Galway Girl

 And so the crazy-ness of traveling every single weekend begins. This past weekend we took a trip to Galway and the Aran Islands, I absolutely loved both of them!! Saturday we went into Galway, and I think it is my favorite city I've seen so far. It's the perfect mix between a cute city atmosphere and beautiful landscape. Navigating our way around via public transportation was a little tough and hard to get used to and as soon as we got the hang of it, it was time to leave. The bed and breakfast we stayed at was pretty far from the city center so it took a long morning of finding the right bus to take and walking into random stores to ask for directions before we finally found it. It was a cute little B & B with a sweet little Irish woman running it. She made us a traditional Irish breakfast in the morning, the home made brown bread being my favorite part! It was nice to be in a real bed and eating real food, as opposed to the hostels we have been staying in everywhere else.

Then on Sunday we took a ferry over to the Aran Islands, not really knowing what to expect, except the fact that we were told that the scenery was beautiful. I found this island so interesting, I think there are about 400 people that live on the island, they have one general store where they do their shopping for absolutely everything and there are about three pubs that serve food. That's it. I cannot imagine living like that, they could take the ferry over but for the most part, I'm sure they stay there. So there are a few different ways to explore the island, you can rent bikes, take a tour bus, take a horse and carriage or walk. We opted to rent bikes and get some exercise in. I never imagined how much fun they would be, I felt like a little kid again. Riding past such a gorgeous coast, going fast down a hill, and just enjoying every second of the fact that I was in Ireland. We spent the day riding around the island and sight seeing then we took the ferry back to land and headed towards a long night of traveling. We had to catch a bus back to our bed and breakfast, grab our bags, catch another bus into town, get onto our bus to go to Limerick, and finally get a bus from Limerick City Center back to UL. 

It was a long weekend but I really really enjoyed myself. I spent it with a great group of girls and we shared a lot of great memories!

This is a picture of Colleen, Ana, our friend Colin who works at O'Connel's, Hannah and myself before we went out in Limerick city a few nights before Halloween. We all had a really great time, it's always entertaining when people are dressed up for Halloween.

 

This is what our B & B looked like from the outside. 

 And this is the view from the window of our B & B, so pretty!

 This was a fun area of Galway, right along the water in an area called "Claddagh Village"

 The one thing I found really interesting was that they were spinning off the "Occupy Wallstreet" and handing out fliers for "Occupy Galway". One of the women explained to us exactly why they were there and it was truly eye opening. She was explaining about how the government is using their tax money for things that are out of their control and they are fed up with it. She invited us into the tent that had tea and just people hanging out, but we had to continue on our sight seeing.  http://www.occupygalway.org/

 This is one of the main pedestrian streets in Galway, it has great shopping and pubs!

 This is one of the poster walls around where the protest was happening. There are some really good points on these papers!

 Later that night we went to a few pubs just to get an idea of what the city is like at night and when we came out there was a really strange, Halloween type parade happening!

 This is just another section of that pedestrian street.

And now begin the pictures from the Aran Islands. These were the remains of a castle on the island.

 Us girls right after we rented our bikes.

 This is the view from the top of one of the forts built on the island. They had huge forts built to protect the island, it was such an exhilarating experience!

 That's probably the closest I could get without peeing my pants.

 Riding a bike and taking a picture at the same time is not as easy as it looks.

 This is another coastal area on the island.

 Overall I had a really great weekend, and I'm glad I got to do these things. My parents got into Dublin on Tuesday and they are driving to Limerick today. When I am done class they should be here so I am really looking forward to spending the weekend with them! I'm crossing my fingers that my mother brought me the pumpkin pie pop tarts I asked for.