Swiss Alps

Svenja took Clayton and I to a town near Interlaken, Switzerland where we rode a train up to the top of a mountain and went for hike! It was amazing!

On the train...

We hiked to the top of that rock!

Who knew this was real- the cows all have bells- which fill the air with bell sounds for miles around them- and each cow has a different shaped bell, so the farmer will know which cow is missing. My dad can usually tell a cow's eartag number long before he can read it- so I would imagine it goes the same way with bell sounds!

Dublin

Final exams were on Friday morning, then Saturday morning some of us took the train to Dublin. I left Dublin on Sunday for Zurich, Switzerland. Dublin was a big city, and there were several people doing the map reading.... Patrick Pearse was a member of the IRB, and on Easter morning 1916, he read the declaration during the staged uprising against the British. The declaration claimed independence from Britain for all Irishmen and Irishwomen. The IRB had planned this uprising, but the British had intercepted some of the weapons that were supposed to be on the way to Ireland. Pearse read the declaration anyway! It tore Dublin apart, killing more civilians than IRB members or British troops, but Pearse was set on declaring independence! (I studied this period of Irish history for a week, so it was so cool to see where all of this finally happened!)

Kilmainham Gaol, this jail has been used for movies, and is still used for concerts because of the great acoustics. It was state of the art for it's time- the first jail to let in so much light- the designers believed it would help turn the prisoners into better people. All of the historical places I toured in Ireland had great guides- most were studying history and were really passionate about what they were doing!

The classic, must see, Temple Bar area...

There was really great music all over Temple Bar area and lots of people just sitting and listening!

English Market in Cork, i.e. the Omnivore's paradise!

I think the English market was my favorite place in all of Cork- so much fresh food. I have eaten surprisingly well this last month... I'm going to miss the fresh mozzarella, fruits, cheeses- all of it! When you walked into the market the smell was something you (or at least I) had to stomach at first as most of the meat was fresh, never frozen. So, you could get sheep liver from that morning, the lining of a sheep stomach, ANY part you can think of from a cow, or a pig, including the head, still holding form. I decided to not take pictures of that stuff. :) "The Omnivore's Dilemma" was a book that really changed the way I eat, and this market was great because if I did buy meat- and when I bought cheese- I knew exactly where it came from and in most cases the person helping you even knew the farmer!

Dingle Adventure!

Molly (in picture) and I rented bikes and cycled the Dingle Peninsula! It was about 30 miles, so we left on the first bus Saturday morning, and got to Dingle about 1:00 pm and rented bikes and we were off! We stopped a lot, to see views like this... That was the great thing about bikes rather than cars, the roads are so small, if you're driving a car you can really only stop where they have designated pull-offs.

We stopped at this beach! The water was so clear!

It was pretty cold, but people were still swimming!

Our lunch, blue cheese and wine! A wave swept up and tried to sweep it all away, but after a pair of wet shoes (Molly's) and lifting our cameras' in the air, everything survived...

We watched the sunset on a beach.

We though we'd save some money by not booking a hostel, so we found this place to sleep!

Positive: it was dry

Negative: concrete wasn't the most comfortable/ warm thing to sleep on

Positive: it was right next to the beach!

Positive: We saved $$$

Now I've done the homeless sleeping thing... Not too bad really- after biking 20 miles, I slept well, once I was able to fall asleep!

Inis Oirr

This is the smallest of the three Aran Islands, and we rented bikes to see what we could see... There are only 350 residents on this island, most still speak Irish. This is hard to find in Ireland today. During the Irish cultural revival, there were organizations put together just to teach the Irish how to speak and write in Irish again. It was like a way of regaining what they felt was lost (unwillingly to the British). So many who did speak Irish didn't remain after the famine (either died or emigrated) and because Catholics were the ones who spoke Irish (not the Protestants coming from Britain) and were being suppressed by the English, the language was really dying for a while. Now it's mandatory in school for students and all the signs are in both Irish (first) and English.

Cliffs of Mohr trip

There were a few pubs in Doolin (nearest town to the Cliffs of Mohr and Aran Islands) and it was the best live music I've heard since I've been in Ireland! I was ready to shell out 15 euro for a Cd of this group, but they don't have one! It's just a few men who like to get together and play- I'm thinking they could sell a few Cd's if they recorded one! There were several locals at this bar- there were a few traditional Irish songs they played that had the whole pub singing every word! This pub must have been past the number of people who were supposed to be allowed in the door, so I had trouble getting pictures, and I didn't want to expose the poor guys to my flash any more than I had to, but I got a few pictures... I'm going to try and upload a video, so we'll see if it works...

Kinsale and Charles Fort

It was Kinsale art week, so the tinted windows were to help with acoustics, I think. Apparently they have concerts in the fort...

Kinsale was a great little harbor town! It wasn't exactly sunny the day we were there, but at least it wasn't raining!