Blarney!

So the third leg of the trip is nearly done, as we jump onto another plane in about three hours. The bus ride from Dublin to Cork was relatively awesome (moreso than Cork itself, unfortunately). Ireland is an unbelievably beautiful country: it is so green it is ridiculous, and there is something about passing an occasional rundown castle that simply blows your mind, and not just because it looks like they filmed all the Highlander movies here.

Cork has been... relaxing, mainly because we couldn't really figure out what to do. This is the problem with doing no research before showing up somewhere, although it is probably good that we only decided to stay here for a day. As we were taking the bus to Blarney, it finally came to me that I maybe should have asked Sarah what she did during the year she lived here in college. But that would have made too much sense.

We made it to Blarney Castle today. The castle is about 8 kilometers outside of Cork. The walk from the village to the castle is awesome, as you pass over a creek or three and through some huge green fields, and then there's this thousand-year-old castle. A lot of history over here, you might say. I am awestruck when walking through New York or Philadelphia and looking at 300-ish-year-old buildings, and then I come over here and see castles and parapets and bridges and churches that were built right around when my great-grandparents-to-the-fifteenth-degree were my age.

The Irish like their quotes, probably because they have a ridiculous history of writers and poets, and somehow I have managed to give Cameron a literary tour of Ireland without him knowing it (or me planning it). We went on the literary pub crawl, then found ourselves on the top floor of the Guinness Storehouse surrounded by Joyce quotes, and then get to the top of Blarney Castle and there is a fantastic, humble quote from George Bernard Shaw, whose house was right down the block from where we stayed in Dublin: "....it is not necessary for me to seek eloquence at Blarney....my natural gifts in that direction being sufficient, if not somewhat excessive." I love Irish people.

After the castle, Cameron and I stopped at a quaint little coffee shop with a backyard garden enclosed by what was probably a 500-year-old stone wall (I base that on the unsupported fact that everything in Ireland is pretty much 500 years old.). It was overcast, finally (after two sunny, 75-degree days in Dublin, I was beginning to wonder if we were actually really in Ireland). The gray arrived today. It's about damn time.

Hanging out with some Corkers

Not sure what else to call the people from Cork. Cork is much smaller and more behaved than Dublin. Our bus ride was amazingly green and uneventful. We walked around Cork about 5 or 6 times before eating in a hotel and then going out for drinks after.

We somehow found a pub that had 2.90 pints until 9pm. They also played the entire Metallica album while we were there. We had a number of pints. I also tried to branch out and have something besides Guinness; shit. I tried some stupid Cider. This is why I don't try new things. So, after a number of pints (I think we bought them 2 at a time) we went back to our super posh hotel. This morning we saw Blarney Castle and the stone and then had some coffee in a super nice little shop.

Tonight we meet up with the Villas, and if we are lucky one more football match. I am sure that Villa has been checking for it. Also, my cord is packed away, so I will have to post pics later. I did draw one...

Slainte

T-minus one hour until we take a long, hopefully scenic bus ride to Cork. Dublin was a trip. There was a lot of Guinness involved, including a trip to the storehouse. They have a pretty good setup there. Charge for roughly three-and-a-half Guinness and grant one free Guinness when you reach the finish line. Although you do get seven free James Joyce quotes at the top of the building, so that's a plus.

Some other thoughts on Guinness: in the mid-80s into the 90s, they used Rutger Hauer as the "Man with the Guinness" for ads all over the UK. I wish they had used them in the US, too, because he is awesome, and those ads must have been incredibly creepy.

We caught some Irish music at Temple Bar last night, and it gave me some insight into the thought process of non-Americans towards the US (note: this insight is not insightful). First, the band asked if there were any Americans in the room. Then they said they were going to play us a tune. To that point, they had dropped in a Dylan song between every three or four Irish jigs, but this time they busted out with something called "Erie Canal." I would wager that most Americans don't know where the hell that is. Cameron is one of them. He thought it was in Indiana, which is an understandable mistake given the epic 1990s television show, "Eerie, Indiana." Also, Cameron is an idiot.

I have a couple of other belated things to post (mainly because I have been reprimanded for not having covered these before. Peer pressure is a bitch.).

Firstly, for everyone's pleasure and amusement: I was nearly attacked by a Spanish schoolgirl while riding my bike in Barcelona. I'll go into more detail, even though that is probably enough for you. I was at the front of the bike tour pack when we passed through an alley full of schoolchildren, all of whom started laughing and pointing at us. And then one girl, rather feisty for having been born in 1997 or so, wheeled up her leg and took aim at my front tire. Fortunately, I had the presence of mind to steal Mike's patented bunny hop and swerve into the wall. This pretty much served no purpose other than to allow the children to laugh and point more.

Now then. Food. We'll just speed through the London portion of the trip. As Mike said last week, he was disappointed with the McDonalds chicken mcnuggets, and when you are A) going to McDonalds in the first place and B) complaining about the food, it's not a good sign. I later accidentally ordered a ham and cheese sandwich on sliced white bread, which cost me something like $5. I was less than pleased. English food sucked.

Moving on to Barcelona... tapas, paella (I have absolutely no idea if i spelled that right), gelato, rabbit and snail (everyone criticized me for eating rabbits because they are cute, but I do not care; it's not like they're going endangered. Contrarywise, one place we went to had large and small "sea cow claws" on the menu. Reading that hurt my soul.). But my favorite part was that we were around the block from an open-air market, so we got croissants and fresh fruit and nifty smoothie things for breakfast every morning. Spanish food was good.

