Dublino
After the last day of Italian class, we had a fall break, which due to my class schedule, was10 days long! Some friends and I had planned a trip to Dublin and then Paris during the break, so Saturday morning I left Italy for the first time since my arrival, and flew to Ireland!
I stayed in Dublin for four days, and the time there was amazing! We were very fortunate to have no rain while we were there except for a little drizzle the day of our arrival. I particularly enjoyed being able to speak English and to have a break from struggling with a language barrier. Not to mention the Irish accents were a lot of fun to hear everywhere! Also, the feel and culture there seemed a lot more similar to American cities, which was a really nice change.
After we checked into our Bed & Breakfast, Ali, Erin, and I headed into town to get dinner. We stopped at the Boar’s Head pub for our first pub dining experience in Ireland. We greatly welcomed the break from pasta and thoroughly enjoyed our sides of potato wedges with malt vinegar! There was an Irish soccer game on television while we were there, so we joined the room full of Irish fans watching it while we ate. Then, we headed into the city for some shopping before meeting up with our five other friends who were traveling with us, but staying at a different hotel in the city.
For our first night in Dublin, I got pulled into participating in a Pub Crawl, even though I was absolutely exhausted from getting next to no sleep the previous night (due to an early flight), and then traveling for a good portion of the day! The Pub Crawl was led by a Trinity College alum, who took the group of travelers to four different styles of Irish pubs throughout the night (although we went home after pub number three). First, we went to a more traditional Irish pub, then a more modern one, followed by a lively micro-brewery, and finally a dance club pub. We spent about 45 minutes at each pub, and then gathered and proceeded to the next one together. At the first pub, I tried a cider beer, that tasted really good (I don’t like the taste of beer really, so I enjoy alternatives). The first pub was probably my favorite of the three I went to; I liked the chill atmosphere there the best. The second one had a lot of tables where we could sit and talk, but was a little too dimly lit for my taste. And the third one was rather loud and lively, with a dance floor, making it difficult to hear or talk in other parts of the pub over the music. But, overall, it was a cool experience, and I was quite glad I stayed awake for it all! Also, we met some interesting people and backpackers from all over the world who were on the Pub Crawl, and we had fun talking to them and hearing their stories. After the third pub, though, I was quite ready for some sleep, so we headed back to our hotel via cab (after stopping for cookies at Subway, naturally!).
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