I went with Marine and Hayden to the Dandrum shopping center in another part of Dublin. It's Billy Fuccillo huge. There are sky walk ramps instead of escalators in some areas and they are at a pretty steep incline. They freak me out- big time. I don't even like the ones that are completely level at the airport. Other than that, the experience was fun. We ate at a local chain sandwich shop, O'Brien's, that sells gluten free bread options. I found a coat that helps me not stick out like a sore thumb anymore and I finally went into a Zara's. Apparently we have them in the U.S., but I have never seen one. Practically all the case studies in my global marketing class are on them so I was interested to see what their clothes actually look like. It's supposed to be somewhere you can get knockoff designer clothing at a decent price. It was still a little too pricy for me to get something I don't have room for in my suit case. On the way back to the bus stop we went to "Liddle", a well known grocery store in Europe. We had planned on coming back with groceries so I brought two bags with me and stuck to not buying more than that so I could carry it back with ease. Marine and Hayden didn't stick to this two bag policy...so I offered to carry a bag for Marine. I didn't mind; it would have been very unpleasant to see her balancing five bags. I told her she didn't fit her French stereotype very well of buying for a few days at a time. We had an adventure trying to find the right bus stop to take back to campus and when it was supposed to arrive- none of us had wifi or cell service. We were waiting for a while so we decided we should ask these girls who were on their cell phones near by when the next bus was coming. Its funny how all of us were uncomfortable asking a stranger for information, especially since they were about 12 years old. I ended up asking the girls to look up the bus schedule and it turned out we were in the right spot and just had to wait a few more minutes.
February 1st
Hayden and I got up early (9am- we are in college) and headed for a trip to Howth, Ireland to see the market and the coast. The Howth Market was a little smaller than we expected, but it was amazing. There were so many different kinds of foods and little jewelry shops. I got a few rings, including a claddagh ring with my birth stone and a hand knit hat. I needed a warmer hat for Howth because the wind was unreal. We went on the Howth Cliff walk and Hayden demonstrated her skills of finding sea glass. I bought an Irish (Gaelic) to English dictionary at a book sale. I hope it will help out with my Irish class. I am also trying to relearn French. I was just naming random items in Marine's kitchen and it's surprising how quickly it comes back to you from a little practice.
Some of you may have seen the picture like this on Facebook. This is what happened the first three times:
The license plate says 131 because it is the year the car was bought. Hayden explained to me that they used to just write the year (12 for 2012), but the Irish are superstitious so they changed it to 131 when it was 2013 so people would still buy the cars. Then it ended up increasing sales for the first part of the year because it looked better that 132 (used in the second half of the year). So now they continued using this system. The American stereotype of driving big cars is completely true. I'm taller than almost all of the cars here.
February 2nd
After Hayden's classes, we went to the Old Jameson Distillery for a tour. Because it's the old distillery, the building is more modern and mainly used for tours. The new distillery is in Cork, Ireland. On our tour we tasted Jameson and compared it to Jack Daniel's and a well known scotch. Jameson was obviously the best. Then they gave us a mixed drink with ginger ale, lime, and Jameson- I recommend it. After the tour we went to an Irish pub for dinner, something on our "do before we leave" list. Then we headed to a free comedy show. There were four acts and the host was great. They were very interactive with the audience, but definitely not a PG show.
February 7th
Hayden and I met up around 3:20am to get a taxi to get a bus to get to the airport for our flight to Edinburgh, Scotland. We flew through Ryainair and it was an interesting experience to say the least. It is fairly easy to get cheap prices around Europe through Ryanair and we found out why. There isn't a screen for you to watch on the plane, which is fine, but in its place there is a sticker on how to exit the plane in various ways. It's not exactly comforting to stare at that the whole flight. We made it safely to Endinburgh and took a bus to our hostel to check in. The walk to our hostel was so ridiculous that we had to laugh at it. The hills in that city belong in San Francisco. The first day there we walked 15 miles and they weren't easy miles.
Our hostel sold a cheap breakfast and we were starving. The breakfast was juice, a roll and cereal. I could only have the juice. If anyone knows me, I get really grumpy when 1. I don't have a good breakfast 2. When I can't find gf things to eat 3. When I'm sick. All of those things were happening at once and Haden was more than nice to me in my nasty mood. We went on the hunt for a place I could eat and found a little cafe. It was pretty expensive because 1£ = $1.50. I got excited about ordering gf pancakes and they ended up being the size of a small snack. We were off to a rough start.
We luckily had great weather the whole trip and we walked the Royal Mile. It has a bunch of landmarks and things to do along the way. It was full of shops to get cashmere clothing and scarves- more than 40. I got a wool sweater because I was freezing. I found it at one shop first and the store owner kept talking it up about it being made in Scotland, but it was just a little too expensive. Then a free shops over I found the same one for less and bough it. The owner from the first store came in when I was buying it and he was very angry with the Polish store owner I bought it from. Hayden and I quickly left...
We visited St. Giles' Cathederal first:
Then we went to Holyrood Palace, but we didn't want to pay to get in because we had a lot to do for the rest of the day.
We were heading for Calton Hill and ended up in a cool cemetery:
It had a gorgeous view from the top:
With a few failed attempts, we found Calton Hill. I think it was my favorite part of the trip.
It was really hard to get up there; I got help from someone. It was even harder to get down so I'm thankful Hayden is so tall.
This is my hat from Howth :) and most of the city of Edinburgh:
We headed towards the Scott Monument next. It was 4£ to go into it. We climbed all 287 steps to the top...and the bottom. The steps were VERY narrow. At one point we had to pass other people in a stairwell and an older women lifted me up to get around me! I got another reality check of my fear of heights and how cluster phobic I can be. But I got to see this:
For some perspective, our hostel was right on the top of that hill by the Edinburgh Castle on the left. For some perspective of how high and narrow the Scott Monument is:
Yeah.
We had a late lunch at an Italian place that sold gf pizzas. Hayden got one too so we could share. We also got gf cheesecake there. I had strawberry rubarb and it was so nice to have dessert food. We went back to our hostel to use the wifi and take a quick nap after our long day. Later we walked around for more than an hour trying to find a pub to have a drink at. Everything looked so intimidating because there was a rugby game on and the pubs were full of men. We ended up at an Irish pub because we wanted to see some live music.
The next day we had an early bus trip to the Highlands and Loch Ness. It's a must do in Scotland. Nothing is edited:
On our last day in Endinburgh we ate breakfast at the Elephant House, which is where J. K. Rolling came up with the idea for Harry Potter. We had loose tea there and it made me want to get a diffuser so badly. After breakfast we went to the Edinburgh Castle. It's modern now and more of a museum for military history. We think that there is still a military training base on it in some parts based on some of the restricted parts. We read about a lot of interesting stories like a man fighting in battle with his newborn in his bag.
Yes, I was that tourist...
We went to a burger place [twice] on our trip. They had gf buns and chocolate shakes. The burgers were incredible and it was supposed to be a fast food kind of restaurant. I highly recommend it. It's called "Brurger." so it's hard to forget.
I am currently on a bus to Galway, Ireland for a weekend trip with Marine. I just wanted to thank the Zalkin family that made all this traveling possible. They donated a very generous scholarship to SUNY Oswego that I was awarded for my study abroad program. My scholarship has made traveling much easier and I have so much more opportunities because of it. Thank you!
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