Ireland and then some

I haven't updated the blog in a while, apologies to my loyal readers. I've been enjoying myself and it gets hard to keep it all updated. I like to make sure the blog experience is the best one possible, therefore, a little extra time has to go into it...ha. Life here in Oxford is pretty much the best thing ever and I know I'm going to really miss it, but I'll be ready to go home once it's time to, don't worry Mom =). This blog is fairly lengthy, so get to reading.

*Insert comments about attention-loving Brits*

As Riou (also known as Batman as well as the nicest Brit ever) would say, "This body doesn't sculpt itself."

Hello, Ed.

I hope you two are happy with the blog referencing.

So this weekend I went to Dublin, Ireland, along with 7 other girls from Oxford. I wasn't too sure what to expect. Ireland has never really been one of the places that is high on my places to visit. But I very much enjoyed it. Every Irish person we talked to was extremely nice and helpful, and they went out of their way to be friendly. On our first night, we got in a little late and were trying to find a place to eat. (And by late, we went looking for something to eat around 9:30...everything closes over here in the Eastern hemisphere) We asked a police officer for some suggestions. He suggested McDonald's and we were like "uhh...try again" He got his buddy, another officer, if he had any ideas and he thought about it for a second and then he suggested McDonald's as well. After we told them no way, they told us some other streets to try and see if anything was open. The officers told us to turn down the street and it would take us about a two-hour walk to find something...if we know where we are going, if not then it would take about 5...ha. Funny Irishmen. We ended up going to McDonald's.

We stayed in a hostel in Ireland which was a very unique experience, I suppose. I paid to stay in a dorm room full of stangers...ha. It felt a bit like youth camp, except with more Germans and French people. Getting to Ireland was somewhat of a challenge. We had to switch trains like four different times and only with about 5 minutes in between each stop and if we would've missed one, we would've missed our ferry. It got interesting. We made it, though. The ferry was kind of rough and I don't suffer much from motion sickness, but I was feeling a bit woozy. On Saturday we walked around Dublin a bit and went to St. Patrick's Cathedral and toured the Guinness factory. I don't think it gets much more Irish than Catholicism and beer. Some of the girls wanted to go to the Guinness factory store, and we weren't too willing to pay the 11 euro fee to tour it. So one of the girls went up and asked the lady where the store was and she said to follow her and she opened up some doors behind the ticket check-in place and led us to the store. Turns out, we were pass all the check points to tour the place, so we decided to take a free tour of Guinness. Probably not the most honest thing to do, but they weren't really worried about it too much, obviously. The tour was boring, but at the top of the factory, it is supposed to have the best view of Dublin. And it did.


On our first train ride, it was really crowded because another train got cancelled, so we had to stand near/inside the bathroom. Fun stuff.

Just a view of the Welsh countryside on our way to the ferry

We went to this restaurant our first night there, after we ate at McDonald's and watched a local band play some nice, classic Irish songs.

The band

That thing sticking up is the Spire...Ireland must have wanted a distinctive landmark but didn't have much money so they decided to make a massive pole. It serves its purpose, I suppose.

A bridge

Us on the bridge

An awesome green mailbox


St. Patrick's cathedral

A fountain at the Guinness factory




We made it safely out of the factory, unscathed.


On Saturday, we tried to find somewhere to eat a little earlier, and a bit more authentic, but all the places had like 2 hour waits, so we ended up going to the Hard Rock Dublin.

But on the upside, they had free refills, which is the only place yet to have had them. I took a picture of mine...ha



Supposedly their painted Georgian doors are famous. I bought some playing cards with all the different colored doors on them.

On the way home from Ireland on the ferry, Laura had bought some Starbursts, but was very stingy with her Strawberry flavored ones and wouldn't share them, so we decided to teach her a lesson. At one point while she was in the bathroom, Mallory and Vannessa took out all the strawberry ones and hid them. Then right before we left, Mallory lined them all up in front of Laura so she could see what we could have done, but because we are so nice, we let her keep them.

Another random picture of the Welsh countryside on our way home.



I have other things that I have done in England that I haven't posted anything about. I guess I can do that now too.

Last Saturday, me and three other girls went to London. We left Oxford at 7:30! Crazy for me, I know. We went to Notting Hill and went to a market along Portobello Road. Supposedly that's a famous road, but I hadn't heard of it. I bought a pocket watch on a chain thing and about an hour after I bought it, someone asked for the time. I ceremoniously and triumphantly opened it and said "It is 11:20..." and kind of trailed off. An hour ago it was 11:20. The girls made fun of me the rest of the day and since.






So this guy is a graffiti street artist and no one knows who he is, but he's kind of a big deal, I learned.



Pianos at Harrod's...some day.





After Notting Hill, we made our way to Westminster Abbey via the underground tube. A few of us actually went in this time. That was pretty mind-blowing. I unfortunately couldn't take any pictures inside. It was amazing to see the hundreds of years of history as well as all the burial places of the greats of history. Fascinating stuff. After a while, though, it gives me a headache. My brain is trying to fathom it, but it can't so it just kind of shuts down. After that we went to Abbey Rd and attempted to recreate the iconic Beatles album cover. The road was a bit busier than expected, so it didn't work out as well as we would have hoped. We also went to the King's Cross railway station. We went there because it's featured in the Harry Potter series. He gets to Hogwart's by taking the train at platform 9 3/4.

Oldest door in all of Britain...it was at Westminster Abbey. I suppose I snuck in a few pictures.



Abbey Road

Abbey Road studios

They have a cute little display for all of the tourists who want to pretend to be Harry Potter. As you can tell, I was excited...ha



Last Thursday, the entire Oxford group went to London for a play at the Globe. We attended King Lear, but it wasn't very good. Well, it was 3 hours long and the seats were wooden bleacher-like things with no backs. That got old, real quick. The performance wasn't too good either. Before we got to the globe though, we stopped at Hampton Court, the vacay home of the royals dating back to Henry VIII. We weren't supposed to take pictures, but being the crazy rebel that I am, I snapped a few, all for your viewing pleasure.






All was going well until...
I made fun of his tights...



Their other throne...HA...get it?



I thought this was hilarious...not too sure why.

The Globe

Inside the Globe


We also went to the city of Bath the other day and toured the Roman baths...I'm kind of tired of posting this blog, and you are probably getting tired of looking at it, but hang in there. I'm almost done...ha


We took a walk through Prior Park before we went to the baths




The nasty water



The Royal Crescent

Jane Austen lived here briefly