Ireland and Spring Fever

Guess what?? I went to Ireland last weekend, and it was awesome!!

And now I need a break to recover from my break, but school is insisting that I write a paper that's due Friday, which I haven't started yet. Hmmm.

Let's concentrate on the fun stuff!

So, last Friday I woke up with mom at 4am in order to make my 7am flight from Edinburgh to Dublin. The flight was fine, and I arrived in Dublin at 8am, having no idea where to go or what to see.



After wandering around Dublin for a couple of hours (and finding a beautiful market, buying some yummy scrubbed carrots and pretty apples and a loaf of bakery bread) I found the train station and jumped on a train to Cork!



Cork was pretty, but not nearly as amazing as Blarney (about 20 minutes away), where I found Blarney Castle, which has the most BEAUTIFUL grounds I've ever seen, and yes, the Blarney Stone.



...Which I just HAD to kiss. I now officially have the Gift of Gab.



Too bad you have to bend over backwards to reach it, or you'd be able to actually tell that this is me. It is! I swear!

So, from Blarney back to Cork, and then on to Killarney, which is the CUTEST town ever! It's a bit touristy, but still very nice.



In Killarney I saw Muckross House, which is a pretty mansion house with amazing grounds much like Blarney Castle, and has the ruins of an old Abbey! I stayed at a nice hostel in Killarney on Friday night, and had a good sleep in a room with about 8 other kids, most of them from China, and communication was a bit difficult, but fun! OH! I also met a Franciscan monk!! I've never met a monk before! Actually, he may have been a friar. I'm not really sure of the difference. Anyway, I met him outside the Friary next to my hostel, and he was wearing a brown robe and everything! It was so cool! We talked for a while and he told me about how he'd been to Minnesota once for a conference, which we both thought was pretty cool.

The next morning I got on a bus which went from Killarney to Galway by way of Limerick. I'd originally planned to stay and see a bit of Limerick itself, but there had been two murders there the day before (they have a lot of trouble with gang violence), so I decided it'd be a better idea to just push on to Galway.



Galway is a great city. It's got the best mix of real-ness and tourist-ness so that you could imagine living there quite happily. It's got a lot of waterways that run from the Atlantic, and it makes the city look very European.



I was planning a night out in Galway with Erica, who I was going to meet, as she was in town at a hostel, but little did I know that the B&B that I'd booked (as all the hostels were full. What is this, Christmas?? Doesn't anyone have a nice stable I could sleep in??) was thirty miles outside of town in a little village called Spiddal. So, I wearily made my way there, buying a small package of pasta at a gas station on my way (as I'd been subsisting totally on the carrots, apples and bread, which were running low). I finally made it to the B&B, which was cute and home-y, and the nice lady who ran it offered to cook my pasta and came down to my room half an hour later with a tray of pasta, tuna fish, butter, good bread, and a slice of rhubarb pie! Things just couldn't get any better! And on top of that, I had a nice bed and a clean bathroom all to myself!



The next morning (Easter morning!) I woke up and went upstairs to breakfast where I met two nice women from Massachusetts (Maine? Maryland? I forget...), and we ate and talked about how awesome Ireland was. Since I knew the next bus back into Galway wouldn't leave until 1:30pm, I asked if they would mind me hitchhiking back into town with them, and they said that would be fine! So, twenty minutes later I'm back in Galway at St. Nicolas' cathedral, where I attended Easter mass, which was AWESOME. Best sermon I've heard since Pastor Mark's Christmas Eve sermon. The church was beautiful, and everyone was so joyful!



(I took that before the church was full, since I didn't want to disturb anyone, of course, but the whole place was PACKED!)

So, after church I ran over to the bus station and got a bus to Kilbeggan, a little town between Galway and Dublin. I landed there a few hours later, and took a taxi down to the village of Clara, which is where I'd heard rumors about the O'Sionnach family castle.



Now, let me explain about this castle. As far as I understand it, my great-great-great-great grandfather was William O'Sionnach, who changed his name at Ellis Island to "Fox," which is the English translation. He had a son named William, who had a son named Isaiah, who had Grace Perry, who had Sandra Schonning, who had my mother, Tracy (and you can ask her about these details. I may have missed one generation in there somewhere).

So, as you can imagine, I was keen to find the ruins of this O'Sionnach castle, even though it wasn't owned by William O'Sionnach, it was probably in his family a bit farther back. Here's a picture that another Fox family member took of the ruins:
http://www.geocities.com/foxclanirish/images/foxslott2.jpg

So, I knew that the castle was near Clara, and I knew (vaguely) what it looked like. I arrived in Clara and began asking around to see if anyone had heard of it. The cab driver looked at me like I was crazy and said "No, there's no castle about Clara. You must be wantin' another place." This was a bit disheartening, but I felt better when I talked to a couple of girls in a gas station who said that there were ruins just about a mile away up on a hill that they used to play in when they were younger. I thought this deserved a look-see, so I asked for directions and set out, jumping over a few fences on the way. But fences couldn't stop me! I was on a MISSION.

AND I FOUND IT!!



I took LOTS and lots of pictures, and explored what was left of the thing from top to bottom. Once I'd satisfied my curiosity, I made my way back to the main road and back to Kilbeggan, seeing this sign only on the way out...



...Oops.

Anyway, back to Kilbeggan where I caught a bus back to Dublin. I met up with Erica and her friend who's studying there about an hour later, and we walked back to her place. I crashed on their couch for the night after having a good time watching Rent, and woke up two hours later at 3am to catch my 6:30 flight from Dublin back to Edinburgh.

It was once heck of a weekend, and I have SO many more stories! So many things could have gone wrong, since the only things I planned before I left were the hostel in Killarney and the B&B in Galway, but everything turned out just fine, and I've gotta thank the Big Man Upstairs for that. But I think this post has gone on long enough. If you want to know more and see more pictures, check out my flicker account at:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/36777493@N00/sets/72157616669652695/
as I finally figured out how to organize pictures so they're in chronological order!

And I'm sure you'll hear more stories from me when I get back home. 6 and a half weeks left!

Birthday Day!!

Hey everyone!

A less depressing post this time, I promise!

So, as some of you know, yesterday was my birthday, and I had a great time! Thanks to all those who sent me birthday wishes! It was great to hear from you :-).



Mom and I spent the day in Edinburgh seeing the sights and having the MOST amazing seafood lunch I've had in my whole life! We went to the Museum of Childhood first, which was just what I needed on the birthday when I become a full-fledged adult. No more provisional license for me!



This whole week has been great, I've gotta say. Mom and I have been seeing ALL the sights, from a day on the England boarder seeing Hadrian's Wall, to Edinburgh, Glasgow, Stirling, and tomorrow we're going to see the 14th century castle in Doune where "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" was shot. Awesome.

Anyway, I can't think of much more to say right now, except for I'm having a great time.

Oh! And that I'm leaving for my solo trip to Ireland on Friday! I plan to travel from Dublin to Cork to Killarney, where I'll spend my first night, and then up to Limerick and a night in Galway, and then a final stop in Clara, where the O'Sionnach Castle is (my family castle!!) before heading back to Dublin. It's gonna be a whirlwind, but I'll have TONS of pictures to show for it when I get back!!

Thanks again for the birthday notes, and I'll talk to you later! :-D

P.S. Check out my Flickr account for more pictures!