Ireland

In Dublin's fair city, where the girls are so pretty, I first laid my eyes on sweet Molly Malone...

For Easter Lucy and I nipped across the ditch to see Ireland. Lucy went a few days before me and dropped in on Northern Ireland, which she might tell you about later.

The trip was just brilliant. Absolutely loved it. Ireland is a lot like New Zealand except the country side had more history and ruins and the cities are more European and exciting (in my humble opinion). The people were just as friendly and nice - plus they had cool accents!

The history was especially fascinating, it was really interesting hearing about the potato famine and what the English did to the Irish - all the more so because the stories they were telling directly affected my anscestors and thus my life. I'd thoroughly recommend a trip to Ireland if you've got some Irish in you.

I arrived on Holy Thursday and we had a look at the Guinness brewery (well, the shop anyway). We began our Paddy Wagon tour of the south on Good Friday. First stop was Clonmacnoise, which is a cemetery that was once a monks fortress. Spent the evening in Galway, but being Good Friday all the pubs were shut so we had a few in the hostel.

Saturday we stopped at a 3,000,000 year old farm on the west coast and went to the lovely cliffs of Moher which are freaking awesome. I was a dumb-ass and climbed over the railing (c'mon, everyone else was doing it) and wandered out to the edge - and almost fell off. Couldn't sleep that night cos I kept imagining falling off!



After a ride on some jaunting cars we spent the night Killarney, which was great, in authentic Irish bars drinking a nice pint of Guinness listening to jigs and what no before retiring to a very dodgy hostel.

Sunday we drove throught Cork, went to Blarney Castle and kissed the Blarney Stone. Stopped in a nice castle in Tipperary before getting back to Dublin.

Went to a useless Easter Sunday mass then went out pubbing. Found a fantastic hotel that had live Irish music and dancing. The dancing was just amazing. Wish I could see some more of it. Their feet move so quickly - apparently Michael Flatley can tap his feet 36 times in one second!! Anyway, we went to a few more pubs and clubs before heading home around 4am. We wanted to keep going, but according to the locals the only places left where the kind where "if you drop you wallet, you want to kick it home". Hmmm.