We arrived in Dublin around 9:30. We took a short bus ride to the city center and then from there walked 15 min to our hostel. It was not time to check in yet, so we put our bags in storage and headed out to see the city.
Our first target was St. Patrick’s Church. Great church! I have been to St. Peter’s Basilica and many other beautiful churches around Europe at this point, but this is my favorite. It is not ornately decorated with bright colors and beautiful paintings. It is simple in its decor. It has a classic feel to it… almost medieval. There are British and Irish battle flags from WWI and WW2. These were heavily tattered and faded which left an impression on the viewer. Jonathan Swift was also minister of this church at one time and is buried here. From there we planned to bypass the Guinness Brewery, but only for a couple hours because we were trying to save the best for last.
We walked passed the brewery on our way to Kilmainham Gaul (gaul is synonymous with prison). The gaul was all the way across the city and slightly out of town. Early on we experienced just how nice the Irish people are. As we were walking out of town I became worried we passed it at this point. I asked a couple walking on the sidewalk if they knew where the gaul was, but they said they were from out of town and did not know. I local riding by on his bike overheard our conversation with them and stopped in the street to ask if I needed help. Who does that?! Well, the Irish do. And this kind of courtesy continued on for our 6 days there. There doesn’t exist a nicer breed of people on earth.
The Kilmainham Gaul was easily the best bang-for-our-buck deal in all of Europe. It was 2 euro and this included a 2 hour tour of the prison. It turns out this gaul is one of the most historic buildings in all of Ireland. Many famous Irishmen were held here and killed. Leaders of their rebellions against the British were put here and sentenced to death (which was usually hanging, but the leaders of the 1918 revolution were killed by firing squad).
Now time for the best! The Guinness Brewery. We had an hour and a half to get through this colossal building of 6 stories, which ended at an enclosed rooftop bar that had a 360 degree view of the city. We made a grave error in saving this for last. We were slightly rushed through the brewery because we wanted to make it to the top floors in time to receive our free Guinness. We got to the 5th floor and were part of the last small group allowed to pour their own Guinness and be taught the proper technique. It may be boring, but I’m explaining it anyway to show that I know how to pour the perfect Guinness and so you can make sure future bartenders do it right, as well. We filled it about 5/6th full and then you let the beer settle as the nitrogen gas leaked out. After it had settled in a minute or two you slightly pulled back on the tap. This only allows more beer to filter in and no more nitrogen gas. And Guinness is definitely better in Ireland! Here is where we made the mistake, though… many people will go through the whole routine of learning to pour, but don’t bother to drink their Guinness. Insane? I think so, especially to a poor backpacker who doesn’t turn down anything that’s free. So we powered through our first Guinness as I spied a couple of full glasses across the room. After punishing our first glasses I ran across the room to round up some reinforcements. So we each had two Guinness’ and went to the roof tower feeling pretty good. Now we understood why the two American, middle-aged women we got directions from on the way to the brewery seemed to be in high spirits after their tour. We proudly began displaying our “Perfect Pour Certficate” that was awarded to us to everyone and saying, “I don’t know if you heard yet, but…” and held up the certificate. When I get home I am replacing my U-M diploma with it. When we came down from our buzz we decided to stay in tonight since we were going to catch a train to Belfast, which is in Northern Ireland, early the next morning. That and the fact we received 3 hours of sleep the night before.
Perfection!
And the proof. Cocky.
We took the 11:00am train (we thought there was a 10am, but there wasn't) to Belfast. This train went along the coast and offered some beautiful views. After we came into the station we took a free shuttle from the train station to the city center. As soon as we arrived we were attacked!
This wasn’t your typical Northern Ireland attack, though. It wasn’t some crazy protestant trying to spill our catholic blood. These we tour guides trying to convince us their tour was the best and a must-do. We collected the brochures and then sat on the front lawn of their government building to deliberate. We decided on a tour that offered a city tour of Belfast today and a day trip to the Giant’s Causeway, which is at the northern tip of Northern Ireland, at a later date.
Capital building in Belfast
As we walked with the tour guide to catch the bus for the city tour he asked us if we had a hostel booked for when we came back to Belfast in a couple days to do the Giant’s Causeway. No we didn’t. So he called up a friend and told us he had a hostel for 10 euro a night. Sold! At a price that low you have to be a little leary of the hostel you just booked, but you can’t say no to that price! Finally we boarded the bus for the city tour.
We grabbed a seat in the top half of the bus that was uncovered because it was a beautiful day. Turns out this was the worst seat on the bus. It was near impossible to hear her through the side-mounted speakers over the bus and the wind. We finally decided to abandon our seats after they took us on the highway (who the hell takes an open-roof tour bus on the highway?!). Now we could finally hear what was being said, at least.
How to insure you won't be getting tipped? Take the open-air bus on the highway
Belfast is a fairly big town, but there isn’t much to do there or much to see. They are still very proud of the fact the Titanic was built here, and when questioned about why they are so proud of a ship that sank they readily toss out the phrase, “She was fine when she left here, but she had an English captain and a Scottish navigator.” We passed by the building where their government debates. This building was expensive to build and one of the nicest buildings we have seen in Ireland, so in order to prevent it from being a bombing target during WWII they rubbed manure all over the outside walls. Our guide said that even though they have since taken the manure off, any Irishman will tell you that the building is still full of shit.
