Dublin, Ireland

I spent last weekend with the Irish! I flew to Dublin with Katie, Jenn, and Rita, and the plane ride was only about an hour long. It was a late flight though, and by the time we arrived at our hostel, it was midnight! The hostel was actually really nice, much better than in Bath, and we quietly got ready for bed, anticipating the next day's adventures.

Saturday we had breakfast at the hostel since it was included in our stay, and then split up. Katie and Rita went horseback riding, while Jenn and I decided to go to Newgrange, Ireland to visit their well-known neolithic/megalithic passage tomb. We had some issues getting out there though, since the booking didn't exactly go through the way we had planned, but we made it there nevertheless. It took a little less than an hour to get out there, and when we arrived, the shuttlebus driver showed us where and what bus to take to get home, since we weren't able to take the shuttlebus back like we had planned. We got our tour for 1:45pm and walked around the exhibit until it was time to take the shuttle out to the passage tomb, which is only like a five minute drive. The passage tomb looked kind of ordinary from a distance, like a small hill with a building in it or something. But when you get close to it you realize the white part that looked like a wall, is actually white stones built around the hill. The entrance has been cut and it is distinct from the white stone; it is dark and it is limestone. There are two entrances, the one on the top is for the sunlight, and the one of the bottom was put there when they decided to allow people to enter. People didn't realize the passage tomb existed for a long time because it just looked natural in the landscape, until some rich guy was going to excavate and discovered it. Inside the passage tomb it was really tiny, but so neat to be inside there. The guide was really smart and he recreated the event that happens on the winter solstice every year, when the sunlight slowly enters and lights up the passage tomb, which was really exciting.

We then had to hurry and get back to the visitor center to try and catch the 3pm bus back to Dublin, but we missed it, so we had to wait around until 445pm, so we were slightly bummed but we had scones and tea while waiting. Yumm. We eventually made it back to Dublin and met up with Katie and Rita, and went to dinner at a nice restaurant. Dinner was really good, and then we decided to have dessert as well! It was really good, and we took our time just talking and enjoying the atmosphere. We then went back to the hostel, and it was 930pm and the other person in our room for 8 was sleeping already! haha so we hung out down in the common area until it was a normal time to go to sleep.

Okay...looks like I'll have to do this in two parts unfortuantely, but it's late and this post is getting very long! More later!