Dublin

Hello again!

I'll update on the list from the last post once I get back next week, but right now I'm in Dublin as part of our first trip for spring break, or Semana Santa as the Spaniards call it. So far we've done so much, and good thing, too - we leave for Venice tomorrow.

Our first night here it was raining, but we got in around midnight or so, and went straight to bed after checking in at the the hostel, where we have one room with two bunk beds crammed into it and a sink. It gets the job done, but it's no royal palace. Free breakfast though!

The first full day we got up at the crack of dawn to book tours for the day, had breakfast, ended up not booking a tour for that day (but rather the next), and wandered to this famous pastry shop, Queen of Tarts where apple crumble and tea were had. Delicious! Then we went to a free walking tour through Dublin and saw: Christ church cathedral, Trinity college, Adam and Eve bar, Temple Bar, Stephen's Green, City hall, Bank of Ireland, ancient Viking settlements, O'Connell Street, the Spire (nicknamed 'the Stiffy by the Liffe' and other such things) the Liffe River, and...Il'l have to sort through my pictures to figure out the rest.

After the tour we sat in Stephen's Green (a park) and watched a pigeon vs. seagull war over bread, and then meandered to a restaurant to have a real Irish dinner, which consisted of beef stew with mashed potatoes and Guiness bread. Once back at the hostel, we played cards and Scrabble until midnight while waiting for the bars to open back up (Apparently, on Good Friday in Ireland there's a law against alcohol sales). We met some boys from France, Alexis and Tibu, and all went down to Temple Bar for a very fruitless 30 minutes of waiting around for nothing, and came home and went to bed.

Yesterday we went on a bus tour through the Irish countryside which was gorgeous! It run from 9 to 5 in the evening, and we got to see so much! The pictures will be up when I get back to Pamplona. When we got back, we at quickly - Stacy and I got burgers, and Kate and Lindsay had Lebanese food. Then we got ready and went with Alexis and Tibu to meet up at Trinity College for our pub crawl, where we found about 150 people there for the event. We split into three groups, but still we had about 50 in our group. We went to three different bars, and got free entry into a night club at the end. Lots of fun was had - Fruli, a strawberry beer, was discovered - and we made friends with some Irish boys at the end of the night, Owen and Brady. Very eventful!

Today, we got up early to go to St. Patrick's Cathedral for Easter mass - the national cathedral of Ireland, which turned out to be Episcopalian. We went two hours early expecting it to be packed, and the doors were locked, so we wandered to the other church, Christ Church Cathedral, and sat on a bench for a bit. One hour beforehand we went and were told that we'd only be let in (without paying) about 15 minutes before the service, so we went and sat in the park next to the church. The service was gorgeous - the St. Patrick's boys choir was incredible. I managed to have a coughing attack at the beginning of mass and had to lock myself in a bathroom with Kate's water bottle for about ten minutes, but besides that it was great. After church, we came home, went to get lunch, and then went to the Guiness factory for a tour. It was so crazy - I didn't expect it to be that fun and interesting! Of course, we got a complimentary Guinness at the end of the tour, which was fun. I learned a lot about how beer is made, and got to see an exhibit on the advertising campaigns throughout the history of the company. All in all, a great day was had!

To Venice tomorrow until Wednesday, then Florence for a day, and then Rome until Sunday! I'll try to keep you posted!

loveyoumissyou,
Hasta luego!
Alex