The highlight off our tour was the murals. These paintings on the sides of buildings acted as a marker for protestant or catholic neighborhoods. Some of the murals depicted men in ski masks holding guns and claiming they protect this area. Other murals pay tribute to those that have died in “The Troubles.” A few murals are neutral, like one dedicated to the Titanic. After our tour we decided there wasn’t much to do in Belfast and we headed home. But before we did I remembered that grandma’s friend, Diane, had given us money and told us to use it to buy a 1/5 of whiskey while in Ireland. That was what this money was intended for so that’s just what we did. From there we hopped on a train back to Dublin.
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We were in Ireland for a long time so I (Brandon) am taking over the second half of this story.
The next morning we made our way to Galway and ended up getting in around 2pm. Once there we wanted to go see the Cliffs of Moher but soon found out that in order to see them you either had to have your own car or go on one of the many tours that leave in the morning so going to them that day was out of the question. So we bought tickets to go on a tour of them the following day and then started to stroll around the town.
The tide change was a lot bigger than we thought
Picture of the same area during high tide
There was also a helpful warning sign that looked like it was created by a high school student warning you of the tides.
After that we headed back to the hostel where we ended up meeting one of our roommates Mike who was from London and invited us to go out with him and these two other German guys (whose names I can’t recall) in our room. As we waited for ze Germans we decided to go back down to the harbor have some beer and drink some of our fifth of Jameson. Headed back to the hostel around 10 and from there we left to go to go out.
The main square was full of different club promoters so we randomly chose when and went in. Upon entry we had to show them ID as we got scanned by a metal detector at which point we began to wonder what the hell we were going into. Once we get inside the music was bumping and the lights were going wild, but there was no one there. It wasn’t till after midnight people began to pile in. We also find out why they came so late, because their pregame is on a whole new level. Never have I been to a bar, or probably even a house party, with this so many smashed people. It seemed like at least one out of four had no idea what was going on.
On the dance floor people just used their bodies as battering rams and others we just fall backwards in the hope that they would fall onto someone. After being subjected to this for about 2 hours (and working up a good sweat) we headed out so we could get some sleep before our 10 am tour the next day.
The hostel we stayed at didn’t have a free breakfast so we bout some eggs, ham, and bread and had one of the most delicious breakfasts since we left the states. We then packed up our stuff and headed out to the tour bus. The first stop on the trip was some guys personal farm that has been in his family for generations. He walked us around for a little over an hour and explained to us Irelands diverse landscape along with some of the local landmarks we could see from the top of the hill on his property.
Back on the tour bus we saw a few castle ruins along the way until we got to the main attraction, the Cliffs of Moher, except the crappy thing was is that they were covered by clouds. There was a few minutes when they broke up a little allowing for some decent pictures.
We did stop by some other cliffs later in the tour that weren’t as impressive, but at least weren’t covered by clouds.
The last stop of the trip was Kerry Castle which I really don’t remember to much about but was where the a royal family lived until the floor collapsed and killed all the servants so they decided to move.
Our hostel that night was in Belfast and the best way to get there was to take the 6:30 train to Dublin and then take a 2 hour bus to Belfast so we ended up getting in a little after midnight. The hostel we had was the one that the guy found for us when we were in Belfast earlier in the week. We were in an 18 bed room, but luckily there was only one other person in it besides us.
The next morning we headed out on our tour to the Giants Causeway. On the way to it we drove along the coast for a large majority of it and stopped at some of the more scenic points. One spot had a rope bridge you could walk across that cost 4 euro and was about 20 feet long. It was a complete tourist trap but we fell right into it.
Soon after that we arrived at the Giants Causeway. It is a causeway that consists of these very weird rock pillars that jut out of the ground and are shaped like hexagons.
After checking that out for a while we took a different way back up to the top that gave us some really good views of the surrounding area.
The last stop of the tour was the Bushmills distillery. Way back when it wasn’t required to label what percentage your alcohol was so you didn’t know if you where getting Parrots Bay or Everclear. For that reason they required sellers to get certified that their liquor is what they say it is and Bushmills was the first ever distillery to get that verification in 1608
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After the tour we got on the train back to Dublin so we could get our 6 am flight out to Nantes, France. We still had about a third of the fifth of Jameson left so we did some work on it on the train ride back.
Thanks Diane!
Once back we headed to our old hostel we stayed at in Dublin to get some internet access so we could get some details about what to do in France and book some hostels and then left about midnight to go sleep at the airport. We ended up getting there around 1 am and slept by pushing two chairs together and using our pack as a pillow.
We woke up around 4 am after getting very little sleep due to the uncomfortable position and due to the fact that they were blasting the air conditioning. So we got up, got in line, checked in (without getting any fines) and feel back to sleep on the plane.
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