Irish food has been like English food, but less terrible. And when you count Guinness as a food, we have had like 15 meals a day. We have also happily discovered that they know what coffee is here, though. It is not espresso. Or espresso. Or espresso.

To Cork!

Finally, Ireland

I would have never guessed I was here unless it started raining, which it did, last night. The weather has been perfect, warm, and sunny. Today it is overcast and the kind of Ireland I have been expecting. I am leaving on a bus for Cork in about an hour and will get to see the countryside.

There isn't much to do in Dublin but drink, and we did that just fine. Last night we saw a live band at the Temple Bar which was a lot of fun. We did a mandatory tour of the Guinness Factory and saw the book of Kells. If you ever get a chance to see it, know that while impressive, they did not know how to use perspective so the art isn't the best. Trinity College is the real treat here in Dublin and like I said there isn't much to do but drink.

I don't have many pictures, just some videos of the band. The problem is they are too large to upload so imagine if you could an extremely crowded place with everyone singing along in their best voice, or maybe just their loudest.

Well off to cork and some castles and rocks you can kiss.

cheers

Christy is Evil, and Cameron is a Year Older

Dear Mike and Christy,

Cameron and I made it to Ireland relatively unscathed, despite the best efforts of Christy to get everyone unexpectedly trashed that last night in Barcelona. I hope you two hurt as much as Cameron and I did when we went to the airport yesterday. Nonetheless, I am suffering from separation anxiety and am counting the minutes until we complain together about another bland serving of fish and chips.

I am having flashbacks to my Dublin trip almost five years ago, when Jacob somehow convinced me that I should ante up and spend some money for possibly the first time in my life. We are staying about four blocks south of St Stephen's Green and Trinity, which is where Jake studied. I don't know how the hotel thing has worked out for you in Paris, but Dublin has kept alive our streak of ridiculously well-located hotels. Mike, you'd love it: the longest walk so far has been for about 15 minutes.

Anyhow, it's 11:30 a.m., high time to go get another drink. Yesterday we went on the literary pub crawl, and today we are hitting up the Guinness factory. And, in the worst of worst-case scenarios, Cameron managed to win second-place in a trivia contest last night during the pub crawl. His well-timed guess that Samuel Beckett was the only of four Irish authors to be on a national sports team meant that he won a mini-bottle of Jameson, which will probably mean bad things for me.

hugs and kisses,
matt

I feel sorry for England.

Ireland is outstanding. Just like Barcelona the girls are amazingly beautiful. I feel really sorry for poor London. I didn't see one cute girl there. Barcelona has too many of them and I couldn't keep track. Ireland is full of girls I could marry today. The weather here is perfect and we are located right in the middle of everything important.

Today is my birthday and I will be spending it having as many pints as I can. We are going to see the Book of Kells after this and then off to the Guinness factory. Last night was outstanding since we went on a literary tour (pub crawl) that was a lot of fun. I ended up winning myself some Jameson and just coming up short for the grand prize t-shirt. I was also able to sit down and read in the park for a hour or two yesterday. Ireland is just what I needed at this point. Matt and I having a well poured Guinness during the tour. I also had a video, but it is 10mb. It is of the tour guide playing U2 with our group, which include 30 danish kids that knew all the words. genius.

One more thing. On our last night in Barcelona we got wasted with two people from Liverpool. Christy was the instigator; curse her. I was so hungover on the way to the airport.

I Ride Bike Good.

I think I last rode a bike in 2003, although I am probably forgetting something in New York. Remembering how to ride a bike was much easier this time than that time, when I almost fell off while trying to get on. And to think, I used to be good at it.

We went on a 3ish-hour bike tour around Barcelona today. Our guide was an enthusiastic woman who never told us her name but did give us some pretty neat historical information, including a lot that essentially proved wrong all the wild theories we had come up with during our self-guided tour yesterday. We covered a lot of the same ground, but this time it did not involve walking through 18 miles of Metro connector tunnels. We also saw a bunch of new stuff, including the Arc de Triomph and the Parc de la Ciutadella, which had an amazing fountain. We found out that a lot of the shorefront hadn't existed before the Barcelona Olympics, which means that there were not a lot of unfortunately naked people on the beaches before the Barcelona Olympics. And we saw a ton more Gaudi, because his stuff is everywhere. And insane. And awesome. Although I would have nightmares if I lived in any of his houses.

Perhaps most miraculously, none of us got hit by (or ran into) a car, bike, pedestrian, dog, scooter, or building, despite the fact that the traffic lights were absolutely impossible to figure out, although Cameron did manage to lose the group immediately after the ride. And on the way from the Park to the Sagrada Familia, I almost found myself left behind, as I was engrossed in a very deep metaphysical conversation with a guy from Sweden and a girl from Seattle. We were discussing the NBA playoffs; he had played for a Swedish basketball league, and she had played college basketball, and I played in grammar school and read a lot of espn.com. These are the things that bring people together (or apart, if we're talking about the rest of the bikers).

Tomorrow, Dublin! I may be forced to drink whiskey (Cameron has already stated that that is one thing he wants for his birthday. Another thing he wants is his Marissa Miller magazine, which Christy has not yet returned. Another thing he wants is a pony.) Oher people on this trip seem to want me to be more entertaining. I think that by "entertaining" they mean they want to see me do something photo/blog-worthy, like run head-first into a pole or hitchike or order Jameson and ginger ale for the entire bar or say something grammatically or common-sensically incorrect, like, "I don't want no euros." I do not know how they get these ideas into their heads.