We were all a bit hungry from the trip, so we headed out to find some food. We stopped at the pub next door and a few people had a pint while we listened to some music- they had live bands both upstairs and downstairs. After the pints we headed across the street to get what we were told is the best pizza in Galway (and not by an employee of the pizza company either). It was actually very good and we brought it back to the room to eat. We probably all made it in bed by 11 or 11:30 and planned to get up the next morning at 8:30 to explore the city a bit before our bus tour to the Cliffs of Moher. For most, it was not a good night of sleep though, because the windows in the hostel were not very sound proof and around 2am when all the bars were closing, a karaoke type concert seemed to break out in the street outside our hostel. I guess you could say we got a free concert for a few hours because they didn't stop singing until about 4am. I did sleep through part of this so I wasn't too tired the next morning, but others were not so lucky, thank goodness I'm a heavy sleeper!
The next morning we got up and started walking towards city center in search of a Pharmacy because someone forgot their inhaler. We asked the people working at the pharmacy where would be a good place to get breakfast, and they pointed us to a little cafe down the street called Lynch's.After breakfast we went in search of the original Clauddah Ring store. We had a day tour scheduled to go to the Cliffs of Moher so after the Clauddah Ring store (no I didn't buy one) we made a pit stop at Dunnes for gloves and headed to our bus.
Inside Lynch's
The original Clauddah Ring store
The tour company we booked through was going to take us to the Cliffs of Moher a must see when visiting the west of Ireland as well as stop a few other places on the way. These stops were mostly things that we have talked about in my Archeology class which was really interesting because I knew more than the tour guide. We stopped first at an old Tower House which is from Medieval times, but this one was unique because someone actually lived in it until the 1970's or 80's. You can now go in and tour it, but sadly only in the Summer, it looked like it would be interesting to see how someone blended the Medieval lifestyle and a more modern one. The next stop was a ringfort which I explain in my Archeology trip blog as well, but this one was much smaller than the one we saw on our field trip.
Tower house
Tower house
Ringfort
Ringfort
After those we drove for a bit and stopped at Poulnabrone, which is the most famous portal tomb in Ireland. It was used for burial in the Neolithic Era which was 4000BC to 2500BC and consists of two portal stone that stand upright and hold up a capstone. These stone are all that are left now, but when originally built, there would have been a cairn on top of all of the big stones, which is a combination of smaller stones and pebbles that create a sort of blanket over the tomb and is then covered in dirt and mud to make it look more like a small hill or mound.
Then we headed off to a small town where we had lunch in a pub, and on to the Cliffs of Moher. It is always windy in Ireland it seems, and it is even more windy on the coasts, so the winds at the Cliffs were almost pushing us down the stairs as we walked. Part of this is because it is the winter so the weather is worse. We were able to walk from the center out along both sides of the cliff which was very fun.
The bus then brought us back, and we got back to the bus station around 6pm. Everyone was very cold, so we spent some time in the hostel changing and warming up.
Huddling around the heater for warmth
Once we were warm, we walked around to try and find somewhere to eat. After much debate, we ended up at a restaurant called Fat Freddie's which was kind of a mix of everything. I split a caesar salad and pizza with someone else. The pizza was so good! It was a pesto sauce instead of red sauce, had onions, pepperoni, potatoes, and cheese on it. After dinner, we went next door to a pub called "The Quey's" (Quey is pronounced "key" and is often on the end of street names, like Bachelor's Quey) to have a pint. We were all pretty tired and had another tour the next morning so we headed back to the hostel to try and turn in early.
The Irish had other plans...
And they had another party in the street. Luckily I was able to sleep through pretty much all of it.
The next morning we got up early, stopped by the trusty Daybreak across the street for some breakfast and headed to catch our bus to the Aran Islands. I had heard before going that the Aran Islands were even better than the Cliffs of Moher so I was excited despite the cold and rain that was going on. One thing I wasn't so excited for...the ferry ride to the Island, which was going to be about 45 min. I did end up surviving the boat ride without any incidence, and when we got off the ferry, there was a caravan of mini buses waiting to try to get you to come on their tours. We were in a group of seven and a man stopped us before we got to the buses asking if we wanted to rent bikes for the day, we had decided it was too cold and rainy even if it would have been cool, but he told us because of the size of our group the buses would probably give us a discount. We headed inside to get a cup of coffee and warm up and wake up a bit. Then headed down and got on a bus. Our tour was only the seven of us and one woman from Japan who was around our age.
The pub we had coffee in
Average Irish Cottage
Look how big that horse is!
The Big attraction on the Aran Islands in Dun Aonghasa which we had also learned about in Archeology. It is a hillfort built on the side of cliffs. These cliffs are about 100 feet shorter than the Cliffs of Moher but less developed because of the Archeological significance of the site. This means that the site is protected, but they have not added any barriers or walkways throughout it like at the Cliffs of Moher. It was amazing to see and because it is not the busy season we were the only ones there for the majority of the time. Lucky for us, but unlucky for her, we had an extra person to take all our group photos for us.
Walking up to Dun Aonghasa
Walking up to Dun Aonghasa
The Chevaux-de-frise which was a grouping of thousands of rocks inserted into the ground at an angle to slow down attackers
Inside the first defensive wall
The left is the second defensive wall, the right is the outer wall
Overlooking the cliffs
Bedrock platform used for rituals
After this, we stopped at a cafe for lunch and I had some yummy vegetable soup. We then went to the farthest point on the Island away from where our ferry dropped us off and looked at the beach. We also stopped at a seal colony to see the seals while the tide was out...it was still pretty hard to see them. Then we hopped back on the bus to go back to the ferry.
Cafe
Shops across from the Cafe
Ruins of an old church
One of three cemeteries on the Island, and is still in use
Far point of the Island
Seal Colony, its hard to see them but there are a few in this picture
We had a little bit of time so we went back to the pub and watched the end of a Rugby game. Then back on the ferry we went. This time I was smart and tried to fall asleep before we left and I was successful which meant I didn't feel sick at all! We then got on a bus and headed back to Galway.
On our way back to the hostel we decided to pick up some food and cook at the hostel, so we went back dropped some stuff off and found out that we had 3 new roommates. We also ended up finally paying for our room. Once that was done, we walked back to Daybreak and got some food for dinner. While we were eating, we met some people from the east coast of the US and a guy from Canada who are studying in the north in Sligo. We ended up talking to them for a while and spending the rest of the night hanging out with them. They are actually probably going to come visit us in Cork in the next few weeks.
The next morning we decided to sleep in a bit, for me this meant waking up at my normal time and reading for a few hours. We were going to take the 2:05 or 3:05 bus back to Cork, and the man working at the hostel said we could leave our stuff in our room until we were leaving for the bus station, so we ventured out into the city. We decided we would just wander until we saw somewhere to eat breakfast and found this cute grocery store with restaurant on top across the street from the place we had breakfast the first morning. They had a great Sunday brunch. A few people wanted to go to this tea room where you could order tea and they had it all decorated like a tea party. Me, not liking tea, decided to join the boys in wandering the city. We were able to cover pretty much the entire city while the rest of the group had their tea. We found a river walk which took us to Galway Cathedral which was huge! We also retraced our steps a bit and saw Eyre Square which is near the bus station.
Spanish Arch
Spanish Arch
Spanish Arch
The Tea Room where the rest of the group had their tea parties
River Walk
River Walk
Galway Cathedral
Erye Square
After picking up the other girls at the Tea Room, we headed back to our hostel to grab our bags and catch the bus. The bus trip was overall unexciting, but went very quickly because we did not make many of the normal stops in small towns.
No comments:
Post a Comment