Like I said before, we went to Theresa’s for a night this weekend in Arklow and it was great. She is spectacular and so freakin adorable, she made us dinner and lunch the next day and everything. We got real beds to sleep on and real towels to use (who knew either of those would be so exciting) – woot woot! But yeah, it was a relaxing day and a half so that was good. We came back to Dublin Sunday afternoon and did some shopping/walking around before I had to return to the hostel and feel like death – yes I officially got sick, no fun at all. That little snippet of time was particularly unpleasant so I basically just stayed in the room for the rest of the night.
Oh! I forgot about the Guinness Storehouse! We went there before we caught the bus to Arklow on Saturday. It was really fun and I’m super glad we went. We ended up saving 5 Euro on the ticket since we are ‘students’ which was good news. It was a self-guided tour but the place is HUGE. There were 6 official levels but I think we went up 1 or 2 before we got to Level 1. It took you through how it originated, how they made it and shipped it and they even had a floor that you could pour your own pint (included in the price). Instead of waiting in the line for that, we went up to the ‘Gravity Bar’ - which was a 360 view of Dublin - and got our drinks there. Yummy.
CHEERS!
I'm exciteddd
Clearly...
On our last day in Ireland/Europe we took a tour to go to Newgrange and the Hill of Tara. Both were pretty awesome. The Hill of Tara had a really good view of the whole surrounding area - so greeeeeeen. It would have been cool to have more time there just to hang out on the hills but we only had half an hour to wander around. Owell. From there we went to Newgrange – SO COOL. I will never cease to be completely amazed by what people accomplished thousands of years ago. So basically, Newgrange is a Neolithic passage tomb (built into the side of a mound with a long passageway) but is also the oldest astronomical archeological structure in the world that’s still intact (3200 BC). It’s epic. Apparently when they excavated it, the only part they had to redo was the front – everything inside was practically perfect. By the way, this thing is 5,000 years old. FIVE THOUSAND. They said it would have taken 50 years to build (which was twice the living age back then) and it’s not like this is the only one. There are passage tombs all around not only Ireland, but Europe. Like really…how is that possible? And let’s not even get into the size of the stones that they used, around the bottom and within the dome inside. Oye.
Hill of Tara
Church
Fairy tree - what we heard is that parents used to bring pieces of their sick childs clothing in hopes that the fairies would come heal them.
So unfortunately we couldn’t take pictures inside of it but I’ll just tell you now it’s spectacularly impressive. The structure itself is remarkable, it forms a domed ceiling with the ginormous rocks, but the concept behind what makes it famous is ridiculous. So there is a window type deal above the opening to the passage (I can’t remember what it’s called now) that is somehow positioned perfectly that on the winter solstice (and ONLY on the winter solstice) the light will shine into the center chamber and illuminate the middle of it for 17 minutes. Literally, only one day of the year will light reach the inside. What you don’t realize when you are walking in or out of it is that the floor slopes upwards, so the window that started above your head is actually at foot level by the time you get to the center chamber. CRAZY. And now I feel lame and stupid. It’s SO cool though.
Newgrange!!!
Big rocks on the exterior
Us at Newgrange!
Now briefly back to the title for this blog. I’ll just jump right to it – a gull pooped on me, literally 20 minutes after I had said that I’d be mad if a bird pooped on me. And not just a little, it was substantial and gross. Most of you are probably thinking that I should be used to it by now from Shoals, but in my defense I only got crapped on ONCE there and it was a TINY bit. So yeah, that was my reaction…but it was pretty hysterical, I won’t lie. The whole series of events was slightly ridiculous, the bird literally swooped down and let it rip as though it was aiming for me – which they can do rather well, but there was no reason for it to aim at me! Ugh. I was going to wear those jeans tomorrow on the plane too – apparently life didn’t think that was the best idea, or that they weren’t dirty enough at that point. Regardless, it provided everyone with quite a bit of humor for the night – what can I say…these things tend to fly my way at the speed of light. All you gotta do is laugh it off.
We went to Leo Burdocks for fish and chips (apparently a TON of famous people have been there and it’s supposed to be the best in Dublin) on our last night and holy crap do they give you a lot of food. They wrapped it in paper and the little package was a hefty little thing. The piece of fish was substantial but the amount of chips was absurd. I couldn’t even come close to finishing it, I think Holly was the only one that did. So much fooooood. It was good though! Just be wary – buy one for two people.
Alright, we are headed off to the airport so this is the final blog! There’s only one airport we can go to, so we shouldn’t have that difficulty this time…hopefully there isn’t anything else that we can royally mess up on the way there. Should be gooooood. But anyway, it’s been an incredible trip and I’m looking forward for adventures to come! Hopefully they will be sooner rather than later. :)
Thanks for reading!!
Fun Fact: In case you suck at dates like me, Newgrange was built 600 years before the Giza Pyramids and 1000 years before Stonehenge.
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