Ireland!

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So last week I took a few days off of work to take a four-day trip to Ireland! I arrived late Wednesday night in Dublin at probably the best youth hostel I have ever stayed in. My room was clean, new had TWO bathrooms (two!) and a full kitchen--also, there was an amazing FREE full Irish breakfast in the morning! My first day in Ireland, I actually spent on a tour from Dublin Newgrange, a neolithic tomb in the Boyne valley that predates the pyramids by about 1000 years. At dawn of the winter solstice, a beam of light shines directly through a long passageway and into the main chamber shining on to a stone which would have contained the ashes of dead important people symbolically carrying them off to the afterlife. I actually got to go inside of the tomb which was also really impressive, albeit a bit smaller than I would have imagined--but considering that the whole structure is thousands of years old and is held together only by the pressure between large stone stabs it was still incredibly impressive. The tour also made a stop at the Hill of Tara, which basically is a field with odd circular hills, but which used to be the ancient capital city of Ireland.

On the evening of my first day in Ireland, eager to get some pub exposure in, but not eager to go out for a drink by myself, I joined the Dublin Literary Pub Crawl--a tour of Dublin's finest public houses accompanied by theatrical interpretations of the works of Dublin's famous writers. I spent two nights at the amazing hostel and on my second day in Dublin I managed to cover all of the major tourist attractions--Trinity College and the Book of Kells, St. Patrick's Cathedral, Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin Castle, an art museum or two, and most importantly, the Guinness Factory (where I received a free pint upon completion of the tour).

That afternoon, I took a train south-west through the lovely, green Irish countryside to Cork. Cork was rather disappointing and the city center itself really had nothing going on at all. Although, before leaving the area the next morning, I did make my way out to the village of Blarney to visit Blarney Castle and kiss the Blarney stone. I have no photographic evidence of this, however, because true to tourist-trap form, Blarney Castle does not let you take pictures of the stone, and all pictures of anyone kissing the stone must be bought from the gift shop for 10 euro--and on my budget, I was not going to spend 10 euro on a picture.

Following my brief one-night stint in Cork, I made my way by train to Killarney. Killarney is probably the best example of touristy Irishness that I have come across. However, it does sit on the edge of Killarney National Park and is on the Ring of Kerry route. The scenery was just absolutely stunning. Also, I stayed in potentially the most Irish-looking hostel possible, the Sugan Hostel, which basically looks like a cute little Hobbit Hole. On my second day in Killarney, I took a coach tour around the Ring of Kerry (approximately 120 miles), which ended up being probably the most scenic drive I have ever been on. We traveled through several small fishing villages, ate lunch in Cahirciveen, and stopped for pictures/short bouts of hiking throughout the day. Absolutely fantastic. I went out to the pub with the other travelers in my room at the hostel--two german students, two australian teachers and one hungarian guy who has basically been living the nomadic lifestyle for several years now.

I had to get up really early on Monday morning to fly from Kerry Airport back to London--Kerry Airport is possibly the smallest, most dated airport I have ever been in. The boarding cards are hand-written, not computer printed, and there is one metal detector at security, one gate and almost one runway--I have never been in a plane that reversed itself to the very back end up the runway before taking off...

All in all it was a fantastic trip! Now I am back at Cambridge with just a week left in the lab--and about a few weeks of work left to do. In other news, I turn 21 tomorrow! Not that there will be any huge celebration, as I am already legal to drink in this country. And my friend Carolyn is coming for a few days next week! And, on Saturday I am flying to Athens to embark on a two-week journey through Greece and Italy, before returning home on the 23rd, just in time for classes to start on the 25th!

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