First update since returning from Ireland and England here’s the recap:
After taking the midnight bus to Madrid, I caught my flight into Dublin on Friday morning (Feb20). Before leaving Ana packed me a shopping bag filled with 2 sandwiches, 7 mandarin oranges, 1 plastic container full of leftovers (fork included, this is detail comes in later), and 6 juiceboxes, and a brick of cheese. Leaving with enough food to feed an army, I finally was on my way. I only traveled with a backpack because Ryanair charges extra per checked bag, so to avoid ridiculous fees I packed a lot of black, hoping to avoid obvious re-wears of outfits. One backpack is roughing it, let me tell you.
Day 1 Dublin: spent the rest of the day exploring the city with Christy and Jill. Picked up dinner along the way and spent the evening at a 3 story bar along the river. I had my first Guinness in Dublin. I even tried the suggested black current (for ladies) in Guinness. Turns out, the additional black current is like dropping sugar packets into the beer. The bartender should have warned this is a lady’s way to completely change the flavor and pretend to like Guinness in front of others (that’s my theory at least). Needless to say, I left that glass sitting on the bar.
Day 2 Dublin: Knowing that we had 3 full days to explore Dublin, Jill cleverly suggested we take one day in the country. We spent the entire day bus touring around the Wicklow Mountains. Best day spent in Ireland. The tour guide was great and with only a bus of 20 people, he let us jump on and off the bus to snap photos of the beautiful scenery (included horses and sheep in the fields!). On our bus I ended up sitting next to a NYU med student. Made friends with him and his girlfriend and ended up meeting up with them later that evening. In search of the real Irish experience, we found a bar that had live Irish dancers. The nightlife in Dublin was outstanding. The streets are packed with people going out at all hours. Because there is a pub where ever you look we managed to look into quite a few including what claimed to be the smallest pub in Ireland. This pub could probably at max hold 20 people and somehow we managed to squeeze in. We also told every bartender at each bar that we went to that we were on a pub crawl and were looking to pick up a souvenir at every pub, so at the end of the night we ended up with several business cards, wine lists, beer lists, and a few more friends haha. A funny story at one of the bars… we weren’t sure if it was rude to say “irish car bomb” so Jill decides to try to order one anyway…
Jill: “I’d like to order 3 bombs.”
Bartender: blank face
J: “3 car bombs”
Bartender: blank face
J: “yeah 3 car bombs”
Still blank face
J: “you know IRISH car bombs”
Bartender: “oh you should have said so in the first place”
Not that I didn’t have any embarrassing moments… right. We decided that we wanted to try the different drafts at different bars. Trying to order a new round I shouted out “3 CADBURIES!” the bartender just starred, I had just ordered 3 chocolate bars and not the beer I wanted which was Carlsberg :)
Day 3 Dublin: A list full of things still left to see in Dublin, we woke up early to attend a Sunday morning service at St. Pat’s Cathedral (the biggest in Ireland). We had no idea of the service hours but figured if we arrived around 9 we would definitely be able to catch one. We arrived to find out we had an hour to burn before the next service, so we went to look for a coffee shop. Again, finding out what a small world it really is, I ran into another AOII studying abroad for the semester (she’s studying in London)! Having no idea Catherine was in Dublin that weekend we ran into each other at the café! So we talked over a coffee and then continued our separate ways. A great way to start the day! The service in St Pat’s was impressive; we got to hear the choir in action and all. The day continued with a visit to Trinity University, Book of Kells, Guinness Brewery tour, and the Jameson Distillery tour. On the Jameson Distillery I was one of eight who got to be an honored whiskey taste tester! I even received a diploma stating my expertise. Not that I needed one, but now I have official documentation haha I now know the difference between scotch whiskey, irish whiskey, and American whiskey. Knowledge to last a lifetime. The Guinness brewery was amusing, but not what I expected. It was cool to be able to pull my own draft at the end, but the tour wasn’t guided and was kind of like a big walk around nothing too special. The Jameson Distillery was far more interactive and interesting.
Monday morning and I was on my way to London!
