We want Moher....Galway!

This weekend a fairly large group of students (11 total) from my program went to Galway for the weekend.  Galway is located on the west side of the country, across the country from Dublin.

We had to get up at 6 AM to get make it out to the train station…some of us walked and others took a taxi but either way it was an early morning and all of us were tired.  I have never ridden a train before and was wide-awake and excited, I love train stations!  The trains had our names on our seats (I rode backwards) and I got a diet coke from a trolley lady and while everyone else slept most of the 3 hour ride, I read a book that I borrowed from my friend Allison.

We arrived in Galway at 10 AM to a rainy/cloudy day.  Our hostel was right across the street from the train station so we checked in right away and got the day started.  I went with 3 girls to the travel center and with the help of an extremely nice lady, we VERY quickly got our whole weekend organized!

Let me preface by saying that what we all discovered quickly were a few key differences between Dublin and Galway.  1. It is much smaller and you can instantly tell. 2. The general population is much younger than Dublin, so it was more up our alley.  3. It is essentially a large college town, with a main university. 4. With the smaller population and cobblestone streets and younger people everywhere, it had the feel of Madison and Ann Arbor for those Michigan kiddos on the program.

Which means that we all felt instantly at home a bit and much less overwhelmed than sometimes when in the city of Dublin.

So…the busy weekend began:

After telling the other people the plans in case they wanted to join, we stopped at a crepe place and ate some lunch, walked around the city center of Galway, grabbed coffee and chocolate for the bus ride (from Griffin’s bakery---amazing) and headed for the coach (bus) station for our 1 PM tour to the Burren and Cliffs of Moher.  All 11 of us decided to go, it was only 16 euro for a 5 hour trip, and the bus was pretty much all ours as only a few other people came.  We drove through Ireland, stopping at various “hotspots” to take pictures of scenery---the day was a bit cloudy, but the sun was starting to peek out of the clouds and everything still looked beautiful, duh!  Finally, after a very bumpy ride in which everyone ended up motion sick (the roads in this country look like one ways and we had a  2 story bus climbing up mountains and such), the sun came out and we arrived to the Cliffs of Moher.

It was 3 PM here so 9 in the states and I called my dad when I was at the top of the climb and told him to google pictures of the cliffs because that was where I was standing.  Of course, we took lots of pictures and did goofy things and then all just enjoyed it…..which was kind of hard to do because there were flies everywhere, including horse fly’s.  But if they wouldn’t have been there I could have sat and watched the view all day.

Soon it was time to head back---we slept pretty much and upon arriving at the hostel, we showered and then got dinner. I went to The Front Door with Allison and Jacki and we had a wonderful AMERICAN meal…..pizza, wings, and beer.  It was the special there and we decided that nothing else would taste better than some American grease.  Dad, you’ll be glad to know the wings are just as good in Ireland and they give you a bowl of water to clean your hands with.

We made some Irish friends who worked there, including some promoters that let us play some trivia games for free cider. After dinner we met up with the rest of the group and headed out on the town.  There were a lot of stag and hen parties going on (bachelor and bachelorette), so groups were out in costumes everywhere!  We ended up at this bar called Coyote’s and, get this, they had a mechanical bull to ride….so we did!  It was SO much fun, even though most of us were horrible at it.  We all had a good laugh and a good time, but we had to get up early so the night had to end.

Saturday morning we woke up too early to shower and catch a bus an hour away to a ferry that would take us to the Aran Islands.  Not all of us went on the trip, but we did gain a new member of our clan…our 8^th roommate in the hostel, Matt, aka Canada.  One of the girls on our trip gets really sea sick so she sold him her ticket and he joined us.  I’ve also never been on a ferry so that was another first. We went to Inis Mor, the largest of the 3 Aran Islands.

After a leisurely lunch of coffee, pizza, and panini’s, we headed out to explore.   The thing to do on the islands is rent a bike and ride around the island.  I was really really looking forward to doing this, but my knee was really hurting from all the activity the night before and decided biking wasn’t the best thing for it.  So everyone rode bikes and one girl, Carly, stayed back with me.  We looked through the shops and then decided to take a horse carriage ride through the islands instead of the bikes. (Another first-never ridden in a horse carriage…really the weekend for firsts among ways to travel).

Although the horse ride was a bit expensive, both Carly and I were extremely glad we payed the money and thought it was well worth it.  Our driver was a local man named John.  He grew up in Galway and now lives on the islands….and what we loved about this experience was that it wasn’t a guided bus tour, but someone living on the island.  He let us stop when we wanted pictures, showed us his house, and his daughters house….stopped to switch horses, and spoke to everyone that passed him along the roads in Gaelic.  It was cool to see a part of the island from the eyes of someone that lived there in a leisurely pace, and here him interact in his native language with other locals.  The only hard thing was that it was hard to understand him so I said “that’s good” to some things I shouldn’t have when I didn’t realize what he was saying, whoops!

We got out at Dun Aongus, an ancient fort on the island.  It was a 20 minute walk up the mountain basically, which didn’t help the knee but was totally worth it.  It was a little like the Cliffs of Moher, but calmer, with less flies.  It was a very hot day outside and people were picnicking in the fort and taking pictures….no one else in our group got this far to walk up it so Carly and I were the only ones. Definitely a must see for anyone heading to Galway.  The thing about Inis Mor is that it is the closest point to America, so there is a bar on the island called “The American Bar” which is actually in Irish bar but it was where Irish people went before emigrating to the US.  Carly and I took pictures standing at the top of the cliffs and looking out to America…the closest point to it, just across the ocean!

John finally got us back to the main area and we hung out talking to some locals before taking the ferry back to Galway.  We didn’t get back to the hostel until 7, so it was definitely another really long day.  Jacki, Allison, and I did dinner again…this time we had our first fish and chips experience.  We ate at McDonaghs’,  which is apparently a famous fish and chips place.  I just started eating fish a year or so ago, but this was by far the most amazing thing I’ve ever had….I am officially in love with fish and chips.

Sunday was great….so relaxing.  We woke up, checked out of the hostel and spent the day walking around the city, taking pictures, and shopping.  After a lunch of again, fish and chips, a few of us hung around under a tree while it rained just taking in the atmosphere an before we knew it, we were grabbing brownies and coffee from our favorite Griffin’s bakery and then heading to the train station to go back to Dublin.

It was a very successful weekend and went smoothly despite the large group.  Everyone had a grand time.  After a weekend of sunburn, we returned finally to rain in Dublin….but the US was playing in soccer so we showered and went to a pub to watch the game. Then, I had my first time at Porterhouse (a top 10 Dublin pub) and got to experience strawberry beer.  It is wonderful and my new favorite beer….Guiness who??