Blogs from Wicklow, County Wicklow, Ireland, Europe - page 3

We left Dublin for Wicklow. We drove up into the Wicklow Mountains, a gorgeous landscape. We stopped at Powerscourt, a grand estate with extensive and beautiful gardens. We were left to ourselves to roam the grounds. I walked around with Serena, who had arrived late the night before. We spent some time in the Japanese Garden, the rose gardens, and the slightly unnerving pet cemetery. We went deeper into the mountains and came to Glendalough monastery, a place I had first read about in an Edward Rutherford novel. It's one of the oldest Christian monasteries in Ireland. Its grounds were so beautiful. Its ruggedness held great contrast to Powerscourt's perfect landscape and gardens. Glendalough was so natural and peaceful. We took a tour of the various ruins and the tower and monastery itself and were then ... read more

Since my last blog, I have learned much more about my host family, the Irish culture, and teaching in Ireland. My host family is very wonderful. I was extremely worried about the money situation since the exchange rate from the American dollar to the Euro is so poor. I am not as worried anymore because for 175 Euros a week (~$250 American Dollars), I get my own room with plenty of storage for all of my things, a warm shower every morning, three meals a day, and my host mom does my laundry. I do not think this is a bad deal at all. I really don't see myself spending too much money on things other than travel. My host family consists of the mother, Muriel, the father, Alistair, two sons, Alexander (13), and Kenneth ... read more

Well we decided to do a last training walk before our big trip. This is SD, AOD and AC walking around Enniskerry up the waterfall. Not feeling too much pain today considering it was supposed to be 3 hours and ended up being 5!... read more

so we woke up a pretty sore (no sleeping pad on a wood floor not so much the most comfortable) and started off. we hiked down into glenmalur valley, then we were hoping to get a lift in laragh, which is the closest town to glendalough. so we get off the wicklow way and start hiking up the road, sticking our thumbs out. eventually we score a ride with dominic, a guy who lives in glenmalur. it's a real good thing, because we would have been walking for a few hours to get into laragh. and he tells us some interesting things about ireland, we drove through some of the last remaining old-growth forest in ireland - the english cut almost all of it down in 1600 (that blows my mind) to make battleships. oh, and ... read more

Rain again this morning but this time very heavy so no-one else interested in going out at all. I braved the day with an umbrella and had the monastic site pretty much to myself. It was wonderful to stroll around the old church, graveyard and especially the round tower. Drove the couple of last hours to Dublin and home Exhausted, happy and holding great memories of beautiful Ireland... read more