Radisson Sas Royal Htl Dublin

... hilarious but not how I wanted to wake up after my ordeal fighting jet lag from the day before. The next morning I did a lot of really touristy things like seeing Trinity College, St. Stephens Green, and walking along the river Liffey. Trinity college is a beautiful campus with quite possibly the greenest grass I've ever seen. St. Stephens green was a very beautiful park especially since the leaves were starting to change colors. At night I did a backpackers ...

Got the 00:45 bus from Gailimh to Dublin airport. Passed buildings I ain't never seen before in mah life. They were like spaceships. What's going on? Also went through a tunnel. All very disconcerting to the sleep deprived mind.

Got to airport and it was lashing rain. Tried to be a REAL backpacker and sleep on the restaurant couches, but couldn't do it, so just gazed around with glazed eyes and freaked the awake people out a little bit.

Just ...

... Land of Opportunity," well it really was for the oppressed Irish. I mean sure, the Irish joke about Americans like everyone in the world jokes about Americans, but generally we're pretty well liked, and everyone has family somewhere in the States. The American Ambassador's residence is right near the Irish President's Residence, and it is nice and massive, as we'd see on the start of our Paddy Wagon tour the next day.

We stopped at a conveinence store/deli on the walk ...

... so much so that I couldn't tell whether he was being nice or about to rob me himself! But nothing happened in the end :) After checking into my hostel, I walked around for a bit and got some food at the grocery store. I just took it easy that night, had some pasta and did my laundry - I couldn't believe it though...it cost me 8 euros, which happens to be the best deal in Dublin! Ridiculously overpriced, but it had to be done. I met an Aussie girl named Anna ...

... we didnt go inside because the wait was way to long, but we did get pictures of the outside. jadyn and reagan would have loved it! then we traveled over to st patricks cathedral, which was dwarfed by all the previous cathedrals we have been to. we met up with a bunch of school kids at this viking gift shop, and we over heard a lot of them saying, "oh, look at it, thats wicked!" it reminded me of griffin :) we walked quite a distance to get to kilmainham gaol, an old, huge ...

... to wander back towards the Medieval Area to check out St. Patrick's Cathedral and the Dublin Castle (which i'm hoping to do the castle tour when mom and dad arrive on Wed). Then i found myself walking past many of the sights Sam had showed me on Sunday, so grabed a few pics of those as well Temple Bar Area & Garden of Rememberance. Got back to the hostel and one of my buddies ...

... further out to a place called Glendalough. A graveyard, yes that's right a graveyard hundreds of years old full of handmade gravestones and stone churches that date back to the 1600's. Again Courtney found that a bit spooky and ghostly, but it is one of the most visited places in Ireland simply for its historical attraction. The day was coming to an end by this stage, but we had to make it to the next local town. We didn't ...

... that they were on tour, showcasing material from their early albums, he was excited. Followed by gutted when he realised that all the local gigs had sold out. Followed by devious / excited when he noticed the Dublin gig and came up with the idea of a mid-week hop over, which he sold to me as a chance to visit a new European country. The gig was on a Wednesday night and I do feel a bit short-changed to have visited a city ...