Galway Girls

The Cliffs of Moher and O'brien Tower!!

Going to Galway was quite the trip needless to say. It started out by me being startled awake at 7:30 because we had to leave at 8 to catch our bus. After only two hours of sleep I was literally a walking zombie attempting to navigate our way to Bus Eireann, and make it on time. We somehow got to our bus with just 5 minutes to spare. We are found our seats and I was instantly asleep. After about an hour Tricia and I traded seats because she had the back row, which was 5 seats all together so I was able to spread out and take a real nap. I definitely got some dirty looks from passengers who walked to the back to have a seat, and realized some obnoxious american was taking up all 5...oops.We finally arrived into Galway 4 1/2 hours later, got a bite to eat, and found a cab to take us to our Hostel. We gave the cab driver our address which we were told was about 15 miles outside the city, and the cab driver looked at us and said "you know this is about 40 minutes away".....uh no, we had no idea. After a 40 minute cab ride of what we like to call the scenic tour of the Irish country side, and 50 euro's later we arrived in a small town called Oughterard where out Hostel was. Our hostel was very cute and country like, and had a cute little old man running it. After getting settled in we walked into the small town of Oughterard and went to one of the 5 bars there called the Boat Inn. A live band started setting up, and we all became very excited. We thought "oh were in a small rural town way outside of a big city, maybe they will place actual Irish music for once". We were totally wrong. They played all the same American song we have heard at every other bar here and Galway Girl. We still enjoyed our time and sang along with every song.

One thing we found very surprising about this small town is how ostracized we felt. Most places we go to in Dublin when people hear that we are American they want to come up and talk to us. We figured it would be the same in Oughterard but it was the complete opposite. People would point at us, and we continuously heard peoples muffled voices saying "americans"...I have never felt so completely out of place in my life! After the band stopped playing we decided to move to another bar, in hopes that people might actually talk to us, and that there might be more people there our age. We were right about one thing. There were a lot more people there our age, but they too continued to point and whisper about the Americans in the corner. It wasn't until all the locals had plenty of drinks in them before they actually approached us. This very nice and cute soccer player named patty invited us back to the Boat Inn, because he said there was a really fun party going on over there. We weren't in the Boat Inn for more than 2 minutes, when we all started to look around and see signs and balloons that say 21 on them. We had just crashed some girls 21st birthday party. Oughterard, being a small town, everyone knows everyone! We stuck out like sore thumbs. Needless to say we didn't stay long. We made our way back to our hostel which was about a mile down an unlit road...so terrifying. We all got into our bed, which I'm pretty sure was made out of bricks and fell asleep.

The next morning we took another 50 euro cab ride back in to Galway to get on our tour bus to the Cliffs of Moher. As soon as the engine of the bus started Tricia and I fell asleep. We would then wake up every time the bus slowed down, because that probably meant we were either stopping to get off somewhere, or we were slowing down to take a picture of some historical sight. Our last stop was the Cliffs of Moher. The Cliffs of Moher were one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen. We spent over and hour there just taking pictures and marveling at them. After about two hours we got back on the tour bus, Tricia and I assumed the position and fell back asleep until we arrived back in Galway. After getting of the tour bus which stated at 10am, and it was now 6:30, we waited to get back on our bus to Dublin which was another 4 hour long bus ride. It felt so nice to be back in Dublin. Riding the bus back to Dublin I started to feel like I was actually going home. Tricia and I needed a full nights sleep because tomorrow is the 4th of July....and that only means 1 thing :]....Stupid Americans!