Dublin Part 1

We met up with another friend from high school in Dublin, Travis. We enjoyed a few pints of Guiness, wandered the city, saw dublin castle and the book of kells housed at Trinity college, and went to the National Leprechaun Museum (very cool actually, more of a interactive myth museum). And then we made our way to Belfast.

Cork

We spent our first night in Ireland in a Southern city, Cork. Very nice, busy downtown with fun things like an English Market and a four-faced liar clock (the east and west sides disagree with each other about the actual time.) Nearby is Blarney castle with the famous blarney stone. We did not kiss the stone (we believed the local rumor that the locals will pee on the stone with delight), but had a fantastic time roaming the grounds. It is huge; lots of beautiful paths, caves, a poison garden, a fantastic place to visit!

Tour around Oban

The hostel we stayed at offered tours of the notable sites around the area.











It was very personal; they put together the tour for Emily and I by convincing two Canadians to join us. Highlights of the tour: lots of upclose encounters with hairy coos :), a trip down Glen Lonan the funeral route of kings on their final trip to Iona, a drive through Glen Coe sight of the famous massacre, a peek at Stalker castle (the final castle in Monty Pythons holy grail), the monument to bonnie prince charlie and the place he raised his standard to claim the crown, and Glenfinnan viaduct (the train track the hogwarts express takes with the beautiful arch architecture).

And now, with three hours of sleep, Marc Emily and I are off to Ireland!!!

Iona

The last stop in the Hebrides is Iona, famous as the site the Book of Kells was started before it made its journey to Ireland. We saw the ruins of the nunnery, and the Abbey. It used to be the center of trade when ferries were more common, and many of the Scottish kings are buried there (Notably Macbeth and Duncan both rest there).

Isle of Staffa

If you ever make it out to Scotland, the Isle of Staffa is a must see. It is one of the most beautiful, impressive places I have ever seen. The big tourist attraction on the island is Fingals cave, the supposed home of Fingal the giant. It is formed by basalt columns in hexagonal steps as a result of volcanic cooling. It is a bit out of the way; we had to take a small boat out for a half hour to get out to this small island. As you approach, it is just like the cave out of Harry Potter that Voldemort hid his horucrux in. Because it is so difficult to get to, there are not many people, and we had the island practically to ourselves. Puffins also nest on the island, and although they are hard to find we did find some off of the cliffs on the northern end of the island.

Isle of Mull

The hebrides off of the west coast of Scotland was beautiful; it was an appropriately drizzly and cloudy day that we explored three of the isles (mull, staffa, and iona). Mull was the largest isle we visited, and most of our time there was spent travelling from one side to another by bus. But the views were spectacular :)

McCaigs Tower

We spent a few nights on the west coast of scotland, to enjoy the hebrides isles.

However, the first night we got in to late to go sightseeing, so instead we climbed up to one of the towns highest points, and enjoyed a spectacular view of Oban at sunset.