Well from now on I'm titling all posts with a song lyric about the city I'm in. YEAH CREATIVITY. You *should* try to guess without cheating by looking at the itinerary, btw.
EuroTrip has begun! Rafa and I are just about to leave Galway departing for Madrid, and it was an awesome way to start the month. We were supposed to leave early-ish for Galway on Friday by bus, like 9am, but per our usual routine did not get on the bus until 1pm haha. Nbd, cause we probably wouldn’t have done anything anyway since the bus ride kinda killed us. We had to change buses in Limerick, but it def took us almost 2 hours to get there…except Limerick is totally only an hour away. Fml. I slept most of the way, since I’ve started pulling a Rafa and staying up really late the night before I travel so I immediately pass out. We got to our hostel and crashed for a while before going out exploring. We were talking to a random Australian dude (who, side note, is on an Australian style football team here in Galway with lots of other Australians) and mentioned that we were going to a pub to see the Connacht vs Edinburgh rugby match (for the Magner’s League) that night. He told us it would be so much better in person, and told us that we could get tickets AT the stadium, which was a 15 min walk from our hostel. EPIC WIN TO THE MAX. So we went, I was a child and got free things (flag and keychain ftw), Rafa got her long-desired burger, and Connacht won! It was a really good game, 27-23 at the end, and even though it rained and was super cold towards the end we had a great time. The sad thing about Munster is that it’s so big that we can’t get tickets except far in advance. The Connacht tix were 15 euro at the gate, which made me happy beyond belief. And we were right up on the fence right behind the players’ bench talking to them, something that doesn’t usually happen at pro games. I thought the men’s team at UCC was huge—these guys were absolute monsters. There was one 2nd row who was def 6’7” AND got lifted in the lineout…he was like the height of a small building. There were a lot of primary school ruggers there too, marching around cheering loudly. One little kid was sitting on the wall next to Rafa with his Pringles and Coke, but knocked the Pringles on the ground. Well that didn’t stop him, cause he went and collected them all in the can. He did start eating them too, but kinda chew-spit one out back on the ground, left, came back and continued eating the rest. Lolz.
Saturday was not, sadly, a rugby day, but it was a day trip to the Aran Islands, for us it was Inismor. We got a student deal for 2 days—Aran Islands and Connemara. The island was awesome and it was a gorgeous day perfect for sightseeing. Rafa and I decided to be frugal and brave and walk to all the places instead of taking a tour bus or renting a bike, and we actually made it like 2 miles UPHILL to the highest point on the island (which was actually off the beaten path and up another freaking hill). There are only about 800 people on the island at any given time, so there is a lot of open land. There are 3 primary schools, 3 churches, and 6 pubs haha. There is an Irish college on the island where mainlanders can come for a summer to learn the language, which is still spoken on the island. The crazy thing about the farmers on Inismor is that the ground is pure limestone—no dirt at all. They basically took seaweed and sand and layered it a couple inches thick to create workable soil, and even then it’s rather sparse. There are cows and horses but no huge herds. No mainlander is allowed to build on the island, only buy a pre-built house, and to build at all you have to prove that you live and work there and will live in the house for at least 10 years, so it’s a pretty small community. Anyway, at the lighthouse we met a tour bus with a family in it, and the driver offered us a ride for a discount, and we def took him up on it. Good thing too, cause we wouldn’t have made it to Dún Aeongus otherwise. It’s a 3000 year old fort on the edge of a 100m cliff, with 2 huuuuuuuge stone walls that originally contained 6700 tonnes of stone and a field of stone pillars called cheveaux de frise. They’re all upright and close together so getting through them is still hard today even though many have worn or been taken away. We went right to the edge, which I got out of my system so when Mom comes to visit I won’t have to look over :P We saw many many cool things, like the smallest church in the world, but at 5 we were happy to be going home. Slept again, despite the annoying Italian girls behind us who talked THE ENTIRE TIME. Wtf, fools. We ended up watching Project Runway (Season 2) on my comp for a couple hours cause I didn’t have internet (had to pay…ew)…I think we’ll be doing that a lot lol. Did try going out, failed at finding a pub, and ended up at Supermacs to get milkshakes. Random thing: we both checked our accounts and found extra money in them, so we printed out the stub and took it out! So I may, possibly, be 60 euro richer haha. Awesomeeeeee.
Sunday we got up early to get Rafa a shower cap so she could stop using a plastic bag lol, then headed to our favorite place ever, Spar. Seriously, best supermarket in the world, aka Europe…sadly Cork does not have one :( Connemara was fun…we went all the way out to Kylemore Abbey, filled with Benedictine nuns. We actually passed Killary and I saw the adventure center we were at haha. Took lots of pictures. A beautiful scenic trip, but not as jam-packed as the Aran Islands. We did stop a couple times by mountains and streams and waterfalls and sheep, though.
Sadly we had to leave our hostel :( It was sooooooo nice especially since it was 11 euro a night! We had a good kitchen, tea, and decent bunkbeds, even though we were on the top lol. I will miss you, Salmon Weir Hostel, and recommend you highly on hostelbookers.com haha. Right now we’re sitting in the bus station waiting for our 1:15am bus to Dublin…oh the life of a hobo college student. Next time I’ll update on how our late night bus ride with little sleep went awwwwww yeah.
Slán go fóill!
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