming, and they are known for their (really cozy and wonderful) sweaters. They didn't get electricity until 1975 and have one small supermarket on the islands (located on Inis Mór; it's a Spar.)

So I guess that gives you an idea of what kind of place I am talking about. Mr. Faherty started the tour by bringing us up to a fort called Dún Arainn, which was supposed to be closed for renovations, but he didn't say anything so neither did we. It was absolutely incredible. This fort is on the tallest point of Inis Mór. We spent probably 45 minutes, climbing on stone fences and admiring the view, which, as you can see above, is pretty breath-taking. 

Dún Aonghasa

Afterwards, we continued on towards Dún Aonghasa (pronounced dun angus), which is the most famous fort on the island and sits right on the edge of a cliff. Oliver dropped us off for about two hours. Before heading up to the Cliff, I went into some of the shops and bought Dip a Claddagh ring and myself a wonderful cozy green sweater. The five of us also had a wonderful chat with Sarah Flaherty, the woman selling the sweaters, who told us that the whole family sweater pattern thing is a load of crap. (I had heard from multiple people that each family on the islands had their own sweater pattern, that way if someone got lost at sea while fishing and turned up later, you could identify the body...morbid, I know.) The more you know. But in any case, the sweater I bought is really cool and intricate. 

After the sweater-buying excursion, we made our way up to the fort. May I reiterate how incredible this place is. These cliffs abut the Atlantic. You can tangle your feet over. It's probably my favourite place in all of Ireland. Up on the cliffs, we had a picnic with cheese, sausage, and baguettes that we had bought from the grocery store. Eventually, we headed back to meet up with Oliver.

We continued the journey to the northern-most point on the island, which has a beautiful, albeit very rocky beach, where we hung out and enjoyed being so close to water. 

We finished our tour by the Seven Churches, which is actually two churches and some other church-related living quarters, which had their roofs burned off them by Oliver Cromwell. (Oliver Cromwell was a proper prick, in case you had some sort of misplaced positive notions about him or something. Before he came, the Inis Mór had 2,000 people on it...then he killed them and anything else that moved or seemed Irish.) Anyways, the seven churches are pretty incredible especially when you have the place pretty much to yourself. Oh and we met a really friendly donkey. 

After the churches, we had a pint and then got on the ferry home. That night we had one last fish n' chips at McDonough's and then went back to Monroe's for live music and fun. And that was about it. The next day we got up early for 12+ hours of travel back to Tübingen. 

That's all I got for ya, dudes. I am not really sure as of right now where my adventures for the remainder of the break will take me, but I will keep you posted. With that, bis später, dudes.

Oh and P.S. a Galway hooker is a boat, you dirty-minded people.