Dublin

It's real

Christ Church

       A quick 40 minute flight from Manchester brought us to Dublin a few weeks ago. The first thing that hit us was the hospitality and friendliness of the people we met on the trip. From the night we arrived and the driver of our bus cranked up "Can't Buy Me Love" and sang along, to the day we left and our bartender cracked jokes and poured the perfect Guinness, everyone treated us well. On our first day we did the standard city tour, seeing the castle, Temple Bar, Christ Church, Trinity College and basically the whole city. Dublin is a sprawling place, and while the center is easy to walk around buildings tend to go out rather than up. This makes things like the towers of Christ Church or the clock tower of the castle stand out really nicely.

Certified Whisky Tasters

    After the tour we hit the Jameson whiskey distillery. There we got to tour the grounds, hear the history and see how the whisky is made. Apparently the barley used to make Jameson is not roasted directly over a fire but in kind of a giant convection oven. This doesn't give it the smokey taste that scotch has, and since its triple distilled it has a cleaner, less sweet taste than Jack Daniels. I learned all of this because I was selected to be a whiskey taster at the end of our tour. Rather than blindfold us and have us guess they just gave us three shots of different whiskeys and told us why Jameson was the best, which it really was by a long shot.
    Dublin isn't like Paris or London in that it isn't a city famous for its landmarks. The Molly Malone statue and other sights are fun to got to, but people visit Dublin for the culture. What better way to experience this than with a pub crawl? We went with the same group that took us out for a city tour and we got to visit a lot of pubs including one that brewed its own beer on site. Our tour guide warned us not to attempt to drink like the Irish because we would fail. I think we came pretty close.

Glendalough

The next day I met up with Aunt Marie and Uncle Frank for a really nice day out in the country. We went to Glendalough in County Wicklow for a walk around amazing 6th century monastic ruins and a hike around the little lake nestled in the hills. The whole place was a large monastic community started by St. Kevin in the 500's, and many years later miners moved in to the farthest edge of the lake. It was beautiful and both Marie and Frank know their stuff about the area and it was great to hear them talk about all the history and stories they have. That night we went back to their house for one of my first home cooked meals in a long time. After thoroughly stuffing my face it was time sit with some tea and talk about the family history, the economic state of Ireland and number of other things. It was a great trip, and nice relaxing cap to my weekend in Dublin.

Uncle Frank and Aunt Marie

Edinburgh

    A few weekends ago I hit up Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland. The train only takes about 2 and a half hours from Lancaster and is relatively cheap. From how much I liked the city trips in the future might have to happen. Edinburgh feels more like a large town than a city, and retains more medieval charm than Prague. I arrived in the rain on Friday night and went out to the bars with some friends from Gettysburg and Abbe, a high school friend that offered to put me up for the weekend. It was a weekend of sleeping on the floor, but hey moneys tight and it was worth it to meet up with someone from home. I tried some of the famous Scottish whiskey and while I didn't experience the "citrus and vanilla undertones" described to me by the menu, it was actually pretty enjoyable.

Black Mausoleum

    The next day and for the rest of the weekend we had complete sunshine, it was great. We took a free tour of the city and got to see all the major sights. The main route in Edinburgh is called the Royal Mile, and its literally the mile between the castle (at the top of the hill) and royal palace, Holyrood House. The House is where the Queen stays when she is in Edinburgh. The tour took us everywhere, and interestingly enough into a graveyard. The Scots don't look at graveyards with the same stigma we do, and they are actually a popular place to picnic. This despite the fact that in the corner of the graveyard is most haunted place in Europe, the Black Mausoleum. This is the burial place of the man who basically butchered Scotland's Protestant population (Covenanters) and most of the hauntings were reported recently, as in they started in the 90's. This story sold us on taking the Haunted Edinburgh tour later that night, but more on that later. The tour took us through the graveyard and pointed out some of the interesting graves, including one of a man called McGonagall. Turns out J.K Rowling would frequent the graveyard and borrow the occasional name for the Harry Potter books, including Tom Riddle. We also saw the window at which she sat to write the books, the inspiration for Hogwarts and the cafe she wrote at.
      That night was the ghost tour of the city. It was perfect with a full moon and not a cloud in the sky. Of course we went to a graveyard but a different one, and we also hit up an entirely different side of the city than in the tour during the day. One of the places we went to was Calton hill, the site of various witch burnings and also an old Celtic site where faeries and demons could enter this world, it might have been cheesy but it was the perfect night for ghost stories anyway, plus the tour included a free pint at the end so, why not.

      The next day we toured the castle. It's more of a complex of buildings rather than one major central stronghold. It offered some of the best views of the city and a lot of history. We saw places where prisoners of war were kept, including American revolutionaries in the 1700's. Some of the doors had graffiti in the form of carved, early American flags. It was pretty cool. After that I hiked up Arthur's Chair, a mountain right on the edge of town that is in Holyrood Park. The hike was easy and you could see the sea as well as the entire city. It was a great walk and on the way down I stumbled upon the ruins of a 15th century chapel. It was a great cap to the trip.
      That night was my last in Edinburgh and Abbe and I went to a local pub to try haggis. Haggis is one the national dishes of Scotland and its basically crushed up sheep heart and lung, thats been boiled inside a sheep's stomach and then some herbs are thrown in. That aside, it was delicious. The pub had huge cushioned chairs and sitting there on a cold night was perfect. I would gladly go to Edinburgh again.