OILEÁN ÁRANN, Inishmore

today we took a day trip to the main aran island, inishmore. we took a bus from galway to the ferry, then took a 45 minute ferry ride to the island. once we got there, we rented bikes for the day and rode around the whole island which was soo cool! there were stone walls literally EVERYWHERE and the water was so blue and the grass was so green, and there were cows and horses everywhere! and some of the houses had thatched roofs (rooves?) which just made everything seem so irish-y and cute.

at one point on the island we had to park our bikes and hike up to Dún Aonghasa, which is (according to my free map) "the most spectacular semi-circular Celtic stone fort in Europe." it was really cool to see, because half of the fort was stone walls and the other half was just a cliff dropoff. the water was so blue and the view from the top was gorgeous.

we made some friends on our bike ride along the coast and as you can see they were sooo cute. we were petting the horses and feeding them..they loved the attention! the cow wouldn't let me pet him though =( and those crazy goats kept fighting/playing so i took a pic of that..we couldn't figure out why exactly they were chained together.

enjoy the pics!



my bike! the seat was not very comfortable


pretty horses


there were soo many rock walls around the island..so cool


cutieeeeeeeeeeeee


my fave pic...2 baby horses and a big horse!


the other horse..they were all so pretty


the coast


...i wouldn't recommend taking pics while biking


ivy on the rock wall with goatskies in the background


fighting goats!


close up of rocks on a rock wall


i made a stone monument


a pretty beach


cute thatched roof restaurant/cafe!


view from the top of Dún Aonghasa - cliff side


stones inside the fort


the inside of the upper part of the fort


right-side cliff view


entrance to the upper level of the fort


HC kids on the cliffs!


another thatched roof house!


pretty house


inside the ruins of an old farmhouse

guinness time

so even though i don't really do much here, it's hard to find time to blog (for some odd reason). which explains why it's been about 2 weeks. anyway, last weekend a few of us went to dublin to see the sights. it was pretty cool to be there, although i'm glad that galway is a little smaller and definitely more manageable than dublin.
once we got there, some of our friends at trinity gave us a tour and it was such a gorgeous campus. we saw the book of kells and the church and everything on the campus was just soo pretty! after that, we walked around on grafton street for a little bit and went to st. stephen's park, and were lucky enough to have gorgeous weather - it was sunny the whole weekend and about 65 degrees. after a picnic in the park, we walked (30 mins!) to the guinness storehouse - dedication right there.
the storehouse was sooo cool! it was pretty much just a museum, but with our 11 euro ticket charge we got a voucher for a guinness in the gravity bar at the very top of the museum, where we could see all of dublin which was awesomeee!
so that's pretty much it about dublin...the past few weeks have been pretty busy for me just with trying to figure out classes and get involved in campus stuff. i joined the photography society and the food and drink society (obviously), and am planning on volunteering once a week at a school helping kids with homework. i also want to join the mountaineering club so that i can get out and see more of ireland, but i need to get hiking boots first =/. the best club though is the surf club, which i joined with mollie, charlotte, julianna and a few of our other friends. the weekend of october 3 we are going on our first trip to achill island, which i am SOOOO excited for! everyone who has gone in the past says its so much fun and so beautiful, and maybe i will actually gain some surfing skills.

ok well that's it for now, feel free to leave me some comments =)

dingle!

this past weekend our advisor Gearoidin took us to county kerry where we visited the dingle peninsula. it's soooo beautiful in county kerry - i didn't get any pics of the countryside there because we were cruising along in a crazy bus, but i definitely want to go back there and take pictures because it's so amazing. there are cows and sheep everywhere and everything is so GREEN it's incredible.

below are some pictures from dingle and the great blasket island, which we took a boat out to on saturday morning. the weather was awful, and my camera lens got a little wet so some of the pictures might seem a little blurry. great blasket was amazing - it's somewhat of a tourist attraction but there are no boundaries on the island, so we were literally walking wherever we wanted. the island was evacuated in the 50s because it was so hard to get to when the sea was rough and there were only about 20 people still living on it, but the sheep are still there, so we were hanging out with them too. i couldn't believe the scenery - it was soo amazing. after the island adventure we went to some old church - i think it was from the middle ages or something but i wasnt really paying attention. anyway, it was really pretty and cool. enjoy the pics!


shot of some houses in dingle across from our b&b


the view from our b&b...the lighting/weather was terrible but you can get the gist of what kerry is like.



another street shot in dingle


beehive huts


the stones that the huts were made out of

view from the boat of the great blasket island...sooooo awesome


house ruins on the island


sheep!


pretty house on the island


crusaders go to blasket woohooo


pretty house on the island

below: different shots of the island.






...a few of us on the beach attempting to spell out "Holy Cross 08" (i'm the second S)


shot of inside the old church


another inside shot


THE BEST PART: MY FEET WERE COMPLETELY DRY AT THE END OF THE DAY THANKS TO MY SWEEEEEEEEEEEET MERRELLS WOOOHOOO!!!! everyone was so jealous of my gear.