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Dublin
Day 1
When we met Jared in Amsterdam we could not think of the name of our hostel in Dublin, so we had to meet him at his.We walked all the way across town to get him and then walk all the way back because we were going to the Guinness Brewery, which happened to be right next to our place.I am about sick and tired of walking.We have walked at least eight hours every day for the past 6 days.The cities are much more spread out over in Western Europe and the price for transportation is ridiculous.Anyways, we made it to the storehouse and toured the 7 floors.It was self guided and more of a museum than a brewery.They explained the process, but Dale and I already knew from the tour in Munich.Actually, the museum was well done and informative.At the top there you receive a free beer and a good view of Dublin.Dublin doesn't have tall buildings at all.I believe the tallest building is 12 stories.
After we left Guinness we headed to meet a couple other girls from school, whom Jared has been living with during the summer.We had lunch and departed ways.They had been shopping the whole morning and had to pack the rest of the day?Exciting.I mean, it makes much more sense to shop in Europe so you get a crummy exchange rate and everything is double what it costs in the states.And on top of that you get the privilege of carrying all your treasures home.It is also well known that Dublin is at the height of fashion in the world.
So the guys went to Dublinier, which is a museum about Dublin and Vikings.The bottom two floors try to give the sense of what it would be like to live in Dublin during the Middle Ages and how it all started.The third floor was for Vikings, the ones who founded Dublin.Afterwards we had an hour to waste because Jared had to be back at his hostel at 5:30.We went to a local bar because it had the cheapest beer in town.We met four locals including the owner, who was overly nice.It felt really good rubbing elbows with these local folk.We couldn't understand half the stuff they were saying, but it was fun anyways.After a couple with the locals Jared had to go back to the hostel.We had so much fun we decided to meet up back at the bar for dinner. We both went to our hostels.
For dinner we ordered burgers.For some reason 3 of the 4 guys drinking were drinking Bud.This struck us a little strange.The Germans almost rioted when Bud bought the rights to sell beer at the World Cup last year and he we were in the heart of Ireland, and these guys were drinking Bud.After dinner we were supposed to go to this other bar to go on a musical pub crawl, but the locals wouldn't let us.They said the bar and the music there is crap.So they made a suggestion and one of them, Mike, actually took us to his favorite place, The Porterhouse.They hand brew beer and he had one of the bartenders come over and explain each of the beers to us.He was right the beer was good here.Mike bought us our first round and after two rounds he called it a night. (This is Dale)The girls from made a brief appearance but I guess that they didn't care for the Porterhouse because they were there for only a short time, they probably had more packing to do.After that we went to a place called the Merchant.It had live music which was o.k. but nothing to write home about.After that Blaine went home and I went to another pub with Jared after that I called it a night.I hope that Jared made it home, and the girls got on their flight o.k., because they had purchased their weight in crappy merchandise.
Day 2
We started the day a little late today but accomplished a lot.We made it to the hop-on hop-off bus stop around 10:30, which was right across the street from our hostel.From there we hopped off first at the Ireland National Gallery.I actually enjoyed this art gallery compared to the other ones we have been to.They had a variety of different paintings.The gallery mainly consisted of Irish artists but also had some famous ones as well, such as Degas and Monet.From there we hopped back on and took the bus to the Post Office, where the 1916 Easter Uprising was started.The columns outside are still riddled with bullet holes.We hopped back on and went to the National History Museum.Only the first floor was open, but still included some interesting things.One of these was Bog People.Bog people are usually victims that are thrown into a bog and persevered by the mud for many centuries.They had three examples on display.
We hopped back on the bus but were constantly disturbed by the kids behind us.This was a tour bus with a guy giving details of the city, but these kids thought that it was a public bus.This is another example of Americans being obnoxious.It is no wonder everyone hates us.Every time we run into Americans they are either doing something stupid or saying something stupid.This is just one example and we have only met a couple examples that would make us think otherwise.We had to get off the bus and catch another one because it was so bad.
At that stop we saw the Molly O'Malley statue and grabbed a bite to eat at that stop, so it turned out ok.I had the traditional Irish beef stew while Dale had the traditional Irish sandwich.From there we got off at the Dublin Castle, but the next tour didn't start for another 50 minutes so we got back on.They did have a "sand castle" display, depicting the famous Irish writers such as the guy who wrote Gulliver's Travels.From there our next stop was at the Kilmainham prison.This was the place that was used to house the Irish revolutionaries throughout the years, before they were executed.The tour was guided and was a presentation of Irish history as much as the prison itself.We hopped back on and stopped at our hostel's stop, which also happened to be the stop for the Jameson Whisky Distillery.We decided to check it out and see how much it was.We were greeted by a very nice Irish man and he said they accepted credit cards, and since we had some time and were running low on funds we decided to do it.While we were waiting he quizzed us on our US knowledge.He asked us the four capitals named after presidents, the two capitals ending in a "u" and what are the four capitals with the name "city" in them, which six European countries were smaller than Rhode Island, and which countries capital is named after a U.S. president?Together we got them all, but this Irishman knew more about the states than we did.The tour was less than spectacular, but Dale did get selected to try 5 whiskeys and pick his favorite.Luckily Dale chose the Jameson or else they might have thrown us out.Dale says that Jameson is the best whiskey in the world and was much smoother than Jack Daniels.Afterwards we went and picked up some food and hung out at the hostel for the rest of the night.We have to get up early because we have a 6:40am flight to catch.
We are going to be travelling all day tomorrow and will get in to Oklahoma at 22:00.Unless something crazy happens this will be our last entry.It has been a fun and challenging experience.We have seen things I never thought I would see in person.We are looking forward to going home but also looking backwards at the unique experience we had.We would like to thank everyone for reading the blog.I hope it has been entertaining or at least readable.Dale has some pictures on his computer that he will need to upload and I will try and tag all the other photos this week.I hope to see everyone soon.Bye!
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