We flew into Gatwick (not Heathrow because Ryanair never flies into mainstream airports, this detail becomes important later as well). Upon arriving we knew we would have to take a train into the city, so we bought our tickets and headed to the train we thought was ours. Almost the moment we stepped aboard the train took off… little did we know were now riding first class and on the express train (neither of which we paid for). An off duty engineer explained this too us, but said not to worry about and we made ourselves comfortable. When the on duty ticket checker (is there an official name for these people?) came to our cart, she firmly explained how we were on the wrong train, at this point the off duty engineer claimed he had no idea we were in the wrong place and would have said something had he known. (wink, wink) First impression of London turned out well. We checked into our hostel and then we were on our way out again.
Here’s a condensed list of everything to save some time:
Tate Modern: Free! I love modern art more and more each time I encounter it. Dalí and Miró are definitely worth going to see in any city.
London Eye: Great views of the city, especially since we went at night! Right on the Thames river and seeing Big Ben and Parliament at night is amazing.
Indian food: a suggestion from my travel guide, turns out there’s more Indian restaurants in London then there are Pubs in Ireland. I actually have nothing to back that up, but it certainly seemed like it. Either way first encounter with Indian food was a surprisingly delicious one.
Indian beer: makes Indian food taste even better
Westminster Abby: like one big famous crypt packed not only with famous dead people, but also great history. Amazing architecture. I even learned some things from the audio tour.
Buckingham Palace: This should make you laugh… so we come up from the underground, figure out where we are and start heading in the direction of the Palace. We are approaching big decorative fences and all of us are looking around, not in amazement, but rather confusion. We are not impressed and decide we must be at the back door, so we walk around the entire perimeter of the place only to discover we had initially approached the front of the palace. I now have appreciation for how large the palace grounds are, not the splendor of the palace.
Globe Theater: Now I might consider re reading a Shakespearen Play, maybe now I’ll appreciate them the way they are supposed to be. Exit, pursued by bear.
Harrod’s: Probably my favorite London museum. Saw beautiful things I could never afford behind locked glass cases.
St. Paul’s Cathedral: Attended an Ash Wednesday service. Worship is of course always free, so it’s the best way to see any cathedral. We even got to hear the organ play! The acoustics in St Paul’s were incredible. I know that if we had paid the tourist fee of 10GBP we wouldn’t have experienced how the cathedral functions or how impressive it is to be apart of a service.
Abbey Road: Turns out Abbey road is a busy road. Snapping pictures on this busy avenue was quite an amusing adventure.
We Will Rock You: we purchased half price tickets to this musical based on Queen songs. I think I have a new appreciation for british humor. It’s basically ridiculous. Either way this show was entirely entertaining.
Tower of London: Biggest jewels I have ever seeen. New goal is to find Prince of a husband to buy me equally impressive diamonds haha I also have met a Beefeater and know what that means.
Camden Market: best part about London. Thoroughly investigated London fashion and even made a few purchases to take back with me. Tried falafel, completely delicious.
Trafalgar’s Square: We hung around for over an hour and let the city sink in. amazing.
Now here is where all the details fall into place. Our return flight was from Liverpool. Liverpool is not in London like Ryanair claims. Liverpool is a 6 hour busride from London. Also, remember how I could only bring one backpack? This now comes into play. Well, after making a few purchases, there is absolutely no room in my bag for anything else and I refused to pay the checked bag fee. So I layered. Several layers later, I fit it all (on me or in the bag). Now going through Liverpool security was other thing. So I place my bag on the xray machine only to have security pull it out of the line and ask me to open the bag to inspect... He askes if there is any other liquids in my bag, I reply that they are all in the clear bag in my hand. He starts searching through and pulls out the small bottle of whisky I had bought from Jameson. WHooops! totally forgot about that... but there's more. He puts the bag back on the machine and again asks me if there is anything I should tell him that's in my bag. I say no, but feel free to look. He then more specifically asks, "There appears to be a fork in your backpack, do you know anything about that?"
Ooooooooh yeah, that fork Ana gave me. Apparently not flight safe. It did however pass through 2 other airports. Funny. I think I connected all the details, yes? The best part was when all my clothes are spread over the table and he asks if he could help me put everything back. He could tell it had taken precision packing to stuff everything in this small jansport backpack :)
that should do it. this has been long enough!
huuuuugs from Granada!
In front of the Palacio Real
At Chic-Atocha the first night in Madrid.
Plaza Mayor
Palacio Royal
Lunch on the Plaza Mayor
