But before I delve into all this, I have to just make a quick note of my first trip on Ryanair. Quite honestly, I had a lovely experience. My heart was pounding like mad prior to the flight because I was pretty positive they were going to make me check my backpack at the gate, which would've set me back €50+ AKA less money for food and drinks AKA I did not want this to happen. They didn't measure my bag but in the middle of the flight, a flight attendant walked down the aisle with my bag, asking who its owner was. Apparently it was too big, but they just kept it for me in the back of the plane and I was able to retrieve it as I got off. I learned my lesson for my second flight, and I ended up packing a good deal more into the "personal bag" I brought to lessen the bulk in my backpack, but more on this when I talk about Scotland. Overall though, I didn't think Ryanair were the monsters some people led me to believe, and I found all their employees to be extremely nice and helpful. And all the seats have the same amount of space, kind of like JetBlue back at home, which provides someone like me who is 5 feet tall with more than enough legroom :)
Back to Ireland...
What can I say? I loved the country, which most people can tell now by my fondness for Guinness.
Dublin is a wonderful city. It's small but not too small. It's fairly expensive (significantly more so than Berlin but definitely not as bad as the UK and France) and has a lot of tourists, but I didn't mind too much. Love blinds ya!!!
Dublin Castle
This was taken the same day I arrived. I wasn't looking for the castle but rather stumbled upon it as the lost little person I was. After a storm, the clouds are breathtaking!
In the room where presidents are sworn in is this bit of English propaganda on the ceiling depicting them as saviors of the "pagan" Irish. Hmm...
And here you can see the archaeological site and form an idea of what the castle used to look like. It was a lot more substantial than it stands today.
Trinity College
Beautiful? Yes, but also quite small. (Let's get real: when it comes to university campuses, Cal's got quite a lovely one!)
There are all these signs telling you to stay off the lawn, which reminded me of The Princess Diaries. Am I the only person who remembers this? Probably. But that's probably how they keep the grass so pristine.
Kilmainham Gaol
This is where I learned the bulk of my Irish history. It's definitely worth the visit even though it's a bit far from the city center, and it was very interesting to learn about the Irish struggle for independence as well as the nation's history in general.
While in Dublin, I also tried boxty, which is a thin potato pancake. True to the stereotype, the Irish are very serious about their potatoes and portions. (This was my plate, and I shared one order with a friend I met at my hostel.) If you know me, you know that I'm also very serious about potatoes and portions, so maybe this was the cherry on top for my love affair with Ireland.
After Dublin, I headed to Killarney in the western part of Ireland. It's very small but full of character and the nicest people I have ever met. Do yourself a favor and visit if you ever feel like you need an escape from it all. I have a list of things I still need to do out there like climbing Carrauntoohil, biking the Ring of Kerry, walking the Kerry Way, and touring the Dingle Peninsula. And I will do all of these things, I promise!
From the Ring of Kerry:
I had a chance to take a pretty lengthy walk through Killarney National Park. Much of the park was actually inaccessible unfortunately, but everywhere I could manage to see was wonderful! Keep in mind that the weather is very unpredictable though. I took these two photos within about two minutes of one another, and then I had to book it out of the park to look for cover because it started pouring like you wouldn't even believe.
Whilst running for cover, I actually met an Irishman named Gerry. No, he looked nothing like Gerard Butler, but I definitely smiled when he told me his name :) he actually asked me to meet him for a pint of Guinness that night but considering he was probably my dad's age, I didn't end up going.
On that note, I just have to say that while people can be nice, they can be overly friendly. There are many times this month when older men started conversations with me, particularly in Ireland and France. As a solo female Asian traveler with an odd life background, I guess I attract a decent amount of attention superficially but even more so after I open my mouth. I don't mind a friendly conversation in a fairly busy area, but I'm not particularly fond of meeting for dinner or a beer in the evening; I only made one exception the entire month to this policy, and it was for someone I really grew to trust. Maybe I should have accepted more of these offers, but I felt more comfortable staying in, sleeping early, and getting as much done as I could during the day. This served me quite well on my trip, and it will probably be how I continue to travel when I'm alone.
Furthermore, just a tip for anyone who finds herself/himself in this situation, I'll talk briefly about someone I met in Dublin who made me feel extremely uncomfortable long after I left Ireland. I met a guy in my hostel who seemed pretty cool, and at this point I was short on friends and everyone else at my hostel was quite clique-y. (The hostel was full of people who were staying long term to learn English and find employment, and this made it very difficult for me to make friends, although I did end up with a few.) He was Irish and made a couple of funny jokes and generally, I thought we got along pretty well. I added this guy on Facebook to keep in touch, which I did with a lot of people that I met. However, this guy got very creepy very quickly. Next thing I knew, he was messaging me constantly. Sometimes it was about sordid details of his life that quite honestly I did not care about, and then he kept telling me I had to go back to Dublin and visit him before I go home to the U.S. I tried to make it as clear as possible that I wasn't interested in this incessant chatter, but he did not get the hint at all. Ultimately, some girlfriends that I met in London helped me take care of the situation, but I was really uneasy about it for a very long time considering we were friends on Facebook and he could've (and probably did) accessed a lot of photos and personal information about me before I blocked him. It made me feel stupid for trusting someone so quickly and telling him about my life when I really didn't know him very well. So lesson learned: first impressions can be very wrong.
BUT GENERALLY SPEAKING... Everyone else I met was so wonderful, and I genuinely hope to keep in touch with many of them. This was literally the one bad egg of the bunch which isn't too rough, considering how many awesome people I met.
To end this ridiculously long post - the first of a few on my February travels - I leave you with a photo of the magnificent Lakes of Killarney. I was brought here during my final hours in Killarney by a local, and it's one of the best kept secrets in town. It has a name, but I don't know what it is - sorry! All I know is it's on a hill in front of a fancy hotel and close to an old cemetery. The photo does not do the view justice, but I tried.
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