Ireland, blarney stone and civil war

J Glasgow was a nice little city (second biggest in Scotland), we scored a 4 bed doorm-room to ourselves, it had an onsuite and T.V. with 7 channels. Needless to say we wish we had more then the one night in the place. We visited St. Mundo's relgious museum and the Necropolis which sits behind the Cathedral, it was quite the spooky graveyard, built on a hill, back in the days when many of the diseasesed surcame to the "black death". We also enjoyed visiting the Kelvingrove Gallery/Museum and walking all over Glasgow (although it had a tube system, it really only had one line that went in one direction or the other).

We flew from Soctland to Northern Ireland on our first EasyJet flight. It went smoothly, and to our amazement we didn't go through any customs or immigration. We arrived in Belfast and were dropped in front of the gates to the Queens University, only a block from our hostel. Unfortunately (thanks to bad directions from the hostel) we walked around in a big circle for 15 minutes before finding our way. Luckily a friendly student saw us and offered directions.

After ditching our gear we walked around the campus and not finding a grocery store we settled for some traditional Irish garb at a place called Maggie Mays' and took in a foregin film from the Queen's Film Theatre. The Film was called Yella, named after the German woman in it who is trying to get a new job while escaping her maniac husband, it was neat.

The next day we left from Belfast on a 1 day Paddywagon Tour. Our driver Joey, who was a local, entertained us with singing and stories the whole day. We saw the Carrick-a-rede rope bridge, the Giants Causeway (very cool) and the city of Derry. We took a walking tour in Derry and learned about the "troubles" and the history behind the war between the Unionists and Republicans that had been boiling over since the late 1960's. It was the site of Bloody Sunday (we all know the U2 song), and there is a memorial there to the 13 people that died that day (and many more in the days, weeks, and years to follow). Joey shared his thoughts on growing up in the area and how the situation affected him and his family. There was a lot of information to assimilate in the few hours that we had, but it was only the beginning of our education on the civil war.

We met a couple of Aussies the next day and went on a Black Cab tour, it was very interesting as we gained a viewpoint which was different from the one we recieved on the Paddywagon tour. We saw the murals, the "peace" wall, and learned about the two communities who fought with each other, killed each other, for decades. Although there has been a cease fire called and many strides toward peace since 1998 when the Good-Friday or Belfast agreement was signed. Our driver grew up in all the violence and hate, and it was amazing to learn how he grew up in fear. It made us very aware of the blessings we have in Canada and thankful for all we have.

We spent the majority of the rest of the day with our two new Aussie friends, we also saw a bit more of Belfast and did some shopping, and then we left Paddys Palace (which wasn't quite a Palace really, look for our reviews on hostelworld.com, our username is canadiantraveljunkies2969).

We jumped on the 8pm bus to Dublin, the bus ride was a little bumpy, our driver was a maniac and the roads in Ireland (never mind the fact they drive on the left) are narrow, and constantly winding, and not smooth. Luckily we had gravol handy. At about 11pm we arrived in Dublin. We had entered the E.U. without being asked to produce our passports, or declare the vegtables in our bags. Amazing.

We hiked across town to our Hostel and fel asleep. Despite the 16 beds in the room our bunk-mates didn't keep us awake, the constant traffic and pub-goers did however. Luckily it was only one night in that room. The next morning we took a Taxi to Paddy's "Palace" Dublin and headed out on a 3 day Paddywagon tour of Southern Ireland.

Our first day we visited Clonmacnoise, the site of an ancient monastery. Then onto the coast and a beautiful city called Galway. We did some shopping, did our first load of laundry while on the road (first laundry goes to Grandad and Eileen, thanks) and got to know the people our on bus . We had a nice meal in the local pub while watching some Rugby, and then walked home through the pubs and buskers.

The next day we visited the Burren, which was a stone expanse that went for miles and had caves underneath (which we did not see unfortunately). Here's a poem I found about them..
The Burren, where there are no trees to hang a man, not enough water to drown him, and if you finally succed in killing him, it's too rocky to bury him. Later that day after lunch we visited the beautiful Cliffs of Moher. After a short ferry ride and some more of the winding and narrow roads we reached our destination for the night, the town of Killarney.

We watched as South Africa beat England in the final of the 2007 Ruby World Cup, it was awesome, the atmosphere, the cheering and of course the fight that broke out on the patio.
We spent the rest of the night at another pub that had traditional Irish music and dancing, we stayed up late and partied with our new friends from the Paddywagon.

On our last day of the tour we visited the national parks nearby via a Horse and Buggy, and then we stopped at Blarney Castle. Michelle kissed the Blarney stone, and I did not. It was wet from the stream of tourists kissing it, and that was the final nail in the coffin. It didn't help that to get your lips on the rock you had to lean over and basically hang off the castle to kiss it, mind you the safety bars meant you probably wouldn't fall to your death, but I figured I already had "the gift of the gab" anyway, and didn't want to find out how well the bars had been fixed to the rock.

We arrived back in Dublin and had made a friend named Katlynn(a fellow Canadian from Vancouver). We finished the day off with a trip to the Arlington Hotel where we enjoyed music and dancing by 5 professional dancers that did their own mini version of the Riverdance! A few pints of Guinness later and we were off to bed with Irish ballads in our heads.

We'll give you an update on our time in Dublin later, it's 11pm and time for bed. We're here until Wednesday when we leave for Madrid, Spain. Goodnight fellow travellers.