Arrival in Ireland!

Trip Start Sep 15, 2005

Trip End Mar 20, 2006

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Flag of Ireland Dublin, Ireland
Wednesday, November 30, 2005

After arriving in Ireland, we ventured off to our hostel in Temple Bar, which was a fabulous location. We had a really nice time there, the night-life and lit up streets were entrancing. The next day we took a bus tour of the city, and saw all the big sites-including the Book of Kells at Trinity college. I appreciated this VERY much considering that I love to paint, bookmaking, and symbolism. The exhibit was quite impressive with videos, examples, the meanings behind the symbolism, description of the alphabet used in the book, and the book itself. It's a must see during any Dublin pass-through. That night we hung out with this Irish guy Chris, who the previous night made fun of my snoring (I made a comment about it to Mary in the morning and said that he hurt my feelings, so he was trying to make up for it the whole night!) He treated me to Starbucks, and we had some good talks. I passed out early, but Mary stayed up talking till about 3am with him about many different things.

The following morning we head out early after Chris and his buddy so we could see Newgrange and the Hill of Tara on a Bus Tour. It was raining, but we saw some great things, lots of sheep and amazingly old irish sites. Lots of stones and such. Newgrange is the most famous site in Ireland other than the Blarney Castle for its stones (which we didn't get to). There are so many theories behind what it actually was used for, but the most believed theory is that it was a burial chamber. The fascination about the site is that on December 21st of every year, light enters a very small hole at the top of the doorway and lights up the entire inside of the site. The emulations are beautiful, as we got to see a demonstration with artificial light.

The rain didn't stop us from having a good day. We definitely made the most out of it again. When we got back we packed up our stuff and head out for the next adventure, this door was going to Mary's past with her family history. The town her great, great, great? Grandfather came from is Mountmellick, which is South East Ireland. The main bus stop dropped us off a little bit away in the town Portloise. This night in addition to the following two we stayed in a lovely accommodation called the Old Farmhouse Hostel out in the boonies. We had to hop by bus from Portloise to Abbeylieux, and then be PICKED UP BY CAR by the hostel owner because there is no way to really get to the hostel otherwise. It was so cool to be out in the boonies-a unique experience indeed. The hostel was half of the farmhouse with warm rooms, a fireplace, and fully furnished kitchen with an oven and stove. The only problem was that the showers were VERY cold, so I was a little stinky because I refuse to bath in what might as well be a bed of snow. ARGH.

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