The Adventures of Studying Abroad: The Emerald Isle

This past weekend Jacob and I went to Ireland and Northern Ireland on a tour. It was an early birthday gift to me from him and my family. Jacob and I had an 8 a.m. flight out of Edinburgh into Dublin on Thursday morning so we were up early in order to catch the bus to the airport. We flew Ryanair which is a budget airline. Jacob was asleep before we even took off and his mouth was moving really odd. I kept watching him and eventually nudged him to ask if he was ok. He said, "Was I moving my mouth?" And I told him yes. His response was "Oh, I was dreaming that I was eating a smore and I couldn't get the marshmallow into my mouth." What entertainment! Maybe next time I won't wake him up and see what else he ends up doing. We both ended up sleeping for the 45 minute flight and woke up to our plane landing on the runway and we were still going really fast. I closed my eyes and hung on tight because I was certain that our plane was going right off the edge of that runway. Thankfully we made it safely but it was a close one in my opinion. We took the airport bus to the city center of Dublin which was conveniently located across the street from our hotel.

We got unpacked and headed out for some lunch. We ate at the Hard Rock Cafe. Oops, we should have known better but we can't help but eat an amazing American burger! We then continued to Temple Bar to do some souvenir shopping. We walked around the rest of the day and went back to the hotel since our tour started at 8 am the next day.

We woke up and got ready for the day. We then walked around the block to where our tour left with PaddyWagon Tours. There were 6 of us on the 3 day Northern Ireland tour. 2 American (us), 3 Canadians, and 1 Australian. Since there were only six of us we took a minivan. Our first stop on the tour was Slane Castle. They made us climb up a brick wall and look over barbed wire in order to see this castle that was probably 3 football fields away. We stopped for two minutes because our tour guide said we weren't supposed to be there taking pictures, yet it was on our itinerary? Why put it on the list of things we get to see when we don't even get to go in or up to it? Next we saw Oliver Plunkett's head in a jar in a Cathedral in a small town. It was kind of gross to see a Priests’ head sitting in a jar inside a church. We then made our way to Monasterboice were they had huge Celtic cross monuments in a cemetery. We saw a grave where a person passed away a year to the day that we were there. Creepy! We then headed to the Grianan Ailligh which is Ireland’s version of the Colosseum according to our tour guide Colm. We then drove to our hostel which was an interesting ordeal.

            The hostel was right across the street from where the bomb was found 2 weeks ago in Northern Ireland. There was a guy with a huge gun standing outside of the Police Station. I was scared to say the least. They only had one room key for a 6 person room so we couldn’t really lock our door when we left or someone would get locked out. We didn’t even get to stay in the actual hostel we had to stay up the street in some random apartment building. Our tour guide also forgot to tell us what time we needed to be up in the morning so we had to guess what time we had to get up.

            The next morning we got up about 2 hours earlier than we needed to. We went to Giant’s Causeway which was gorgeous. There were cliffs and hexagonal stones that were popping up all over the place that were formed by a volcanic eruption. I can’t explain in words how beautiful it was so pictures will have to do. We then went to a Rope Bridge which we shouldn’t have had to pay for because according to our tour it was included but we had to pay for it anyways because our tour guide told us it wasn’t included. This bridge was high up and it’s a skimpy rope bridge that was very very scary. I hate heights and the winds were 20 mph. I cried after I finished crossing it and the bad thing was that the bridge leads to an island so I had to cross the scary bridge twice.

            We then took a 2 hour drive to Belfast where we were going to be staying that night. They ended up “overbooking” our hostel which I am not quite sure how that’s possible since the tour cost $500 for 2 people. May I ask why we weren’t priority? I find it quite ridiculous that we couldn’t stay there when we paid so much money. They took us to a completely different part of town and made us stay at a hostel that wasn’t even affiliated with PaddyWagon. It was called the Linen House and it was disgusting. The lady at the front desk tried to make us pay to stay there and we refused since we already paid money for the tour. We were put in an 18 person room where there was no lock on the door so all of our stuff had the possibility of being stolen. 2 of the people in the room were living there which made the room smell. I actually never saw them get up and leave so maybe I should have checked their pulse. Oops.

            The next day we walked around Belfast and finally rode back to Dublin. Many more things went wrong on the tour but there’s too many to write. I’ve e-mailed the company requesting a full refund. All in all we loved Ireland the country but not so much the tour. We come in 3 days which is crazy! Time has gone by way too fast. We can’t wait to see everyone!

Love you all,
Hayley and Jacob