Ireland Adventure, March 21

Saturday we planned to meet the boys in the morning after breakfast. We actually got breakfast at our hostel this day so that was good – just had some cereal, wasn’t very good but whatever it was obvious we went for the cheapest hostel, the showers definitely proved that as well. Then we checked out of that hostel and checked into the next one – the one Allison Quick (sister to two of my friends at TU) was staying in. We met up with the boys who were wanting to play golf but didn’t know if they could find a place where they didn’t have to dress up, that rented clubs, and wasn’t too expensive. They hadn’t found one but Kelly and I decided to go book a tour for the 4 of us for Sunday – through the Wicklow Mountains, stopping in Glendalough and Kilkenney. When we got back they had figured it out and found somewhere to play golf, they were ecstatic. Kelly and I wanted to show them our park since it wasn’t too cold so we went and got some lunch and sat in the park. It wasn’t nearly as nice as the day before, a little chilly, so there weren’t as many people out, but still fun.

Kyle, Me & Tyrel in St. Stephen's Green


After lunch we parted ways and Kelly and I went to Malahide Castle. We had no idea what to expect – I had no idea Malahide was a town. SO we got on the train and ended up in this little town. Oh, and we both decided to wear our new boots this day so keep this in mind. We got off the train and had no idea where we were supposed to go but saw a map that said it was a 15minute walk to the castle. So we headed down the road and seemed to be the only people walking there. So we walked around 30minutes, following the arrows pointing to Malahide Castle, and finally turned into a dirt road. We seemed to be walking a lot more than 15 minutes and could not see any sign of a castle. We were on that dirt road, with people running by and us in our boots and peacoats, for another good 30 minutes.

Kelly doing some hurdles on our way to the castle


Kelly even asked some boy “excuse me, is there a castle up there?” which I found pretty funny – how the heck do you not see a castle that big?! But we finally made it and the castle was beautiful, there was even a lawn people just liked to relax on. We had to sit for a little bit so we got cokes and relaxed for a little. Then we decided to tour the castle, which was dumb – I have decided that castles should only be looked at from the outside. But whatever at least now I know. And we didn’t want to walk another hour back to the train station because we had to be back to meet the boys so we got a taxi to the train station then took the train back to Dublin.

Me in front of Malahide Castle


I had e-mailed Elizabeth a couple times because Tyrel wanted to meet up with Blake but they went on a day trip Saturday and weren’t going to be back in time to meet us so we would have to call them later. But the boys, Kelly & I got dinner at an Italian restaurant and then went to a place called “The Joy of Coffee” for dessert. This place was an adorable little restaurant that had like 100 different types of chocolate. We each got a piece of cake or something – mine was chocolate mousse cake, and coffee. Delicious! We just hung out and talked for a very long time. And we had finally gotten a hold of the other girls and met up with them at Temple Bar. We went to another pub because it was called O’Neill’s (Elizabeth’s last name) and just hung out there, talking and catching up. Then my group went back to bed because we had the tour early the next morning and we parted ways with the other group.