Ireland
Thursday the 20th was my first day in Ireland, EVER. I had been excited to go to Ireland for a very long time mostly because of growing up with movies like Darby O'Gill and the Little People, and from eating Lucky Charms.
Interestingly though, my first day in Ireland was not filled with Shamrocks and Leprechauns, but instead was filled with Crystal.
Waterford Crystal
We found the Waterford Crystal building, and took a tour.
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| Waterford Crystal Clock |
This was actually the second time I saw something like this on this trip. The first time was on Bornholm. Wait, what's that? Okay, sad story time:
There's an Island that belongs to Denmark, and it's off the coast of Sweden. It's called Bornholm, and we went there twice. The second time we went there, I took my camera but forgot to put the memory card in it, so I took picture on the camera's internal memory. About four months later, my phone was stolen. Therefore: no pictures of Bornholm, :-(
Sad story #2: After taking this next picture my camera's battery ran out, so no more pictures of Waterford. :-(
The crystal making process is pretty incredible. If you ever get a chance, so see something like this. This guy is twirling molten glass.
Day 2 in Ireland was Cobh, which is next to Cork, and it happens to be the final port of call for the Titanic, but more on that later.
Here's the first thing I saw after getting off the ship.
I try to carry some loose cash on me for when I video street performers, but I didn't do that on this day, so I felt bad and kept walking by this guy.
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| This church overlooks the water in Cobh. |
After the train to Cork, on the way to the bus station, I saw this sign and laughed.
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| Ah, ha ha. History jokes. |
And then we saw these cool things on the way to the bus station.
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| St. Patrick's House |
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| I found it! |
I have a suspicion that "St. Patrick's" in Ireland occurs as frequently as the word "First" does on American churches. (ex First Presbyterian Church, First Methodist Church).
After the bus ride to Blarney, we popped into the nearest restaurant because we were starving.
And it was Asian food.
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| No complaints here. |
Traditional Irish Asian Cooking
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| Or perhaps just Asian cooking. |
And then it was on to the Blarney Castle!
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| (It's only a model) |
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| New Rule: When you take your picture with a castle, you have to look the part. |
It gets even better when you start to climb the castle.
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| Arrow Slits! |
So here's the center of the castle, and we're at the top. If you can't tell by now, it's a really old castle ruin. I don't know much about it, other than it's really cool and over where all those people are gathered is the Blarney Stone. Supposedly, if you kiss it, you get the gift of gab. I've never been much of a talker, and I'm certainly not superstitious about anything (I'm OCD, there's a BIG difference!). But, nevertheless, I'm going to participate in this Blarney kissing thing, if for no other reason than to add to my catalog of life experience.
Video: Kissing the Blarney Stone
Alright, time to head out.
And go down these windy stairs...
with my friends. We can't forget them.
Wait! One last stop before getting back on the bus.
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| Finally doing something Irish. |
Five seconds later.
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| Okay, now I'm ready to go. |
Right, so like I started to say earlier, Cobh is famous for pretty much this one thing: It was the last port of call for the Titanic. Now, I get how that's kind of cool if you're passing through. But I'm on a ship. And my ship is going that same way. Maybe it's just that I'm still a novice sailor at this point, but this is something I don't want to think about as I say goodbye to land for many days.
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| How is this supposed to make me feel good? |
And then the cure for my anxiety came in the form of an Irish band giving us a traditional Mexican send off. Can I get a big WTF?
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